When I was a part of the Uhuru Movement here in Oakland Ca, back in the late 1980s, I was introduced to alot of powerful protest music, and most of it was Roots Reggae. I was already familiar with Bob Marley, since his hit Roots, Rock, Reggae was played “on the R and B” here in California, U.S. But I started getting a fuller understanding of the power of this roots music as I was exposed to other artists. This black liberation music taught me alot about who I am and the struggle that I find myself in. It also taught me that I and all black people should be involved in the fight. Get in where you fit in!
There was one album that stood out for me. It was titled, “Liberation” by Bunny Wailer, who was one of the original members of Bob Marley and the Wailers. In the beginning they were simply called The Wailers. But stuff happens, and eventually they separated and Bob Marley became the most well known and famous of the three, which included Peter Tosh.
Every song on the Liberation album is powerful and spoke to our struggle as black people! I especially like “Rise and Shine”. The song is classic for the bassline intro alone, but the beginning chant (lyrics below) along with that powerful bassline ought to move you! I remember how this music encouraged me and propelled me to continue struggling for black liberation and my own mental freedom!
I’m wondering, is this type of powerful liberation music still being made anymore?
This is the cry of a people
who were robbed and raped from their homeland
and their loved ones.
A people stripped of their culture,
their dignity, their liberty and their rights
and by the cruel and presumptuous
hands of the colonial and imperialistics slavers
were cargoed into the west,
where for over 400 years they have toiled and laboured,
and with their blood, their sweat, them tears and hands
they have built the great city of Babylon,
only to be paid with the wages of the taskmaster’s whip,
torture and death. continue
Then the lyrics to Bunny’s song “Ready When You Ready” is another powerful one, speaking directly to the people about revolution of the shitstem.
Hey!
Mi ready when you ready fi go chant down Babylon, dutty system.
Mi ready when you ready fi go lick down Babylon, in a rhythm.
Mi ready when you ready fi go tear down Babylon.
Mi ready when you ready fi go mash down Babylon.Them nah do it like how dem say dem plan
dem just a dash it out dey in a foreign land.
A hungry nation is a angry one
and it is bound to cause a revolution.
Power struggle a bubble it a bubble
and starvation is on the double.
The ghetto children don’t seem to stand a chance
instead of opportunity it’s self reliance. cont.
As the last surviving member of the original Wailers, Bunny Wailer is that unsung giant of the black liberation struggle. He’s only 63 years young and is still fighting through his music. One Love!
A Luta Continua!
afrospear.wordpress.com 
Hi Anna Renee,
You said “I’m wondering, is this type of powerful liberation music still being made anymore?”
Yes, one of my favorite people now is Luciano and I think his song No Evil was the best song of the past decade..”Where are the eyes that don’t want to see evil and the ears that don’t want to hear it…” Thats just one song.
Another is Jah Mason “Oh what an offer you nah see Jah gave us life, free without cost, priceless without price. What an offer you nah see Jah gave us life give thanks unto the Black Christ…”
I will be posting one of Queen Ifrica’s songs on my site some time today, I hope you come by and check it out.
Here some other artistes that are continuing the liberation stuggle via song today.
Ray Darwin, I Wayne, Chuck Fenda, Etana, Queen Ifrica, Anthony B, Jr. Kelly, Richie Spice, and Pressure Busspipe just to name a few.
I think the main difference between what Bob Marley, Bunny Wailer, Burning Spear, U Roy and the Abysinnians and others of the time did is how they express the lyrics. Today, most of the artistes of sing or dj in full on Patwa (patois) when the older artistes were attempting to push the music world wide they did not do this.
I love Queen Ifrica, Anthony B and Luciano! Thanks for the names of these conscious reggae artists!
one luv fi tru!
See, now that’s what the Afrospear is about for me!! 😉
I wrote that fully expecting that the answer would be NO! But then my coat is pulled and I find out the answer is YES, YES, ans YES!! That is good news!!!
OK Yes Imma come on over there and check it out! As for African Americans not listening because of patois, when I was younger there’s no way that I would let not knowing Jamaican patois stop me from listening to MY roots music!
And this: I used to work at the Berkeley Flea Market, which was an open market where all manner of black folks, and other races of folks sold all manner of things, in what was and is the parking lot of the Ashby Bay Area Rapid Transit station. BART.
I did a post about this experience at the Black Culture blog. This construct of black people of every nation was the closest thing to heaven that I ever experienced!! The blacks were in the majority and the white people were comfortable with it!!! 😉
Anyway, reggae was and is the #1 music there, with rap and soul in second place. So its sure that the African Americans there learned to understand patois–all it takes is listening and learning from context of what is being said–at least thats how it works for me.
And now Im learning another “patois” Nigerian pidgin English. This patois go kill me O!! Let’s learn each others “patois”! My Nigerian husband already learned African American “patois” !! OK Im rambling.
Excellent commentary! Bob and Peter are the more well known of the original Wailers, but Bunny’s music is also very powerful! The music they did together was revolutionary when it first came out. I remember as a little boy in Jamaica, they were seen as rebels and their music and “look” was considered subversive. They got no love from the majority of Jamaicans, nor radio play for that matter from the establishment.
Bunny has always been a deeply conscious and spiritual brother. He has always taken an uncompromising and unwavering stand when it comes the black liberation struggle. The man is “strictly roots” as we Jamaicans like to say!
Thanks for this! It will be this week’s “sat’day riddymz”.
The most hurtful thing is most Black Americans refuse to listen this music because the artistes are singing or djing in patwa (patois). It’s wicked because we are missing some of the best music that’s bringing uplift and consciousness to our brain waves and most of us won’t listen. Then I see videos of white Europeans and Asians, some don’t speak a lick of English, singing the patwa lyrics back to the artistes during a concert in Japan, Germany, France, Sweden or Poland. This is horrible. I go and visit home (San Diego) and put on some Jah Mason the people tell me they can’t listen. WTF!!! So much of this music should be played on mainstream radio but as we know, you can have hella sales in Europe, but to blow up you need U.S. sales and we are backwardly holding the music back by not listening and buying the “good good.” Then complaing there is no good music out there.
There’s a song by Burning Spear called “Greetings” where he sings–
“One thing I don’t understand, why so many black people in America, have no intention, have no respect for their culture. BUT anyway, I-man love I-man black brethren in America! I-man love I-man black sistren in America!”
That lyric made me feel some kind of way! I thank God that I worked in a major library, and an old angry black revolutionary brother came in looking for a book of black history that was hidden in the closed reference stacks. When I found that book for him, I also found alot of other obscure black history books, like J.A. Rogers Africa’s Gift to America. My eyes were opened to “my history and culture”
But anyway, now I can answer Burning Spear–I think that African Americans are the most culturally oppressed because of where we are–in this super culture called America, that dominates by sheer force, not only African Americans here, but many peoples the world over! But my answer is to not give up on African Americans, it takes more time to get through all the mental conditioning that’s going on even more so up until this very hour–even with the suppression of real hiphop music–It’s not so much that we are holding the music back ourselves but that the music is being suppressed and we arent used to it, because we never hear it on a regular basis. I think you spoke to that in that piece with Wise Intelligent. African Americans may be in a deep cultural sleep, (in some ways) but with a hard hard shake, we can be woke up my brother!!! The struggle continues! Peace
LOL …Anna Renee, I think you and I are exceptions to the rule. For real!
And I love the post!!!
Im listening to Boderation, and that sounds like Peter Tosh!! Boderation is a new discovery for me. Is that Peter Tosh?
I just listened to it myself. It definitely sounds like Bunny.
The most hurtful thing is most Black Americans refuse to listen this music because the artistes are singing or djing in patwa (patois).
It may be a matter of taste, not the language. Music is very personal.
It is also not like American Blacks didn’t have sophisticated music or culture either. The circumstance here created consciousness, didn’t need music to instigate it.
“The circumstance here created consciousness, didn’t need music to instigate it.”
@ Hathor: I get your point. The circumstances in Jamaica also created a consciousness, particularly among the poor and oppressed, which became reflected in reggae misic. The circumstances in Trinidad also for example, created a consciousness which became reflected in calypso, soca and baccanal.
“It is also not like American Blacks didn’t have sophisticated music or culture either.”
Without a doubt American Blacks do have sophisticated music and culture. They even have their own form of “patois”. For example, I’ve been watching Treme and have been learning a bit about New Orleans African American culture and music.
African, Caribbean and African American music are all influenced by and are influencing each others music. I love it!
“It is also not like American Blacks didn’t have sophisticated music or culture either. The circumstance here created consciousness, didn’t need music to instigate it.
@Hathor I am a Black American born and raised parents as well. I fully understand your point, in fact live it. And, yet without a doubt the most intertwined musical sounds in the Western Hemisphere that have played with and off each other is Jamaican and Black American music.
For years prior to the advent of Reggae, Mento (which sounds a lot like Calypso) music was the primary music of Jamaica brought to the U.S. by Harry Belafonte. With the increase of Jamaicans coming into the U.S., of course our Blues (the mother of all popular music coming out of the Western Hemisphere including Reggae and Soca, IMO) and gospel sounds (another child of the blues) was taken in and quickly added to the Jamaican musical catalogue so to speak. Seymour Clement “Sir Coxone” Dodd began working in the U.S., hearing the sounds of Blues and Soul went back to Jamaica and opened Studio One blending the sounds of the Jamaican Dancehall, Ska, Blues, Jazz and Soul rendering the sound we commonly hear when we listen to Reggae music of the era of Bob Marley, Horace Andy and the like. In other words Black American music influenced Jamaican music as much as Jamaican music has influenced our music going even into Trinidad with the advent of SOUL Calypso AKA So-Ca/Soca.
In addition, many Reggae songs of the late 60’s and early 70’s were songs written by Curtis Mayfield that were never sold here in the U.S., but became great hits when reproduded by Jamaican artistes
And, in fact, just as Asa points out, the circumstances in Jamacia created a consciousness which became reflected in the music, the same occured here. You cannot discount the songs by James Brown when he created I’m Black and I’m Proud. We cannot believe that music instigated Whats Going On or the Ecology Song by Marvin Gaye it was the circumstance. In fact the circumstances of the late 70’s created another consciousness and the birth of Hip Hop/modern Dancehall came forth.
When I was referring to people not hearing today’s Reggae due to the heavy use of patwa is from personal experience with friends and family and being from Southern California. I now live in Atlanta and have heard interviews with artistes that note, when they go to California they change their musical style to play to that audience which is a real Roots/foundation audience. What I spoke of is personal knowledge not conjecture.
In the end Rasta sings “We are all one people” and I say if we look at our music, Reggae, Soca, Blues, Calypso,Soul, Gospel, Makossa, High Life, Jazz, Rock we will see the oneness and not feel the need to defend what needs not defending if we really know oursleves, truly.
Yes my beautiful black peoples! Curtis Mayfield is at the top of my list of conscious artists. And we black people are more the same than we are different. For example, my Nigerian husband had to inform me that Reggae artist, Lucky Dube, was South African! Here I thought he was Jamaican! And he was beloved in Nigeria!
It’s up to us to dig out the truth of who we are and how our lives truly intersect especially culturally. Imma prove that right there when I post at my blog about Fufu throughout the African diapora!! 😀
Oh, the joy of my beautiful black culture!! Wouldn’t want it any other way for real tho!
Oh and Bro Asa, you forgot to mention Chicken and Dumplings in your Stuff black people like piece a year ago!! HA HA!!
Reggae artistes Alpha Blondie and Majek Fashek, are from Africa as well.
Check the videos.
http://www.ensaynreality.squarespace.com