Bob Marley's Fifty Best Songs
Rolling Stone, last year, put out a Bob Marley Special Collectors Edition, the cover emblazoned with the same photo that adorned the August 12, 1976 “Rastaman With A Bullet” edition – Bob with his Gibson Les Paul strapped over his shoulder, arms outstretched, biceps long and taut, dreadlocks flying, face rent in the ecstasy of genius that can’t be hidden even in a posed shot. It’s Bob as we like to remember him, fit and healthy and brimming with life, animated with the spiritual beauty of a man who knew where he was going and where he was from. A One-Love warrior with a quiver full of Zeus-class thunderbolts to sling at Babylon’s raasclot wickedness.
Rolling Stone claims this to be the “ultimate guide to [Bob’s] music and legend.” Yet one is astounded by the Gilmore article “How Bob Marley Changed the World”—which is otherwise very good—for its unfathomable exclusion of albums Exodus chronologically through to Confrontation—including the masterful Survivor—from Bob’s “essential” opus for wearing “much of their resistance” in their titles, claiming only a “deep sorrow about them” offsets their “prettiness.” Neither does Gilmore drive home his title thesis that Bob changed the world. Bob did change the world—but more on that later.
A centerpiece of the Collectors Edition is its ranking of Bob’s Fifty Greatest Songs. The list too falls short. Ordinarily one doesn’t quibble with another’s favorite songs, but when it comes to a revolutionary symbol like Marley and the category is greatest songs, Rolling Stone as the presumed high authority carries the onus of getting it right. One fairly expects Rolling Stone to show the world exactly why Bob is as great as we believe him to be. So let’s check their list.
The Rolling Stone list:
1 Get Up Stand Up 2 No Woman No Cry 3 Redemption Song 4 Trenchtown Rock 5 I Shot the Sheriff 6 Concrete Jungle 7 Positive Vibration 8 Buffalo Soldier 9 Natural Mystic 10 Soul Rebel 11 Roots Rock Reggae 12 Stir It Up 13 Lively Up Yourself 14 No More Trouble 15 Them Belly Full 16 Kaya 17 Small Axe 18 Burnin’ and Lootin’ 19 Sun Is Shining 20 Slave Driver 21 Selassie is the Chapel 22 Put It On 23 African Herbsman 24 Duppy Conqueror 25 Crazy Baldhead 26 Simmer Down 27 Bad Card 28 One Love 29 Natty Dread 30 Nice Time 31 Waiting In Vain 32 Exodus 33 Is This Love 34 Could You Be Loved 35 Three Little Birds 36 Stand Alone 37 Jamming 38 Caution 39 Guava Jelly 40 So Much Things To Say 41 Bend Down Low 42 Zimbabwe 43 Fussing and Fighting 44 Kinky Reggae 45 War 46 Night Shift 47 Midnight Ravers 48 Punky Reggae Party 49 Lick Samba 50 Rebel Music
These are all great songs. If Bob’s musical oeuvre were a big bowl of spaghetti and it were thrown in a mad tizzy against the wall, whatever stuck would be a masterpiece. You’d want to scoop it onto a plate and enjoy it with Parmesan and a nice glass of Chianti. So what’s the problem? The problem is that Rolling Stone’s list doesn’t tell the whole story, doesn’t give full measure to a man who for so many reasons was and remains a true world hero. Bob Marley deserves to be seen in full epiphany.
Marley songs must be ranked not only as music that knocks your socks off but for their conscious lyrics as well. This is a man who has arguably come to be the revolutionary hero and symbol of freedom and human dignity in the world today, Che Guevara rolled up with Mandela and Martin Luther King and ganja fumes in your face. It follows then that one cannot discuss Bob Marley’s music without giving an account of whom and what the revolution is against and exactly who and what it is that keeps people from being free, prosperous and at peace. Burnin’ and Lootin’ and Get Up Stand Up are songs of resistance against something and that something needs to be named and fleshed out; this isn’t ivory tower philosophy. It isn’t enough, as per Gilmore, to acknowledge Bob’s magnificent portraits of the living hell of a Third World ghetto. Only by plunging into Bob’s history and times do we get a clear sense of what the struggle and music is all about, where it begins: with the West’s long history of abusing, plundering, destabilizing, robbing and murdering the peoples of the Third World—continuing since the end of colonialism in the form of neoliberal economics, “free trade,” structural adjustment, corporate greed, CIA destabilization and drone attacks, usurious international bank loans, self-interested “aid” and military intervention (or the threat thereof). Failure to acknowledge this is to view Marley with sociopolitical blinders and weakens if not negates any attempt to gauge the depth of his work. This is true as well of the recent Marley documentary film.
Consider a number of crucial or near-crucial songs that didn’t make their list, alongside songs that in effect “bumped” them:
Crucial/near-crucial omissions – (Bumped by)
Wake Up and Live — (Stand Alone) So Much Trouble in the World — (Lick Samba) The Heathen — (Guava Jelly) Africa Unite — (Night Shift) Trench Town — (Kinky Reggae) Running Away — (Fussing and Fighting) Ambush in the Night — (Bend Down Low) High Tide or Low Tide — (Caution) Guiltiness — (Punky Reggae Party) Top Ranking — (Lively Up Yourself) Rat Race — (Three Little Birds) Survival/Black Survivor — (Nice Time) Forever Loving Jah — (Bad Card) Zion Train — (Simmer Down) Johnny Was — (Sun Is Shining) Rainbow Country — (Small Axe) Babylon System — (Midnight Ravers)
These omitted songs can be broken into thematic groups (loosely-defined and highly interconnected):
First Group: Struggle in the Third World
So Much Trouble in the World – Rat Race – Survival (Black Survivor) – Babylon System – Ambush in the Night – Top Ranking – Guiltiness.
These seven songs, all highly listenable, paint a powerful portrait along relatively global lines of what the struggle is all about.
“Some people got everything some people got nothing… in this age of technological inhumanity scientific atrocity atomic mis-philosophy nuclear mis-energy it’s a world that forces lifelong insecurity” (Survival / Black Survivor)
And:
“See them sailing on their ego trip blast off on their space ship million miles from reality no care for you no care for me” (So Much Trouble in the World)
Bob goes on to tell us that the people carrying out these atrocities are not renegades and rogues but the best and brightest the West can offer, shining stars in its pantheon of heroes, stamped-out alumni of institutions of global enslavement, mass produced by the churning wheels of the system:
“Babylon system is a vampire… graduating thieves and murderers sucking the blood of the children continually” (Babylon System)
In Ambush in the Night Bob shines a light on the more subtle of their methods:
“so they bribing with their guns, spare parts and money… through political strategy they keep us hungry”
Top Ranking elucidates the all-important role of divide-and-rule:
“they don’t want to see us live together all they want us to do is keep on killing one another Top Ranking, are you skanking?”
A “top ranking” refers to a ghetto warlord, but it is clear that Bob is really calling out Mister Big, the politicians and planners, whether they be in Jamaica or the West.
“these are the big fish who always try to eat down the small fish… they would do anything to materialize their every wish” (Guiltiness)
Not for a second does Bob miss the geo-political implications:
“Rasta don’t work for no CIA” (Rat Race)
A One-Love Revolutionist, Bob would turn his cheek only so far.
“we’ve been trodding on your winepress much too long, rebel, rebel” (Babylon System)
Second Group: Mean Streets
These songs that did not make RS’s list take a more intimate, street-level look at suffering in the lives of the people. Here we have: Trench Town – Johnny Was – Pimper’s Paradise – Coming In From the Cold – High Tide or Low Tide
Few songs from any genre or era are as emotionally powerful as Bob’s Trench Town, a real place with a real history and flesh-and-blood people beaten down by society but defended by Bob with every ounce of his strength:
“in desolate places we find our bread and everyone sees what’s taking place another page in history”
This is so elemental, so right on, it’s astonishing. Year after year, decade after decade, the same atrocities and injustices occur and re-occur in the so-called “developing world:” famine, environmental degradation, habitat loss, political strife and more. Yet year after year, decade after decade, the same policies and practices in the West that cause or exacerbate these problems are only intensified before the god of corporate profits. All eliciting hardly more than a collective shrug of resignation that, yes, sigh, the system is messed up and tragic, but this is just the way it is, so forget about it and get on with your life of privilege. Bob won’t stand for it:
“can anything good come out of Trench Town? that’s what they say say we’re the underprivileged people so they keep us in chains pay, pay tribute to Trench Town”
In Johnny Was, life and death on the streets unfolds before our very eyes:
“woman hold her head and cry ‘cuz her son had been shot down in the street and died from a stray bullet / just because of the system”
What incredibly brilliant lyrics. We get the idea that Johnny was killed by a bullet meant for another. Bob is acknowledging the fact that an oppressive system creates an expanding ripple of evil that might not be discernible at first glance, in the initial wave of body counts and casualties. Citizens tyrannized by a brutal regime tend to take their frustration and anger out on each other, a pattern that may continue long after the regime has gone and be dismissed by commentators as, for example, hooliganism and “black on black crime.” Caring not who fired the bullets, still the mothers suffer, as Johnny Was brilliantly tells:
“can a woman’s tender care, she cried cease for the child she bear?”
In Pimper’s Paradise, again Bob examines a universal problem in the tragedy of a single person, this time a woman driven to desperate measures just to get by:
“a pimper’s paradise that’s all she was now… don’t lose track of yourself, oh no don’t be a stock on the shelf”
Bob doesn’t just blame the system for all evils and leave it there. Echoing Marcus Garvey’s wisdom, Bob challenges his brothers and sisters to take responsibility for themselves and get it together, despite the oppression and struggle:
“would you let the system get inside your head again, no, man, no would you let the system make you kill your brother man no, dread, no” (Coming In From the Cold)
In the achingly beautiful High Tide or Low Tide, Bob pleads for children to be brought up with love and tender care and moral guidance:
“said I heard my mother she was crying in the night and the words that she said still lingers in my head she said a child is born in this world he needs protection Lord guide and protect us when we’re wrong please correct us”
Third Group – The Spiritual World
These omissions are some of Bob’s most explicitly spiritual songs: Forever Loving Jah – Zion Train – (and in an Old-Testament kind of way) The Heathen.
“so Old Man River don’t cry for me I’ve got a running stream of love you see… everything in life got its purpose find a reason in every season” (Forever Loving Jah)
Zion Train, often passed over in discussion of Bob’s greatest songs, contains lyrics of brilliance:
“which man can save his brother’s soul… don’t gain the world and lose your soul wisdom is worth more than silver and gold”
In The Heathen, Bob delivers militant fire-and-brimstone lyrics in vocals as dread as anything he’s ever done—as anyone’s ever done—that send chills down your spine:
“rise O fallen fighters rise and take your stance again he who fights and run away live to fight another day”
We might pay note in this grouping also to Ambush in the Night, Bob’s musical thanks to Jah for keeping him and everybody else in the house alive after the December 3, 1976 attempted massacre at 56 Hope Road:
“through the powers of the Most High we keep on surfacing, keep on surviving”
Fourth Group: Living Up-ful and Right
This is less a grouping than a theme sprinkled liberally throughout Bob’s work in which he takes on the role of elder brother and psychological counselor to the youth and advises the struggling and downpressed how to keep on keeping on. Examples are many, including Coming In From The Cold and Zion Train, as previously cited, and Wake Up and Live, the backbone of what Marley biographer Stephen Davis considers—rightly, I believe—Bob’s best album, Survival.
“rise ye mighty people there’s work to be done so let’s do it little by little flee from hate, mischief and jealousy don’t bury your thought put your vision to reality…” (Wake Up and Live)
In Why Should I, a song that might eke its way onto the tail end of the golden fifty, Bob encourages optimism, tenacity, perseverance:
“The old world has ended the new world has just begun and all the people that live therein shall live on and on… why should I hang down my head and cry?”
Fifth Group: Unity
These songs deal with the all-important theme of Unity, the only way to defeat this “holy Armageddeon.” Songs include Keep On Moving, Zimbabwe and Africa Unite. Musically, Keep On Moving may not match the early deep roots songs, but it has its brilliance:
“I know someday we’ll find a piece of land somewhere not nearby Babylon the war will soon be over and Africa will unite the children who live late in darkness have seen the great light”
Some versions of Keep On Moving contain a very sweet and charming verse where Bob is communicating with his family from afar; it goes a long way to illustrating Bob’s human side as a devoted and loving family man:
“I’ll send you a check through the post though you did not get the first I’ll send another to quench your thirst… tell Ziggy I’m fine and to keep Cedella in line”
On the topic of Unity, Africa Unite is both primer and advanced text:
“how good and how pleasant it would be before God and man to see the unification of all Africans”
It touches upon the idea of repatriation, a dream long dear to Bob’s heart:
“cuz we’re moving right out of Babylon and we’re going to our Father’s land”
It shows Bob’s respect for the ancestors:
“Africa you’re my forefathers’ cornerstone…”
And heralds the wisdom of Unity in real-life terms:
“unite for the benefit of your people unite for the benefit of your children”
Finally it connects Old World and New:
“unite for the Africans abroad unite for the Africans a yard”
Zimbabwe, on RS’s list but ranked much too low, touches upon the theme of Unity at a basic human, even biological level:
“divide-and-rule could only tear us apart in every man’s chest there beats a heart”
Zimbabwe rivals Get Up Stand Up as one of the most important songs of revolution ever written, with the added weight that in this case Bob was singing about a real ongoing blood-and-guts revolution, his words giving solace and inspiration to freedom fighters opposing racist rule throughout southern Africa.
Final Thoughts
Bob Marley was first and foremost a man of God in the best sense, a devout disciple and in some sense a prophet. He was a sufferah who pulled himself up by the sweat of his brow while remaining compassionate toward those trapped by a wicked system. He was a keen observer of the evils of Babylon, both on the streets of Kingston and in the world at large. A shrewd social critic, he cried at the top of his lungs against injustice and abuse of power. Rita put it most eloquently when she remarked that when Bob was singing he was fighting a war. A revolutionary who sang of taking up arms as the “only way to solve our little trouble” (Zimbabwe), he was always guided by Jah’s righteousness, not in some esoteric philosophical way but from the depths of his heart, a heart filled with humanity, generosity and wisdom. He packaged this all into some of the greatest lyrics ever written and more than a few of the most fabulous musical performances the world has ever seen.
Bob Marley did change the world – not by destroying or even directly weakening the vampires and hypocrites who run things but by giving strength and hope to I and I, child of Africa and Babylon alike, helping us to discern Truth from Falsity, to stand up for what is right and to walk in accord with the One Love vibe, as true a spiritual message as has ever blessed this earth.
I submit the following list of Bob’s Fifty Best Songs for your consideration. RS’s rankings are in parentheses.
1 Get Up Stand Up (1) 2 Zimbabwe (42) 3 Exodus (32) 4 Concrete Jungle (6) 5 Wake Up and Live (–) 6 So Much Trouble In The World (–) 7 War (45) 8 Positive Vibration (7) 9 The Heathen (–) 10 Them Belly Full (But We Hungry) (15) 11 Crazy Baldhead (25) 12 Natural Mystic (9) 13 No Woman No Cry (2) 14 Slave Driver (20) 15 Trench Town Rock (4) 16 Burnin’ and Lootin’ (18) 17 Africa Unite (–) 18 Waiting In Vain (31) 19 No More Trouble (14) 20 Trench Town (–) 21 Stir It Up (12) 22 Running Away (–) 23 So Much Things To Say (40) 24 Ambush In the Night (–) 25 High Tide or Low Tide (–) 26 Guiltiness (–) 27 Redemption Song (3) 28 Soul Rebel (10) 29 Top Ranking (–) 30 Rat Race (–) 31 I Shot the Sheriff (5) 32 Jamming (37) 33 Is This Love (33) 34 Survival/Black Survivor (–) 35 Natty Dread (29) 36 Forever Loving Jah (–) 37 Zion Train (–) 38 Johnny Was (–) 39 Rainbow Country (–) 40 Babylon System (–) 41Time Will Tell (–) 42 Put It On (22) 43 Rebel Music (50) 44 Could You Be Loved (34) 45 Keep On Moving (–) 46 Pimper’s Paradise (–) 47 Coming in From the Cold (–) 48Turn Your Lights Down Low (–) 49 Satisfy My Soul (–) 50 Why Should I (–)
