WEBVTT - Bob Marley: Rasta Vigilante 0:00:00.720 --> 0:00:13.360 Disgraceland as a production of Double Elvis. 0:00:17.720 --> 0:00:20.160 The truth about Bob Marley is pretty nuts. 0:00:20.680 --> 0:00:24.160 The peace in Love, Rastafari and reggae superstar was also 0:00:24.239 --> 0:00:27.320 a violent, revenge fueled kid from the trench Town ghetto 0:00:27.520 --> 0:00:31.560 who would not be denied justice or his due. He 0:00:31.600 --> 0:00:34.159 once hung his manager out of a hotel window to 0:00:34.240 --> 0:00:37.519 renegotiate a contract. He and his friends were known to 0:00:37.560 --> 0:00:40.840 strong arm DJs for radio play, and in a rage, 0:00:40.880 --> 0:00:43.360 he jammed a pistol into the side of a colleague's 0:00:43.400 --> 0:00:46.879 head until he was given what he wanted. If you 0:00:46.920 --> 0:00:49.199 were the big tree and in his way, he was 0:00:49.240 --> 0:00:53.479 the small axe sharpened to cut you down. And he 0:00:53.560 --> 0:00:57.120 sought and possibly attained justice by having a trench Town 0:00:57.200 --> 0:01:01.160 kangaroo court string up his would be assassins from palm trees. 0:01:02.720 --> 0:01:05.560 Bob Marley believed in justice, but there was a thin 0:01:05.680 --> 0:01:09.760 line between justice and vengeance. You can hear both themes 0:01:09.800 --> 0:01:13.600 throughout his music, and Bob Marley made great music, some 0:01:13.640 --> 0:01:16.760 of the greatest music ever made. In fact, that music 0:01:16.800 --> 0:01:19.240 at the top of the show that wasn't great music, 0:01:19.800 --> 0:01:22.679 that was a loop from my mellotron called rumba Guitar 0:01:22.880 --> 0:01:27.199 Low MK two, and I played you that loop because 0:01:27.400 --> 0:01:29.120 I can't afford the rights to Night. 0:01:28.959 --> 0:01:30.240 Fever by the Beg's. 0:01:31.319 --> 0:01:33.560 And why would I play you that specific slice of 0:01:33.600 --> 0:01:34.839 Harry Medallion Cheese? 0:01:34.920 --> 0:01:35.720 Could I afford it? 0:01:36.480 --> 0:01:39.520 Because that was the number one song in America on 0:01:39.600 --> 0:01:43.560 April twenty second, nineteen seventy eight. And that was the 0:01:43.640 --> 0:01:48.080 day that Bob Marley, international reggae superstar, the Tough Gong 0:01:48.440 --> 0:01:51.560 and the Rastafari man of peace and love may or 0:01:51.600 --> 0:01:54.560 may not have brought violent justice down upon his enemies 0:01:55.600 --> 0:02:01.000 on this episode a kangaroo court rumba guitars, Harry Dion Cheese, 0:02:01.200 --> 0:02:03.920 Bob Marley and Rastafarian vengeance. 0:02:04.440 --> 0:02:07.920 I'm Jake Brennan and this is disgrace sand. 0:02:18.880 --> 0:02:22.280 Before the tiny Ford capri had even stopped skidding, the 0:02:22.360 --> 0:02:25.360 four young men from Trench Town jumped out onto the 0:02:25.480 --> 0:02:29.560 unpaved parking lot of the Jamaica Broadcasting Corporation. One of 0:02:29.600 --> 0:02:33.520 them was Bob Marley, and he was pissed. Pissed off 0:02:33.520 --> 0:02:37.320 that his bandmate Bunny Livingston didn't want to tour, pissed 0:02:37.360 --> 0:02:40.160 off that money was tight. Still in his twenties, he 0:02:40.240 --> 0:02:44.600 was supporting seven children by four different women. Ja will provide, 0:02:44.840 --> 0:02:48.880 but within reason and most important in this moment, Bob 0:02:48.960 --> 0:02:51.680 was pissed off at his latest single, despite being the 0:02:51.800 --> 0:02:55.480 number one selling song in all of Jamaica, couldn't get 0:02:55.480 --> 0:02:59.160 spun on the radio. Trench down Hoods got a bad rap. 0:02:59.360 --> 0:03:00.119 But the real. 0:03:00.080 --> 0:03:03.600 Gangsters or the suits in the music industry pulling strings 0:03:03.760 --> 0:03:08.920 and playing kingmaker Bob's song Small Axe killed, and so 0:03:09.040 --> 0:03:11.960 did Bob's right hand man, the man rushing the radio 0:03:12.000 --> 0:03:14.160 station with him at the moment, who went by the 0:03:14.240 --> 0:03:18.720 unambiguous nickname Take Life. He was a brutal presence back 0:03:18.720 --> 0:03:22.720 in the ghetto. A second killer hurried along Bob's other side, 0:03:22.800 --> 0:03:26.360 and the last man, the Wheelman, a professional footballer named 0:03:26.440 --> 0:03:30.160 Alan Skill Cole, who, when he unfolded his six foot 0:03:30.240 --> 0:03:32.200 five inch body out of the front door of the 0:03:32.240 --> 0:03:35.040 fastback coop, made it look more like a clown car. 0:03:35.880 --> 0:03:38.640 But there would be no clowning around on this visit 0:03:38.640 --> 0:03:42.600 to the radio station. These guys meant business. Skill carried 0:03:42.600 --> 0:03:45.880 with him a cricket bat, Take Life carried a ratchet knife, 0:03:46.200 --> 0:03:49.320 and Bob Bob Marley carried with him a lifetime of 0:03:49.440 --> 0:03:53.080 angst and desperation that only growing up an abject poverty 0:03:53.320 --> 0:03:57.480 can add to your load. The foursome burst into the studio, 0:03:57.640 --> 0:04:00.960 uninvited and intimidating. Its all hell, you go and play 0:04:01.000 --> 0:04:04.760 the new Whaler's record on JBC, Bob demanded of the 0:04:04.800 --> 0:04:09.400 confused British DJ behind the console. Take life, leaned back 0:04:09.400 --> 0:04:12.800 against the wall, played it cool, cleaned his fingernails with 0:04:12.840 --> 0:04:16.080 his knife, and sucked on his teeth, while the other short, 0:04:16.320 --> 0:04:19.920 well dressed thug Frowser loosened up his neck muscles to 0:04:20.040 --> 0:04:22.840 let the DJ know in no uncertain terms that he 0:04:22.920 --> 0:04:26.799 was ready for combat. Skill just smacked his open palm 0:04:26.839 --> 0:04:31.960 with the cricket bat slowly and stared with menace, And 0:04:32.000 --> 0:04:34.960 then he said, listen here. If we don't hear small 0:04:35.000 --> 0:04:39.280 acts on JBC before an hour pass, we smash your windscreen. 0:04:39.680 --> 0:04:43.279 Then if another hour pass and we don't hear small acts, 0:04:43.480 --> 0:04:48.479 we smash your face. Skill had recently begun helping the 0:04:48.480 --> 0:04:52.240 Whalers out with what he called quote unquote management. His 0:04:52.360 --> 0:04:55.279 Jamaican patois was a little easier for the cowering DJ 0:04:55.400 --> 0:04:58.520 to understand than the words of Marley, who now fixed 0:04:58.520 --> 0:05:01.440 the DJ with an intense game a look that those 0:05:01.480 --> 0:05:06.400 who knew him called Screwface. The DJ had heard tale 0:05:06.440 --> 0:05:09.000 of Marley and his muscle visiting the island's only other 0:05:09.080 --> 0:05:13.560 major station, Radio Jamaica, earlier in the week. The damage 0:05:13.560 --> 0:05:16.920 amounted to one broken nose, four slash tires, and a 0:05:16.920 --> 0:05:20.840 sudden increase in airplay for Bob Marley. The only thing 0:05:20.880 --> 0:05:23.400 that DJ was able to verify was that he had 0:05:23.440 --> 0:05:27.000 indeed heard Small Acts on Radio Jamaica on his drive 0:05:27.040 --> 0:05:31.280 to work that morning, and now here was Bob Screwface Marley, 0:05:31.560 --> 0:05:34.640 the tough Gong himself, armed with a couple of thugs 0:05:34.640 --> 0:05:36.960 and the country's best footballer staring. 0:05:36.640 --> 0:05:39.880 Him in the face. He had only one choice. 0:05:40.600 --> 0:05:44.800 And so Bob Marley's top selling Jamaican smash Small Acts, 0:05:45.040 --> 0:05:48.560 cut through the island's airwaves and all around his hometown 0:05:48.839 --> 0:05:51.760 people were finally able to hear Bob Marley on their radios. 0:05:52.600 --> 0:05:57.320 His message was revolution, his message was love, His message 0:05:57.520 --> 0:06:00.400 was peace, and so what if the message needed a 0:06:00.400 --> 0:06:04.560 little strong arm to get across. Jamaican radio in the 0:06:04.640 --> 0:06:08.880 nineteen seventies was difficult for rostas to crack. There were 0:06:08.920 --> 0:06:12.159 only two radio stations on the island. One played disco 0:06:12.440 --> 0:06:14.280 and the other was busy trying to be the BBC, 0:06:15.200 --> 0:06:18.320 and they both ignored the musical revolution growing like weeds 0:06:18.440 --> 0:06:24.160 right outside their studio doors. Reggae was alive throughout the 0:06:24.200 --> 0:06:26.880 streets of Jamaica, a true music of the people. 0:06:27.560 --> 0:06:30.400 Or in Jamaica, just like in America, it was pay 0:06:30.480 --> 0:06:30.920 to play. 0:06:31.680 --> 0:06:33.760 If you wanted a record plate on the radio, well, 0:06:33.800 --> 0:06:36.159 you better show the program manager some love and come 0:06:36.200 --> 0:06:39.600 calling with cash or coke, or women or all three. 0:06:39.800 --> 0:06:41.039 But bribes weren't enough. 0:06:41.480 --> 0:06:44.760 The proletariat power of reggae, even in those early days, 0:06:44.839 --> 0:06:49.320 spooped radio programmers, and despite whatever enticements were brought their way, 0:06:49.839 --> 0:06:51.760 DJs were still reluctant. 0:06:51.240 --> 0:06:53.480 To accept them from the dreadlocked rostas. 0:06:54.360 --> 0:06:58.000 But take life, Frowser and Skill brought a different set 0:06:58.040 --> 0:07:01.880 of skills to the proverbial negotiating and things for the 0:07:01.880 --> 0:07:08.120 whalers and Bob Marley slowly started to change. That the 0:07:08.200 --> 0:07:10.960 radio station was ignoring the needs of the masses was 0:07:11.000 --> 0:07:14.840 symptomatic of a larger political problem in Jamaica. The island 0:07:14.880 --> 0:07:18.280 achieved independence about a decade before, in nineteen sixty two, 0:07:18.760 --> 0:07:22.880 but Jamaica was still unapologetically neo colonial run by a 0:07:23.000 --> 0:07:26.440 lazy white middle class minority who had their own interests 0:07:26.440 --> 0:07:29.280 at heart and had no interest in losing their power 0:07:29.400 --> 0:07:32.560 to the masses and the shantytowns. The gulf between the 0:07:32.680 --> 0:07:36.120 rich and the poor seemed to widen daily. Even under 0:07:36.160 --> 0:07:39.200 the socialist rule of Prime Minister Michael Manley and his 0:07:39.280 --> 0:07:44.320 People's National Party, life in Jamaica was rough, so its 0:07:44.320 --> 0:07:48.200 citizens looked to their government for change, and everyone, it seemed, 0:07:48.440 --> 0:07:52.120 took an interest in politics, including it was rumored the 0:07:52.120 --> 0:07:55.720 American government, who had a vested interest in ousting the 0:07:55.760 --> 0:07:59.640 sitting Prime Minister in favor of their own puppet. So 0:08:00.040 --> 0:08:03.120 sterious shipments of guns started floating up on Jamaican shor 0:08:03.160 --> 0:08:06.360 as they were handed out in the ghetto, CIA agents 0:08:06.400 --> 0:08:07.480 began training. 0:08:07.200 --> 0:08:09.640 Rude boys on how to use their new M sixteen's. 0:08:10.480 --> 0:08:14.080 Rumors started circulating the Prime Minister Michael Manley was a 0:08:14.120 --> 0:08:18.600 Communist puppet for Cubas Fidel Castro, and as such, distrust 0:08:18.720 --> 0:08:23.680 was sown and the tiny country was further destabilized. Meanwhile, 0:08:23.920 --> 0:08:26.880 as Bob Marley's star rows and as his name began 0:08:26.920 --> 0:08:29.800 to ring out throughout the island, he formed an alliance 0:08:29.840 --> 0:08:32.760 with Michael Manley, the sitting Prime Minister, and his People's 0:08:32.840 --> 0:08:37.160 National Party also known as the PNP in the early seventies. 0:08:37.960 --> 0:08:40.960 The Whalers headlined a nineteen seventy one tour called the 0:08:41.040 --> 0:08:45.480 PNP Musical Bandwagon, and whenever asked in interviews which of 0:08:45.559 --> 0:08:48.360 the two parties he preferred, Bob would always stump for 0:08:48.400 --> 0:08:52.040 the People's National Party and nearly all these interviews, and 0:08:52.040 --> 0:08:54.880 Bob Marley did a lot of interviews. He would also 0:08:54.960 --> 0:08:58.679 extol the virtues of Ganja, encourage all blacks to repatriate 0:08:58.679 --> 0:09:01.880 to Africa, and pre that Mighty God was a living 0:09:01.960 --> 0:09:07.960 man Ethiopian Emperor Haile Selassii aka jah Rastafarai I and 0:09:08.080 --> 0:09:13.160 I will survive. Bob was far out unconventional. Even so, 0:09:13.520 --> 0:09:16.880 with his new clout, his endorsement of Michael Manley carried weight. 0:09:17.640 --> 0:09:21.000 Bob was fast becoming an international superstar, and with or 0:09:21.040 --> 0:09:25.160 without Jamaican radio, Jamaicans were listening to him an app 0:09:25.240 --> 0:09:29.000 to follow his lead politically as well as his message 0:09:29.000 --> 0:09:33.680 of revolution and justice. For years, Marley had been yearning 0:09:33.720 --> 0:09:36.760 to expand his message beyond the island. He struck out 0:09:36.760 --> 0:09:39.199 on his own and the Whalers became Bob Marley and 0:09:39.240 --> 0:09:43.280 the Whalers. After founding members Peter Tosh and Bunny Livingston quit. 0:09:44.040 --> 0:09:46.400 It was also time for Marley to get a new manager. 0:09:46.960 --> 0:09:50.280 Although Skill Cole had been helpful or at least forceful, 0:09:50.320 --> 0:09:52.520 in Marley's development, and he was a hell of a 0:09:52.520 --> 0:09:54.760 lot of fun to kick the ball around with. Skill 0:09:54.880 --> 0:09:58.880 was returning to the world of professional soccer. So in 0:09:58.960 --> 0:10:01.520 nineteen seventy three, when The Whaler shared a bill with 0:10:01.559 --> 0:10:05.600 Marvin Gay, Bob Marley met Don Taylor, the concerts organizer, 0:10:05.960 --> 0:10:10.080 and a business relationship was struck. Taylor had strong US 0:10:10.160 --> 0:10:14.560 music industry connections and a shrewd business acumen. This, coupled 0:10:14.600 --> 0:10:18.520 with Marley's natural and immense appeal, helped Bob make influential 0:10:18.600 --> 0:10:22.520 friends from other parts of the world. By the mid seventies, 0:10:22.640 --> 0:10:26.199 most major rock acts had begun integrating reggae into their sound, 0:10:26.559 --> 0:10:30.119 and it was entirely because of Bob Marley, the Rolling Stones, 0:10:30.280 --> 0:10:33.920 Paul McCartney and Paul Simon. Some did it more convincingly 0:10:33.960 --> 0:10:37.520 than others. Eric Clapton covered I Shot the Sheriff and 0:10:37.559 --> 0:10:40.560 Clapton was God, and so to white kids, that meant 0:10:40.600 --> 0:10:43.400 God was covering Bob Marley, a ghetto kid from a 0:10:43.440 --> 0:10:45.880 tiny island, a large portion of the world had barely 0:10:45.920 --> 0:10:49.760 heard of. Stevie Wonder even wrote a song about Bob Marley, 0:10:50.080 --> 0:10:52.400 and after the Whalers shared a bill with Stevie, had 0:10:52.400 --> 0:10:55.800 a benefit concert in nineteen seventy five, Bob decided he 0:10:55.840 --> 0:10:58.720 wanted to give something back to the Jamaican people respect 0:10:58.760 --> 0:11:03.439 his roots free concert. The concert was to be an 0:11:03.440 --> 0:11:07.559 a political event called the Smile Jamaica Concert, but nothing 0:11:07.600 --> 0:11:11.360 in Jamaica in nineteen seventy six was a political. Bob's 0:11:11.400 --> 0:11:14.840 intention was to bring people together to ease social tensions 0:11:14.880 --> 0:11:18.600 on the eve of a divisive election. Prime Minister Michael 0:11:18.600 --> 0:11:20.760 Manley wanted the concert to be held on the Prime 0:11:20.800 --> 0:11:23.920 Minister's lawn. Bob felt like he was being played by 0:11:23.960 --> 0:11:27.760 Manley's political machine, being boxed into a position where he 0:11:27.800 --> 0:11:29.920 would be seen as being too far out on his 0:11:29.960 --> 0:11:33.680 front foot as a political shill. So Bob declined fuck 0:11:33.760 --> 0:11:36.000 that Bob Marley wasn't going to go calling on the 0:11:36.000 --> 0:11:39.640 Prime Minister. The Prime Minister could come calling on Bob Marley. 0:11:40.679 --> 0:11:43.000 The concert, it was decided, would be held at the 0:11:43.080 --> 0:11:46.640 National Heroes Park, but then shortly after the date of 0:11:46.679 --> 0:11:50.480 the concert was announced, Manley's incumbent political party pulled a 0:11:50.520 --> 0:11:54.120 fast one and moved the election up two weeks, effectively 0:11:54.160 --> 0:11:57.320 making the event seem like a rally for Michael Manley himself, 0:11:57.640 --> 0:11:59.880 when in effect that was never to be the case. 0:12:00.800 --> 0:12:03.440 It did, indeed now look like Bob was shilling for 0:12:03.520 --> 0:12:07.600 Manley to win the election. Bob Marley was pissed, but 0:12:07.720 --> 0:12:11.800 perhaps more important, the heavily armed CIA backed Conservative Labor 0:12:11.840 --> 0:12:15.000 Party back in the Ghetto was even more pissed. This 0:12:15.080 --> 0:12:18.640 election was war. Every battle mattered, and if Bob Marley, 0:12:18.800 --> 0:12:22.920 the country's biggest star, was openly supporting their sworn enemy, 0:12:23.000 --> 0:12:26.160 Prime Minister Manly, then this was not to be tolerated. 0:12:26.720 --> 0:12:30.959 Marley fully backing Manly, even by accident or by manipulation, 0:12:31.360 --> 0:12:35.000 was a bridge too far, a bridge worth blowing up, 0:12:35.480 --> 0:12:39.160 a bridge worth dying on. If Bob Marley was going 0:12:39.200 --> 0:12:41.800 to help win the reelection for the Prime Minister, then 0:12:41.840 --> 0:12:53.680 Bob Marley had to be stopped by any means necessary. 0:13:01.840 --> 0:13:04.600 Bob marleyan made it. He knew this because he'd moved 0:13:04.600 --> 0:13:07.840 from the slums of Trenchtown, Jamaica to a Kingston estate, 0:13:08.360 --> 0:13:11.400 and perhaps out of guilt, or perhaps just because he 0:13:11.440 --> 0:13:14.520 was a truly righteous dude. Bob Marley took Trench down 0:13:14.520 --> 0:13:17.560 to Kingston with him. Bob was more than happy to 0:13:17.600 --> 0:13:20.160 allow all sorts of friends and hangers on to get 0:13:20.160 --> 0:13:22.680 together and feel all right at his swanky new digs. 0:13:22.920 --> 0:13:25.640 And if in doing so he brought the property values 0:13:25.679 --> 0:13:28.320 of his white devil neighbors down, then so be it. 0:13:29.360 --> 0:13:33.240 His front yard was overrun by gangsters, gunmen, and half 0:13:33.360 --> 0:13:36.520 naked children, many of them his own, from an ever 0:13:36.640 --> 0:13:40.440 expanding stable of women who weren't his wife. Members of 0:13:40.480 --> 0:13:44.439 the Twelve Tribes of Israel, an intense sect of Rastafarianism, 0:13:44.679 --> 0:13:48.360 of which Bob was a part, kept intense watchful eyes 0:13:48.440 --> 0:13:51.840 over the makeshift Neu Voreche commune that Marley was bankrolling. 0:13:52.960 --> 0:13:56.000 A reporter once asked Marley if he found it difficult 0:13:56.240 --> 0:13:59.079 to keep writing from the perspective of the struggling man, 0:13:59.200 --> 0:14:01.960 now that he was no longer struggling, if he found 0:14:02.000 --> 0:14:05.600 it difficult to stay in touch with the ghetto. Bob said, 0:14:05.800 --> 0:14:09.400 find it difficult. Watch now, you look into my yard. 0:14:09.880 --> 0:14:12.800 It's a ghetto. This is a ghetto you're looking at. 0:14:13.240 --> 0:14:18.400 Look out there. I've just brought the ghetto uptown two 0:14:18.480 --> 0:14:21.440 days before the Smile Jamaica concert was to take place. 0:14:21.840 --> 0:14:24.920 Bob was standing in his kitchen, taking a break from rehearsal, 0:14:25.240 --> 0:14:27.960 waiting on one of Jamaica's finest herbsmen to show up, 0:14:28.200 --> 0:14:32.720 and sharing a grapefruit with Whaler's guitarist Don Kinsey. That's 0:14:33.040 --> 0:14:38.480 when the gunshots ran out, pop pop pop. At first, 0:14:38.480 --> 0:14:41.560 the sound was in the distance, it almost sounded like fireworks, 0:14:41.840 --> 0:14:45.720 but then the second round came and there was no 0:14:45.800 --> 0:14:48.440 mistaking the sound out in the yard of gunman shot 0:14:48.520 --> 0:14:52.160 Bob's wife, Riada Marley in the head. Bob Marley's rosstafiring 0:14:52.200 --> 0:14:54.760 and Valhalla was on a siege, and two white dots 0:14:54.760 --> 0:14:57.280 and compacts had snuck in through the gates behind the 0:14:57.320 --> 0:15:00.960 car of Bob's manager Don Taylor, and quickly two teams 0:15:00.960 --> 0:15:04.480 of gunmen exited and had begun their hunt. They prowled 0:15:04.520 --> 0:15:06.880 over the grounds under the cover of night, with pistols 0:15:06.880 --> 0:15:10.680 and machine guns in hand, crouched slinking around, looking to 0:15:10.800 --> 0:15:13.440 kill their man, the man with all the influence, the 0:15:13.480 --> 0:15:16.120 man with the plan, the man they believed to be backing, 0:15:16.160 --> 0:15:21.280 Michael Manly Bob Marley. After shooting Riader Marley, one of 0:15:21.320 --> 0:15:23.720 the gunmen burst through the rehearsal room door into the 0:15:23.760 --> 0:15:26.800 house and fired a revolver off with the assembled band numbers. 0:15:27.440 --> 0:15:31.359 The gunman was no more than sixteen years old and terrified. 0:15:31.720 --> 0:15:35.440 He pissed himself while firing off multiple shots, all with 0:15:35.600 --> 0:15:39.480 his eyes closed. Over in the kitchen, a masked gunman 0:15:39.520 --> 0:15:42.280 stuck his head into the kitchen door. This dude wasn't 0:15:42.360 --> 0:15:45.160 fucking around. He raised the barrel of his submachine gun 0:15:45.200 --> 0:15:47.760 and emptied the clip toward the counter where Bob, his 0:15:47.880 --> 0:15:52.240 guitarist Don Kinsey, and manager Don Taylor was situated. Bob 0:15:52.280 --> 0:15:54.920 remained standing, but crammed his skinny body into a corner 0:15:54.920 --> 0:15:57.600 to make himself as small as a target as possible. Don 0:15:57.680 --> 0:16:01.200 Kinsey jumped behind some musical equipment as five bullets ripped 0:16:01.200 --> 0:16:04.480 into Don Taylor's side and the upper legs, and then 0:16:04.960 --> 0:16:09.760 a bullet found its way to Bob Marley. First it 0:16:09.800 --> 0:16:13.080 grazed his breastbone, then it burst by his heart and 0:16:13.120 --> 0:16:16.520 eventually lodged itself into the bicep of the singer's left arm. 0:16:17.080 --> 0:16:20.720 And then, just as soon as they had arrived, gunmen 0:16:21.200 --> 0:16:26.400 were gone. All that remained in their wake was smoke, silence, 0:16:26.560 --> 0:16:30.800 blood and ruin. Bob Marley opened his eyes. He was 0:16:30.840 --> 0:16:34.520 in pain, but he was calm. He knew that someday, 0:16:34.960 --> 0:16:38.440 maybe not tomorrow, maybe not next week, but one day 0:16:38.880 --> 0:16:42.040 the people who did this would get theirs. He knew 0:16:42.040 --> 0:16:44.560 in his bones that peace and love would not be 0:16:44.720 --> 0:16:48.200 cowed by violence and hate, and that justice would one 0:16:48.280 --> 0:16:50.000 day be coldly served. 0:16:51.480 --> 0:16:54.840 We'll be right back after this word word word. 0:16:57.000 --> 0:17:00.960 The blood was everywhere all over his body. Bob Marley 0:17:01.040 --> 0:17:04.480 was a mess. Prime Minister Manley could hardly recognize the 0:17:04.520 --> 0:17:08.359 singer when he got to the hospital. Miraculously down the 0:17:08.400 --> 0:17:11.600 hall in a separate ward reader Marley lay in bed 0:17:11.640 --> 0:17:14.560 in fair condition, despite having a bullet lodged between her 0:17:14.600 --> 0:17:17.440 scalp and her skull, and Don Taylor had to be 0:17:17.480 --> 0:17:21.160 airlifted to a hospital in Miami. Bob was placed inder 0:17:21.240 --> 0:17:24.720 national protection by the Prime Minister and quickly ushered out 0:17:24.760 --> 0:17:27.360 of the hospital to a remote home in Jamaica's Blue 0:17:27.440 --> 0:17:31.960 Hills that belonged to Island records head Chris Blackwell. The 0:17:32.000 --> 0:17:34.760 Smile Jamaica concert that Bob had been planning for a 0:17:34.800 --> 0:17:38.240 few days later had not yet been called off, despite 0:17:38.320 --> 0:17:41.520 the headlines that gripped the island, detailing the shootout at 0:17:41.560 --> 0:17:46.040 Bob's home. Political pressure continued to mount, and so did 0:17:46.080 --> 0:17:48.760 the pressure on Bob to perform and not give in 0:17:48.800 --> 0:17:51.080 to the fear that his would be assassin's were counting on. 0:17:51.960 --> 0:17:55.560 Manley's political machine was keen on Bob not backing out. 0:17:56.040 --> 0:17:59.160 It was symbolic, don't give an inch to these animals, 0:17:59.320 --> 0:18:02.480 don't let them see sweat. But Bob, like the rest 0:18:02.480 --> 0:18:05.720 of the country, had no idea how dangerous performing would be. 0:18:06.920 --> 0:18:09.639 What would happen when he went on stage. He had 0:18:09.640 --> 0:18:12.080 a bullet lodged in his arm. The doctors told him 0:18:12.080 --> 0:18:13.760 he might never be able to play guitar again if 0:18:13.760 --> 0:18:16.320 they removed it. He told him to leave the bullet in. 0:18:17.160 --> 0:18:20.480 Bob knew he'd rise to the occasion. But what about Rita? 0:18:21.000 --> 0:18:23.880 She still had a bullet in her head. In her head, 0:18:24.240 --> 0:18:27.399 how was she supposed to sing backup alongside him? And 0:18:27.520 --> 0:18:30.879 Scarier than all that the assassins were still at large, 0:18:31.160 --> 0:18:33.600 and they were still out there when they tried to 0:18:33.640 --> 0:18:36.720 finish the job while Bob was on stage, gut him 0:18:36.720 --> 0:18:40.280 down from the shadows of the crowd. Fear hung heavy. 0:18:40.600 --> 0:18:43.640 The tension in the air was palpable. All of Jamaica 0:18:43.680 --> 0:18:47.040 felt it. This wasn't just politics, this was justice, This 0:18:47.240 --> 0:18:50.560 was right and wrong. This was quite literally freedom, the 0:18:50.640 --> 0:18:53.680 freedom to use your voice, the freedom to speak truth 0:18:53.760 --> 0:18:56.720 to power, the freedom to make your living, the freedom 0:18:56.760 --> 0:19:00.520 to live. And the gossip surrounding the shooting was everywhere, 0:19:00.880 --> 0:19:03.800 and most Jamaicans were convinced the CIA did it, or 0:19:03.800 --> 0:19:05.560 at least put the guns in the hands of the 0:19:05.560 --> 0:19:08.040 people who did do it, coached them up from the 0:19:08.080 --> 0:19:10.720 ghettos and trained them to kill as they had anti 0:19:10.760 --> 0:19:12.960 Castro Cubans a decade and a half earlier. 0:19:14.040 --> 0:19:15.200 The public pointed to. 0:19:15.160 --> 0:19:17.720 The song rat Race on the most recent Whalers album 0:19:17.880 --> 0:19:21.880 Rasta Mann Vibration as illustrative of the beef. And there 0:19:21.920 --> 0:19:25.199 was also a proof that people said because Carl Coby, 0:19:25.280 --> 0:19:28.240 the son of former Director of the CIA, William Colby, 0:19:28.560 --> 0:19:30.800 was in Jamaica as part of a film crew to 0:19:30.840 --> 0:19:35.200 shoot the Smile Jamaica concert, and sons of powerful CIA 0:19:35.280 --> 0:19:38.000 men showing up at the crime scenes of culture shifting 0:19:38.040 --> 0:19:43.560 assassinations is not an entirely uncommon thing. Senator Prescott Bush, 0:19:43.640 --> 0:19:46.840 a man who literally helped invent the CIA, you might 0:19:46.880 --> 0:19:49.840 want to look into the presence of his son, George H. W. 0:19:49.960 --> 0:19:53.280 Bush in Dallas on the day President John F. Kennedy 0:19:53.359 --> 0:19:55.760 was killed. And while you're at it, check into the 0:19:55.800 --> 0:19:59.840 declassified nineteen ninety one FBI file on George Bush's activities 0:20:00.040 --> 0:20:04.119 immediately following the assassination, as well as his experience with 0:20:04.200 --> 0:20:09.240 anti Castro Cubans. The photographic evidence, though grainy, does not lie. 0:20:09.760 --> 0:20:13.800 Google it, but I digress sort of because in nineteen 0:20:13.840 --> 0:20:17.200 seventy six, the year Bob Marley was shot, the year 0:20:17.280 --> 0:20:21.560 Jamaicans believed the CIA was running guns in support to 0:20:21.640 --> 0:20:25.639 those who opposed their Prime Minister Manly, exactly as the 0:20:25.640 --> 0:20:28.600 CIA had been doing for anti Castro Cubans a decade 0:20:28.640 --> 0:20:30.960 and a half earlier. Do you know who was the 0:20:31.000 --> 0:20:35.080 head of the CIA at that time? The answer George H. W. 0:20:35.200 --> 0:20:38.080 Bush. More rumors persisted the. 0:20:38.080 --> 0:20:40.840 Shooting happened because Bob and Skill Cole fixed a horse 0:20:40.920 --> 0:20:43.080 race and made a lot of bad people a lot 0:20:43.200 --> 0:20:47.080 less money. The shooting happened because Don Taylor, Bob's manager, 0:20:47.400 --> 0:20:49.720 was in major debt after skimming off the top of 0:20:49.800 --> 0:20:53.160 concert grosses and gambling the money away. The shooting happened 0:20:53.200 --> 0:20:55.600 because one of Bob's route boys got Bob to finance 0:20:55.640 --> 0:21:00.119 a scam that backfired majorly a fact or fiction, it 0:21:00.160 --> 0:21:03.000 didn't matter. The truth was that Bob needed to lay 0:21:03.040 --> 0:21:06.840 low for a hot minute and cool out. He sat 0:21:06.920 --> 0:21:10.120 back in Chris Blackwell's plush leather recliner and took a. 0:21:10.160 --> 0:21:12.080 Cheek hollowing hit off a spliff. 0:21:12.600 --> 0:21:16.920 Outside in the darkness, rasta vigilantes surrounded the house, armed 0:21:16.920 --> 0:21:19.960 with graye a ganja for themselves and sharp machetes for 0:21:20.000 --> 0:21:23.040 anyone who dare come try and fuck with Bob Marley again. 0:21:24.240 --> 0:21:25.399 Bob let his head wander. 0:21:25.800 --> 0:21:28.480 The Smile Jamaica concert was all he could think about, 0:21:29.160 --> 0:21:31.720 and was he going to perform? Would he be killed 0:21:31.720 --> 0:21:34.240 in the process, and who would want to kill him? 0:21:34.680 --> 0:21:37.080 He was Bob Marley. He was a man of peace. 0:21:37.760 --> 0:21:41.399 His songs inspired people to love one another, not to kill. 0:21:42.040 --> 0:21:46.320 Songs of freedom. He fought for justice, he fought for equality. 0:21:46.520 --> 0:21:49.000 And this was horseshit. And this wasn't even supposed to 0:21:49.080 --> 0:21:52.119 be a political show. It was supposed to be his show, 0:21:52.240 --> 0:21:55.760 Bob Marley's show for his people. He had to do it. 0:21:55.880 --> 0:22:00.520 Fuck the assassins, fuck the politicians, fuck the CIA. He 0:22:00.520 --> 0:22:02.560 heard one of his home invaders was so scared he 0:22:02.600 --> 0:22:06.040 pissed his own short pants. Amateur Bob was a pro 0:22:06.320 --> 0:22:09.679 a professional musician, a professional healer, a prophet, a true 0:22:09.680 --> 0:22:13.400 man of the people. If the punk shooters CIA backed 0:22:13.480 --> 0:22:16.040 no Soul mercenaries had the balls to try and finish 0:22:16.080 --> 0:22:18.880 the job at the concert, the crowd would have Bob's back. 0:22:19.160 --> 0:22:22.879 He was Jamaica's favorite son. Or if things went south 0:22:23.080 --> 0:22:25.680 and the assassins managed to get a shot off or worse, 0:22:25.760 --> 0:22:28.199 put a bullet in him, he'd go down doing what 0:22:28.280 --> 0:22:31.400 he did best, bringing the truth to the people and 0:22:31.480 --> 0:22:32.159 dying for it. 0:22:33.119 --> 0:22:34.840 And it was a cause worth fighting. 0:22:34.560 --> 0:22:37.560 For, especially if the weapon of choice was music, and 0:22:37.680 --> 0:22:40.080 really going out in a blaze of bullets on stage 0:22:40.080 --> 0:22:42.600 would make him a martyr, and that's the last thing 0:22:42.640 --> 0:22:46.280 the CIA would have wanted. Martyrs last a lot longer 0:22:46.320 --> 0:22:47.960 than one term political pawns. 0:22:48.640 --> 0:22:49.800 His mind was made up. 0:22:50.480 --> 0:22:54.040 Shit was On the day of the show finally came, 0:22:54.400 --> 0:22:57.440 Tens of thousands of fans flocked to National Heroes Park. 0:22:57.840 --> 0:23:01.320 The opening performers, Third World, took the stage, not knowing 0:23:01.400 --> 0:23:04.000 if they'd be the reluctant headliners or the warm up 0:23:04.000 --> 0:23:07.000 act for one of the most historically significant shows in 0:23:07.040 --> 0:23:10.399 the history of regae and the history of music. And 0:23:10.440 --> 0:23:12.679 what was going to happen? Was Bob Marley actually going 0:23:12.760 --> 0:23:14.520 to go through with it? Were they're warming up the 0:23:14.520 --> 0:23:17.600 stage for a dead man? Crowd had no idea what 0:23:17.680 --> 0:23:20.199 to expect. What if the entire show was a ruse, 0:23:20.240 --> 0:23:22.480 a scam. What if Bob was actually out of the 0:23:22.520 --> 0:23:25.199 country and hiding and all the concert goers were to 0:23:25.240 --> 0:23:27.959 be exterminated. That's a hell of a lot of PMP 0:23:28.119 --> 0:23:30.480 supporters who wouldn't be alive to cast their votes for 0:23:30.600 --> 0:23:33.879 Manly Or if the real Bob did step on stage, 0:23:33.960 --> 0:23:36.080 how long we last? Were they going to have to 0:23:36.119 --> 0:23:38.360