Speaker 1: Pushkin. In the four decades since his death, Bob Marley
Speaker 1: has become so iconic that it's hard to believe he
Speaker 1: was ever a real person. Thankfully, in addition to the
Speaker 1: wealth of music he left behind, there's also a trove
Speaker 1: of photographs documenting his brief, impactful life. In twenty twenty,
Speaker 1: to commemorate what would have been Bob's seventy fifth birthday,
Speaker 1: Ziggy Marley curated a book of photographs of his dad
Speaker 1: called Bob Marley Portrait of the Legend. Ziggy has of
Speaker 1: course gone on to become a reggae icon in his
Speaker 1: own right, and there's now an eight time Grammy winner,
Speaker 1: a philanthropist, author, and keeper of his dad's legacy along
Speaker 1: with the rest of the Marley family. Today we'll hear
Speaker 1: Malcolm Goldwell and Ziggy talk about the turbulence and seventies
Speaker 1: Jamaica by two opposing political parties. Ziggy recalls the night
Speaker 1: gunman and ambushed the Marley house, shooting his mother and Bob,
Speaker 1: both whom thankfully survived, and Ziggy answers the question we
Speaker 1: all want to know, was it famously soccer obsessed Bob
Speaker 1: Marley really any good on the field? This is broken
Speaker 1: record liner notes for the digital Age. I'm justin Richmondon.
Speaker 1: Here's Malcolm Gladwell and Ziggy Marley. This conversation was taped
Speaker 1: live as part of the Live Talks Los Angeles series.
Speaker 1: This book that you've done, with all of these photos
Speaker 1: of your father, it had a kind of personal residence
Speaker 1: for me because, as you may know, my mom as Jamaican,
Speaker 1: and when I was growing up in the seventies, we
Speaker 1: were good at Jamaica every year, every Christmas and all
Speaker 1: these so many of these photos are from the Jamaica
Speaker 1: that I remember as a kid. It's funny, It's like,
Speaker 1: I mean, it's very personal for you, but in this
Speaker 1: weird indirect way, HiT's personal for me too. You know
Speaker 1: how when you look at the photo of Jamaica, you
Speaker 1: can smell Jamaica. I could, I could smell I could
Speaker 1: smell Jamaica again. It's just lovely, like took me back
Speaker 1: to my childhood. What led you to want to do
Speaker 1: this book? So over the years we've we've collected a
Speaker 1: lot of photographs of Bob. I'm from different photographers and
Speaker 1: stuff like that, and you know, usually I think the
Speaker 1: photographs you see a Bob our iconic photographs, you know,
Speaker 1: obviously the iconic images, and so for this we came
Speaker 1: up on the same the fifth at birthday anniversary, and
Speaker 1: I felt like, let's do some special for the seven fifth.
Speaker 1: Let's take some of these photos we having our archives.
Speaker 1: I'm put together a photo book. The family has them.
Speaker 1: I've done one before, other people have done one. Then
Speaker 1: I'm totally understand. Always when you're taught about you smell
Speaker 1: Jamaica at the photo because doing the book like they
Speaker 1: brought back to that time too, you know, when looking
Speaker 1: at it, just it's like it's such a it's such
Speaker 1: a real experience, a real thing that when I was
Speaker 1: looking at the phot does it you know, everything else
Speaker 1: kind of came back to me. Yeah. When you say,
Speaker 1: I was just thinking logistically, you said, this is really
Speaker 1: the family's book. There's so many of you. How on
Speaker 1: earth did you guys? Did you guys coordinate picking all
Speaker 1: of these photos? Did you have like a family council
Speaker 1: where you're all sat down and went through them? No? No,
Speaker 1: well I was given a task. I was given that
Speaker 1: responsibility of going through the photos. That's all we do.
Speaker 1: What kind of delegate responsibilities? Yeah, you know, everybody this
Speaker 1: is your project. You have you have the family's approval
Speaker 1: and blessing is your project. Go ahead and do it,
Speaker 1: you know. Yeah, Well, tell me about your your memories
Speaker 1: of your father. You so you're born in sixty eight,
Speaker 1: so you when he dies, you're you're just a teenager.
Speaker 1: Yeah it going on thirteen. Yeah, yeah, tell me tell
Speaker 1: me a little bit about what you remember of your father.
Speaker 1: Well everything, I mean, there's don't to forget really because
Speaker 1: the limited experience we've had with him, you know, everything
Speaker 1: was memorable and left her ever lasting impact on my psyche,
Speaker 1: you know what I say. Everything. It was like going
Speaker 1: to school, but a different type of school, you know.
Speaker 1: Manna says like so growing up with Bob, I mean,
Speaker 1: there was different elements. It was a fun side, happy side,
Speaker 1: didn't player on the children. We would travel to the
Speaker 1: countryside his hometown u every now and again. And it's
Speaker 1: funny remember those days. They were no seat, bess, he
Speaker 1: would have been a lap in the front seat or
Speaker 1: seat that no, no, no, you're back. Yeah, I believe you.
Speaker 1: I remember that. I'mbing started making the back of a
Speaker 1: Volkswagen Beetle driven by my uncle. Yeah. Yeah, my mom
Speaker 1: one of those two. She had one of those beatles too.
Speaker 1: Yeah yeah, so um but I mean, and then there
Speaker 1: was a serious side. It was what I saw was
Speaker 1: another discipline. This money, a lot of work hard, this money,
Speaker 1: a lot of discipline, this manner. He's from the countryside
Speaker 1: and he's so rude rooted in his humility that for
Speaker 1: him to come back to his home Toner, go back
Speaker 1: to trench Stone in the ghetto, it was like, it's
Speaker 1: just it's just Bob. This is just Bob. It's not
Speaker 1: like Bob the Superstarabob or whatever, you know, It's just Bob.
Speaker 1: So I mean lots of sucker, lots of football, sucker music,
Speaker 1: sucker music. And the spiritual side of it was a
Speaker 1: very powerful thing. And Babbabo's love having Bible, and he
Speaker 1: would take me and my brother Stephen to these um
Speaker 1: what you call him. It's like service, like you know
Speaker 1: people go to church service, or people go to the
Speaker 1: synical or the mosque. When we are these thing called
Speaker 1: nia bingis and we would it would be like some
Speaker 1: weird time at night. And it was such a mystical.
Speaker 1: That's why I said it left such an impression on
Speaker 1: me as a child, because it was such a ni
Speaker 1: being was such a mystical thing, you know, smoke, fire, drums, singing, chanting,
Speaker 1: and a whole spiritual vibe. So yeah, you know, we'll
Speaker 1: go up that kind of environe where every memory really
Speaker 1: is stuck with us, and the memory is stuck with
Speaker 1: us more than just a memory. It stuck with us
Speaker 1: as like I experience that as kind of mounded us
Speaker 1: into who we are today. You know, who is are
Speaker 1: really a heavy thing, you know, it's heavy. Yeah. The
Speaker 1: other part of it that's fastened to me, as I
Speaker 1: said earlier, was the Jamaica of that period, which is
Speaker 1: Jamaica in the seventies. So many of these photos are
Speaker 1: about Jamakaan the seventies and Jamaica the seventies is an
Speaker 1: intense place. I mean, politics is manly in Siaga, and
Speaker 1: there's violence, and there's gun cord and there's reggae, and
Speaker 1: there's you know, Don Quarry winning gold medal. I mean,
Speaker 1: it's just sort of like there's somber go, there's a kid.
Speaker 1: It's just like so much was coming from rural Canada
Speaker 1: where nothing happened, to a place where everything was happening. Talk.
Speaker 1: Can you talk a little bit about that I mean
Speaker 1: you're in the epicenter of this because your father was
Speaker 1: at the was the kind of in the middle of
Speaker 1: the of the Maelstrom. Yeah, there were certain minor posts
Speaker 1: that I can like remember about the seventies, especially the
Speaker 1: more um turbulent times politics. So we can't go back.
Speaker 1: I remember, um, the night my appearance were a shot, right.
Speaker 1: I remember before my mother left to go to rearses,
Speaker 1: I were like, yo, moment tapent to earth. I wanted
Speaker 1: to go. I wanted to go to resta and said no, one,
Speaker 1: like you have school tomorrow. And I was like very
Speaker 1: like angry that she didn't let me go to rearses.
Speaker 1: And then, you know, looking back after you the shooter,
Speaker 1: I think she probably it was a good decision, right.
Speaker 1: So I remember that night. I remember she leaving and
Speaker 1: we went to bed, right, But in the middle of
Speaker 1: the night, some police came to the house and like
Speaker 1: grabbed us up and like there's a lot of you know,
Speaker 1: like kiosk and like let's go move through, let's go,
Speaker 1: let's go get the kids and mout to the house
Speaker 1: and they drove us to wherever we're going. We don't know.
Speaker 1: I was just like this, I was like, what is
Speaker 1: seventy seventy six, but you're about getting the assassination the
Speaker 1: seventy six ye. So another more impactful experience I was
Speaker 1: with my mom. Actually we're talking about the seventies and
Speaker 1: what was going on there, the political upheaval and just
Speaker 1: you know, the drama everything. So my so, my mother
Speaker 1: pick us up from school. This was during the height
Speaker 1: of the There was a big protest going on political
Speaker 1: They were blocking the roads, fire burning, tires burning in
Speaker 1: the streets. So my mom pick us up from school
Speaker 1: in in the beetle, in the VW. She's driving us
Speaker 1: home and we'll come up on a road back. Okay, okay,
Speaker 1: I'll get home. We're not too far from home, but
Speaker 1: we can't pass because these guys there, there's tires burning,
Speaker 1: and these guys are like and I remember being in
Speaker 1: the back seat. I'm watching my mother. She came over
Speaker 1: to the car and she confronted these guys in a
Speaker 1: very bridge brave. I mean it's brave what she did.
Speaker 1: She like stand up, I say, yo, and I feel
Speaker 1: you know what if I did? She cursed or chel
Speaker 1: and she talked them down and they're kind of like
Speaker 1: okay and kind of part of part of the road
Speaker 1: back and we drove toe. So that's a that's another
Speaker 1: memory that's like from from member that time and the
Speaker 1: turbulent political situation. Those two my post is what I
Speaker 1: go back to. But I mean there was good times too, man,
Speaker 1: you know what I mean. I mean going back to
Speaker 1: Change Stone playing football. You know, it was a very
Speaker 1: double edged sword that period of time because it was
Speaker 1: so good too divide the energy of the music. There's
Speaker 1: so much life and there's so much revolutionary like change,
Speaker 1: you know, Like it's the same time Bob and Claud
Speaker 1: mass Up, who was a strong man or a strong
Speaker 1: arm for the political function and booking Marshall, they came
Speaker 1: together and we're starting for kind of this on the politics.
Speaker 1: And I was there too. I met I met all
Speaker 1: of these guys take life, and I knew who. I
Speaker 1: knew what was happening um and and I kind of
Speaker 1: but actually when I got later and I kind of
Speaker 1: understand who these guys were because I just saw them
Speaker 1: as guys as Bob's friends, and I know they were
Speaker 1: meeting and talking and blah blah blah. But when I
Speaker 1: grew up with area as these guys were some dangerous men.
Speaker 1: They were just like some la. These guys were some
Speaker 1: serious guys, you know. So that is yeah, that is
Speaker 1: the world. That is the world, you know, marking at
Speaker 1: the seventies. I remember, it's funny you talk about your
Speaker 1: mother and that roadblock. My grandfather telling me that he'd
Speaker 1: be driving down the road and they'd be a roadblock,
Speaker 1: and he got really good at guessing whether it was
Speaker 1: JLP or p NP, the two two parties. So he
Speaker 1: take a look, he's take that's JLP. Wavers fished out
Speaker 1: the window JLP. They're like waving through next BNP. But
Speaker 1: you know, to your point, it's the world that bursts
Speaker 1: this extraordinar amount of your father's music. I mean, it's
Speaker 1: what gave his music such immediacy and urgency and power.
Speaker 1: Did your father talk a lot about the cut of
Speaker 1: the politics of Jamaica? Not, I mean not to me.
Speaker 1: I mean I've I've overheard stuff and i've you know,
Speaker 1: but never directed to us. Um. Yeah, I mean he's
Speaker 1: spoken about it. Obviously, he's not a political person to say,
Speaker 1: well him decide these politics are that political party or whatever.
Speaker 1: I think he was a trait because his thing was Rastafari,
Speaker 1: which is another thing. He says, need a P and
Speaker 1: p r GP. It's like it's own thing. And what
Speaker 1: was happening was that I love the mentioned cloud, the
Speaker 1: master of Bocking, Marshal. These were the strong arms, they were,
Speaker 1: These were the enforcers of the political party, the lead enforcers.
Speaker 1: These guys was coming over at the Bob side. So
Speaker 1: there was a whole other thing going on that the
Speaker 1: political powers were losing their their muscle to this other
Speaker 1: idea of rastafar Rai, and that a waso bubble was
Speaker 1: really about really if it, I mean, if if he
Speaker 1: was about politics, it was the political party of Rastafari,
Speaker 1: which is the spiritual movement, you know, change, change how
Speaker 1: things are. So I think that was his politics. Rastafari
Speaker 1: was his politics. We could say, you know, yeah, I
Speaker 1: was trying to think whether there's another musical artist who
Speaker 1: has had the same kind of status in his or
Speaker 1: her home country as your father did. I mean, I'm
Speaker 1: remember that famous concert where the two political figures of
Speaker 1: the day, Siaga and Manly didn't they shake hands on
Speaker 1: stage at a at a Bob Marley concert, Yeah, the
Speaker 1: One Love Peace concert. Yeah. I mean the analogy would
Speaker 1: be as if Donald Trump and Joe Biden had kind
Speaker 1: of hugged on stage at a Bruce Springsteen concert. Right,
Speaker 1: that's the that's the clothes, I mean, but it doesn't
Speaker 1: need that doesn't even capture it. I mean, this is
Speaker 1: why I love the book so much, because it takes
Speaker 1: us back to the time and the place. Yeah, there's
Speaker 1: wonderful photos of the One Love concert with Siaga and
Speaker 1: Michael Manley. Yeah, I remember that it was brother went
Speaker 1: on stage because that's what we usually do. Like me,
Speaker 1: I'm Stephen, Stephen, you would go on stage. We would
Speaker 1: go on stage in that last time, which is usually
Speaker 1: exdus those times was tough to the One of Peace concert.
Speaker 1: So I remember, let me let me. I don't think
Speaker 1: we're having the photos that appeared. But when Bob after
Speaker 1: that assassination attempt, and Bob had come home for the
Speaker 1: One of Peace concert, so we all went to the
Speaker 1: airport and you know, there was totals of people at
Speaker 1: the airport because no Bubo is coming back. And the
Speaker 1: thing is that political strongmen for the parties, political parties
Speaker 1: now we're on the CMPH as Bob, and so everyone
Speaker 1: that supports these political parties now was supporting Bob and
Speaker 1: and and these these guys who know have their own
Speaker 1: ideas of peace and less political violence. So the airport
Speaker 1: was full. And then I was there and I remember
Speaker 1: the crowd and then pulled Bob and I'm there. I'm
Speaker 1: outside now in this crowd, all mixed up with everybody.
Speaker 1: And Bob get pulled into a car and I'm by
Speaker 1: the window like this bub bub Why not he pulled
Speaker 1: me through the window. Well, you knew you got left behind.
Speaker 1: I got mixed up in a cart and it was
Speaker 1: like there's could no and there was no one. I
Speaker 1: had no nannier and no one body watching me. It's
Speaker 1: important to remember in this moment in Jamaican history, it's
Speaker 1: almost like the country is in a state of civil war.
Speaker 1: There is violence everywhere. You know, the people are leaving
Speaker 1: Jamaica in droves to come to the United States or
Speaker 1: Canada to escape. It's a kind of a crazy period.
Speaker 1: Well it's funny, not only as civil war is like
Speaker 1: a geopolitical world going on too at the same time,
Speaker 1: between the United States and Russia and Cuba. Because that
Speaker 1: was the thing. That's why Edwards Siaga he was a buston.
Speaker 1: He guarded from Boston University, and so there was the
Speaker 1: geopolitical situation even elevated the stakes even more. Yeah and Bob,
Speaker 1: I mean, Bob was in a serious position and nobody knew,
Speaker 1: but he was in a serious position because of the
Speaker 1: geopolitical element. Would would America allow a socialist government who
Speaker 1: has tied with Cuba to have another which would then
Speaker 1: mean Russia having a a more influenced in that region.
Speaker 1: You know, America didn't want that. I would not allow that.
Speaker 1: I know. There was this guy, this singer guy who
Speaker 1: who people were drawn to and he was like she
Speaker 1: had some political power too, because the political strong men
Speaker 1: and their people were no drawn to this singer guy.
Speaker 1: Who who's this singer guy? You know what I'm saying.
Speaker 1: So the stakes are really high beyond what I think
Speaker 1: we realized, or even Bob might have realized at the time,
Speaker 1: our people around him. You know. We'll be back with
Speaker 1: Malcolm Gladwell and Ziggy Marley after a break. We're back
Speaker 1: with more from Ziggy Marley and Malcolm Gladwell. Can you
Speaker 1: think of a musical figure who is an analogous to
Speaker 1: your father? Yeah? I think more Fella Cut from Nigeria. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and him he was. He was another one of my
Speaker 1: I met him once, um chica, but he was he
Speaker 1: was serious. He was really and I mean what he
Speaker 1: didn't in Nigeria starting up against the government, the brutality
Speaker 1: and the songs he wrote about that. Really he just
Speaker 1: like my father had assassination and m I mean they
Speaker 1: would read him and beat him and beat his mother
Speaker 1: and you know type of things. So fella co would
Speaker 1: be a good analogy to Bob, I think, yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: And there are a couple maybe a couple of South
Speaker 1: African um maybe it would be a good analogy. But
Speaker 1: when do you become aware that you want to make
Speaker 1: your life in music? Is that something that comes to
Speaker 1: you very young and looking at your father or afterwards
Speaker 1: after his death? Now it come? It come before that.
Speaker 1: I mean the first concert would play was a concert
Speaker 1: that U Baba was on was the International Year of
Speaker 1: the Children, what I hear? That was seventy nine. So
Speaker 1: he and he wrote the first song that we have
Speaker 1: a song. Yeah, So we was out of his music
Speaker 1: and bab always call us to sing when he's writing it.
Speaker 1: It comes sing we're playing, we want to go play,
Speaker 1: telling us to come sing. You know. We started very
Speaker 1: young with music. The thing I get from Barba musically speaking,
Speaker 1: is a discipline and the focus and the seriousness in
Speaker 1: which you approach the music, the respect that you gave
Speaker 1: the music. So you have to put in the work
Speaker 1: that shows you respect the music. It's not like it
Speaker 1: does better and you know you have a sing the
Speaker 1: right now, you have a practice, you know. So really
Speaker 1: when we used to see that Rorstie and watch Bob
Speaker 1: the Mirs, and I think for some reason I grew
Speaker 1: up taking that ethic of hard work and and and
Speaker 1: putting it into my own music of my life in general,
Speaker 1: you know, without they exercise and or whatever. I think
Speaker 1: seeing him just you know, grinding and like, well I'm
Speaker 1: making it right. And the discipline, the discipline, you know
Speaker 1: said the discipline is really a strung impact. I mean
Speaker 1: is seeing that discipline as as growing up around that.
Speaker 1: Can you talk a little bit about the way he
Speaker 1: made music? I mean, was there was there a kind
Speaker 1: of an approach that a particular approaching. Can you can
Speaker 1: you give a lovess of an example of how he
Speaker 1: worked and how he created? Well what I saw and
Speaker 1: this was probably in Miami at his mother's house. Yeah,
Speaker 1: but he always had his guitar around and a lot
Speaker 1: of time it's mumbling, you don't it's not a song.
Speaker 1: He does her ideas coming out, And for me, he
Speaker 1: would always have fun with it. It doesn't like I
Speaker 1: see us like writing and you know, it was always
Speaker 1: like something very joyful in the process, was very joyful
Speaker 1: and happy and people are own and laughing and you know,
Speaker 1: did you getting the lyrics? Making fun? There's this one
Speaker 1: another one thing he remember did release this one. It
Speaker 1: was really this kind of like he did as a demo.
Speaker 1: Really it's kind of like a really good time and
Speaker 1: I remember him beating in Miami in his bedroom with
Speaker 1: his Ovision guitar, and it was just having fun with
Speaker 1: you in a real good time, you know, and people
Speaker 1: you know, I'm a smoke split fun. It's just a
Speaker 1: good energy, just a good vibe. You know. I'm that
Speaker 1: says like And then I you never hear when the
Speaker 1: sound compete. You only hear when it come on the record.
Speaker 1: You hear pieces of with ideas of things, you know,
Speaker 1: and then you hear a record, So you never I
Speaker 1: never really him compete one song writing a song completely.
Speaker 1: You know you're already here a little bit sent pieces
Speaker 1: here and there. When your father became ill, was there
Speaker 1: a sense of urgency with him? Did his work take
Speaker 1: on him a new kind of seriousness? No, he was
Speaker 1: always urgent from him. I mean he was urgent from
Speaker 1: the get go, because there are a few examples of
Speaker 1: that kind of energy of his urgency, of his work, ethic,
Speaker 1: of his determination. So he was in the band Win
Speaker 1: that with with Bonnie and Peter the Street guys. Right,
Speaker 1: they were in his band and obviously have a world code.
Speaker 1: Because occurring to what he said in an interview is
Speaker 1: like and him said these words, he used my name,
Speaker 1: he says, if if you would think when Ziggie wants
Speaker 1: to go to school that he can say blah black.
Speaker 1: He didn't want to work, He didn't want to do
Speaker 1: this what you know, So he wants to work, you know,
Speaker 1: he he wants to get things done. There was always
Speaker 1: an urgency. There was never a lap time. There was
Speaker 1: named a lap time. There was always music. There was
Speaker 1: never and the like all right, let me take a vacation, No,
Speaker 1: I let me go chill out. No, there's no. It
Speaker 1: was like thirty six I mean how much year in
Speaker 1: thirty six years of like pushing you know, pushing and
Speaker 1: pushing and pushing it touring, never stopping, so that urgency
Speaker 1: fee was always there. Of all of his music, what
Speaker 1: are the songs that speak to you? Do most? The
Speaker 1: song that gets minimost redemption song? Because I remember shout
Speaker 1: haf Empass that was the album that was this album.
Speaker 1: That song was was the emotional spear, the emotional arrow.
Speaker 1: You know when you hear that song like that in
Speaker 1: that time it so that memory of that song I
Speaker 1: related to that time period and it was him and
Speaker 1: his guitar. It's so it's so soulful and just the
Speaker 1: final thing is just Himan guitar, and so that song
Speaker 1: always kind of have an emotional impact on me. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I wanted to know more about your childhood. There's a
Speaker 1: lot of moving around. Your family went to London right
Speaker 1: after the shooting, is that right? Yeah, but we we
Speaker 1: never got to land on so all right, So chrenchedtwne
Speaker 1: right changedtone where I was born in Chrenstone. We grew
Speaker 1: up in a chrenchedtone look a bit and then moved
Speaker 1: to Delaware where his modad moved I'd migrated to. So
Speaker 1: we lived in Delaware, Willimanton and Delaware. I went to
Speaker 1: school elementary school in Delaware for maybe a year or so.
Speaker 1: Then we'll move back to Jamaica, but we'll move out
Speaker 1: a chrenchedtone and moving to a place called Bulb, which
Speaker 1: is a much better standard of living. It's like, you know,
Speaker 1: not poor, but not rich. It's like the middle like
Speaker 1: middle class or something like that in Jamaica at the time.
Speaker 1: But it's funny. Within that middle class community where my
Speaker 1: mother live, we would still with our grand aunt and
Speaker 1: it was like we had to walk up the road
Speaker 1: and up the hill and she was living in a
Speaker 1: poor a poor class house with no water and no toilet,
Speaker 1: no nothing. So right, we didn't that middle class thing.
Speaker 1: There's right. If I went to my aunt, I was
Speaker 1: I was like I was in another neighborhood. And so
Speaker 1: we would stay with her a lot of times because
Speaker 1: mommy and Daddy would go on tour and then we
Speaker 1: would have to stay with grand and Auntie in that
Speaker 1: hose there. And then after that we moved to an
Speaker 1: upper middle class neighborhood now and then after after my
Speaker 1: father passed up, when mother moved us into a more
Speaker 1: upper class in the hills with a big hose and uh,
Speaker 1: lots of rooms and stuff like that. So yeah, that
Speaker 1: was a movement and we was fun as a child.
Speaker 1: Everything was a great learning experience, you know, this life
Speaker 1: with my family and my father and my mother and
Speaker 1: what they were going through. I was also learning from.
Speaker 1: At the same time, what's it like going back to
Speaker 1: Jamaica now? Let down? I haven't been back in a
Speaker 1: wire is still about going back when I went back
Speaker 1: last time? Jamaica? I mean a lot, A lot has
Speaker 1: changed another generation, A lot of the vibe has changed,
Speaker 1: the oldlook has changed. You know. I'm I'm a lot
Speaker 1: of more americanization of Jamaica. But the countryside is where
Speaker 1: the magic still remains. You know. The city, the city's side,
Speaker 1: I'm not so, I'm not. It's not a when we
Speaker 1: when we were growing up in a city. It wasn't
Speaker 1: like I met a big metropolitan turn city. It was
Speaker 1: like a little town and it was still had that
Speaker 1: vibe of like you're still in Jamaica, but no it
Speaker 1: kind of city kind of get a little more hectic,
Speaker 1: and so what the countryside is still weird. It's Jamaica
Speaker 1: has a vibe to it. You don't really get anywhere
Speaker 1: ees for me, you know, it's a very inspirational place. Um,
Speaker 1: if you find the right spot, you know. Yeah, yeah, Fleming,
Speaker 1: he wrote his ga bund stuff in Jamaica. Golden Eye,
Speaker 1: Golden Eye is written in Jamaica. Well, and I new
Speaker 1: pot Antonio. I think there's a there was a there
Speaker 1: was a house he state at. Yes, that's right. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: so plenty inspiration. Yeah, it's easy to see why Jamaicans
Speaker 1: have such an inflated sense of their own importance, because
Speaker 1: the whole world comes running very very Yeah. We'll talk
Speaker 1: about some of the photographs that mean the most to
Speaker 1: you in this book. My first question was how many
Speaker 1: of these photographs did you take, our other family members
Speaker 1: take and how many of them are professional photographs? Well, um,
Speaker 1: I didn't, We didn't take any. These aren't all photographs.
Speaker 1: These are professional. There's there's this friend never who used
Speaker 1: to do his lighting and designed his album, or don't
Speaker 1: have some photos in there. But with the book, what
Speaker 1: we what I try to do is um do a
Speaker 1: balance of those type of professionals like iconic images and
Speaker 1: with more like images of you know, just in real
Speaker 1: life outside of the musician, outside of the stage, you know,
Speaker 1: show some bad you know, show him beyond that and
Speaker 1: as I said in the book, try and make people
Speaker 1: even feel a deeper relationship too, because if you know
Speaker 1: someone just as your eye can are as you as
Speaker 1: a as a musician, I mean a singer, then that's
Speaker 1: one we have known him. But if you can't get
Speaker 1: a deeper understanding of his life during not seeing period
Speaker 1: of time beyond that, then you can feel even more
Speaker 1: connected to the person and that level. So that's what
Speaker 1: I was trying to do with the book, you know,
Speaker 1: but we never, unfortunate way at the time, we never
Speaker 1: really do a letter. You know, we never have cameras
Speaker 1: and we never have a camera. We never have a camera. Yeah,
Speaker 1: you know, photographers have cameras. We don't have cameras. With
Speaker 1: the process of going through all these photographs painful, what's
Speaker 1: the brought back all kinds of memories, yah know, but
Speaker 1: joyful not painful. I mean melan Calibo barbers are here.
Speaker 1: And when you look at the photograph and say, oh,
Speaker 1: what a young man, I'm fifty I'm fifty two, knows
Speaker 1: so when I look at him, he's like, we get
Speaker 1: this young guy, young kid, you know what I mean?
Speaker 1: Why you know, it's so that is a sad thing.
Speaker 1: But there's so much the joy overwear that. There's so
Speaker 1: much joy. I'm just looking at him and seeing him
Speaker 1: in that where where I know he was having a
Speaker 1: good time while he was doing it too. You know,
Speaker 1: he wasn't upstad he was having a good time. He enjoyed,
Speaker 1: He enjoyed his experience, you know what I mean. I said,
Speaker 1: So I feeling happier about that guy. I know he
Speaker 1: was having a good time doing it. You know, there's
Speaker 1: a fart we want to talk about the four Let's
Speaker 1: go to the p ninety seven China ninety seven. If
Speaker 1: you can't come from it seemed it seemed like at
Speaker 1: his home, in his home in the countryside. Yes, so
Speaker 1: this guy I used to we used to go to
Speaker 1: the country to him. This is the same time we
Speaker 1: used to go back with him and a chip and
Speaker 1: this this is just a real barb. You know, I'm
Speaker 1: gonna said, this is and these are the people, This
Speaker 1: is where Bob come from. These are his people, this
Speaker 1: is his roots. He was born on this land. And
Speaker 1: I mean, you can't see the guys he's coming to.
Speaker 1: He's either coming from the field. I go into the
Speaker 1: field him have some properly yea my stuff in that
Speaker 1: crocus bag you have there, and everybody. I mean, Bubba
Speaker 1: is just one of the people. He was just one
Speaker 1: of them. And as you can see, and he's talking,
Speaker 1: he's eating a banner and I'm talking to some of
Speaker 1: the kids them, you know, and some of them have
Speaker 1: shoes and some do have shoes on and they're laughing
Speaker 1: subab well, you know, in communication with people, of good
Speaker 1: communications skill with people, and you know, yeah, and just
Speaker 1: having fun. He was an entry in life. He's sitting
Speaker 1: and he's sitting on the stairs here on the next
Speaker 1: page over their pictures, is I mean he's so you
Speaker 1: can just tell how relacs and at home he is. Yeah, yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: but at the time this photo is taking, he's at
Speaker 1: the height of his fame. Yeah, man, after the assassination
Speaker 1: at him. So this is yeah, he's at the height
Speaker 1: right here. And this is as you see this, he's
Speaker 1: leaning on the other page, leaning up on the v
Speaker 1: W Van. This is so we had my mother had
Speaker 1: a beat her and he he would drive this v
Speaker 1: W van. I think those are the only two kinds
Speaker 1: of cars they were in Jamaica in those years, Vans
Speaker 1: and VW Beatles. So yeah, and yeah, some of these people.
Speaker 1: Some of them his cousins too. There's a couple of
Speaker 1: cousins in here. This is at the home and then
Speaker 1: this is the last further from that series. I think, um,
Speaker 1: if you go to the next bit, is him sitting
Speaker 1: down still in sentence, but he's alone, his guitars on
Speaker 1: the floor here on the ground right here, and he's
Speaker 1: he's beer foot also right there. This fortune always like,
Speaker 1: this is Bob. I think Bob was always like Alona,
Speaker 1: and he always felt alone although he had so many
Speaker 1: people around him. This is Bob. This is him, and
Speaker 1: he's like, this is his meditation. This is him like
Speaker 1: in his space, you know what I'm saying, alone and
Speaker 1: us vibing. I felt like he felt like he was
Speaker 1: always alone, um in somewhere, you know. This kind of
Speaker 1: represent that lundiness in a way. We'll be back with
Speaker 1: more from Ziggy Marley after this quick break. We're back
Speaker 1: with the rest of Malcolm's conversation with Ziggy Marley. As
Speaker 1: an added bonus, you'll hear the Live Talks Los Angeles
Speaker 1: moderator take questions from the audience at the end of
Speaker 1: Malcolm's interview. I love some of these group shots there's
Speaker 1: there's on page fifty there's this fantastic group shot with
Speaker 1: the band. Yes, all right, this fourth done was taken
Speaker 1: in in England. I was here. I was there. Oh
Speaker 1: really we were I underway to Zimbabwe. Are coming from Zimbabwe.
Speaker 1: That's why the next quarter of me, if you look
Speaker 1: at next quarter, this is England too. So this is
Speaker 1: this is a time period. We're there, um right before Zimbabwe.
Speaker 1: Are after Zimbabwe. We were in. Yeah. And I had
Speaker 1: went on the trip with him, and you know, football
Speaker 1: as he was. I had not realized the extent to
Speaker 1: which she was a soccer First of all, I know
Speaker 1: you're a son, but I want you to be honest.
Speaker 1: How good was he? That was good. I mean I
Speaker 1: remember he played against me when I was in um,
Speaker 1: you know, sometimes an appearance versus I was on a
Speaker 1: soccer team in elementary school and I remember he came.
Speaker 1: There was appearance versus you know, students, and you know,
Speaker 1: so he came and I was like, yeah, I'm marked
Speaker 1: this guy. I'm marked. I have this guy. I'll take him. Um.
Speaker 1: He was fast, which is good. Yeah, and he had
Speaker 1: a good kick and you're a good player. He was
Speaker 1: a good player, man, because he he id alized soccer player.
Speaker 1: One of his good friends was Alan Skillicode, who was
Speaker 1: like the top Jamaican player at the time, and they
Speaker 1: were good friends. So I mean he kept fit, he
Speaker 1: kept his workout. Was like a professional soccer player work card.
Speaker 1: You know, I've dominas, you know, running on the sand
Speaker 1: playing soccer like that was that was That was a
Speaker 1: work called there's a soccer player work called basically, and
Speaker 1: his friends, all of his friends were soccer players. I
Speaker 1: could play soccer. Yeah, he was drawn towards you know,
Speaker 1: people like that. You know, but Ziggy, to be a
Speaker 1: fan of Jamaican soccer, is it exercising masochism. It's like
Speaker 1: the I know that from my cousins. Nothing is more
Speaker 1: painful than this team that just loses and loses and loses. No,
Speaker 1: but the funny And we have some of the best
Speaker 1: players in the world. But I don't know. I think
Speaker 1: we had some great players and um, but we have
Speaker 1: the best runner. You always have the best runners, the
Speaker 1: fastest runner. That's all. But that's been true forever. Um.
Speaker 1: I want to talk a little bit about your own music,
Speaker 1: and you must have thought about you had this extraordinary
Speaker 1: gift which is the gift of your father and his legacy,
Speaker 1: but it also presents a challenge to kind of carve
Speaker 1: out your own identity and that how have you approached that?
Speaker 1: When I go back and look at my history, right,
Speaker 1: our family history, so we have musicians and artists on
Speaker 1: both sides of my family. A lot of people always
Speaker 1: talk about my father and legas and my mother was
Speaker 1: also key in um in everything. My mother was actually
Speaker 1: a keen. Bob's success wet my mother, Bob wouldn't be
Speaker 1: as successful. I wouldn't even have bod he has. She
Speaker 1: was the one who reintroduced him or introduced him to
Speaker 1: the Rassafara and culture, which had a big impact on
Speaker 1: him mentally and spirituality. She's the one who when they
Speaker 1: didn't have nothing, She's the one who gave him somewhere
Speaker 1: to sleep, and she was the one who slept on
Speaker 1: the floor with him in the studios, who sold records
Speaker 1: with him on their heads, riding their bicycles through through
Speaker 1: the streets. She was the one who got shut in
Speaker 1: her head the same time he got shut in her hand,
Speaker 1: and still showed up for the concert when other people
Speaker 1: are like, no, we're not going. She still had a
Speaker 1: bullet in her head. So her impact and his legacy
Speaker 1: and where we are is I always remember that too,
Speaker 1: you know, when I think about my um, what you
Speaker 1: just asked me about, you know, making my own way
Speaker 1: or whatever, I remember that what I have is that
Speaker 1: just coming in from my father's, coming from my mother,
Speaker 1: her grandfather, her father. My grandfather was a saxophone player.
Speaker 1: My father, mother and his family were all church people, singers,
Speaker 1: they're singing churches, and so the spirit there there's you know,
Speaker 1: so it's both sides. And for me, yes, I understand
Speaker 1: the question of my father and his wit or his
Speaker 1: impact and what it would mean to someone like me
Speaker 1: or a son of any person like Bob, and and
Speaker 1: how we kind of who we who choose to be
Speaker 1: in the same line of where kind of have to
Speaker 1: overcome whatever that thing is. So for me never really
Speaker 1: wasn't the forefront of my mind, and it wasn't the peripherals.
Speaker 1: And I heard it. I heard him thing, and I
Speaker 1: heard it, but I never paid much attention to it.
Speaker 1: I started seeking a spiritual part when I was a teenager.
Speaker 1: So my whole mentors see it was if I've being
Speaker 1: that because I was looking and it's because of my father.
Speaker 1: I was looking, you know, because I've his spirituality led
Speaker 1: me into search for my spirituality. And so for me,
Speaker 1: I was were past my ego of trying are thinking about?
Speaker 1: Are putting that persure and myself to leave up to
Speaker 1: the legacy, are to make my own name or make
Speaker 1: my own way. I don't need to make my own way.
Speaker 1: I just need to be myself. That will That will
Speaker 1: sound all the problem that I would start, the problem
Speaker 1: that people is asking a question about. I don't need
Speaker 1: to like try to do it. I just need to
Speaker 1: be true and then that that is what that is
Speaker 1: all it really is. And I also need to accept
Speaker 1: and I do accept that my father there's a part
Speaker 1: of me. There's gonna be similarities, There's going to be
Speaker 1: things that is like you know, it's like Bob, you
Speaker 1: know what I mean. So we're not trying to this
Speaker 1: um this stand to ourself from him in that way either.
Speaker 1: So there's no that's child that doesn't exist because I
Speaker 1: don't want to self from him because I am a
Speaker 1: part of him. Anyway, you cannot do that. Yeah, that
Speaker 1: sound car running away, you're running away, but you can't
Speaker 1: run away from yourself. You don't mess. So that is
Speaker 1: the way. That is howhy I really try. That is
Speaker 1: howhy I when I analyzed it myself after being asked
Speaker 1: that question, that is how I see myself. I've been
Speaker 1: dealt with it in that way, you know. And yeah, yeah, no,
Speaker 1: that's beautifully part. Yeah. Well, thank you, Ziggy. I think
Speaker 1: we have some questions, ted is that right? But this
Speaker 1: is like I said, the book. The book was so
Speaker 1: lovely and took me back to so many kind of
Speaker 1: wonderful memories of that era in Jamaica. And it's a
Speaker 1: real thrill to talk to you about it me too,
Speaker 1: same thing. All right, thank you, Malcolm. The first question,
Speaker 1: Ziggy is have you been to Ethiopia and can you
Speaker 1: say something about your connection and your father's connection to Ethiopia. Yeah,
Speaker 1: we were in Ethiope our years back to celebrate I
Speaker 1: think it was a sixth tieth one of those birthdays
Speaker 1: are Bob. Because obviously Ethiopia and it's history. We found
Speaker 1: a strong connection to true um, the Rastafari culture. It's
Speaker 1: a deep story because and I've probably living in Jamaica
Speaker 1: during the times of after independence, you know, where it's
Speaker 1: a post slaveryhere or whatever. The Christian faith and the
Speaker 1: filth that was forced upon us by the colonist was
Speaker 1: something that a sector of you know, Jamaica and started
Speaker 1: to turn against, like, you know, this is a slave
Speaker 1: master thing. You know, why God, why Jesus is a
Speaker 1: white guy with blue eyes and blah blah blah. Whereas, oh,
Speaker 1: who do we identify with it? And so Marcus Gather
Speaker 1: really started our whole conversation and this someone and said
Speaker 1: some stuff. You know, when Marcus was black thing and
Speaker 1: the black one and you know your black identity, that
Speaker 1: was a strong inspiration. And then when Rastafari start using
Speaker 1: the same Bible that was given to them by the colonists,
Speaker 1: to know, interpret it in a way that put an
Speaker 1: emphasis on this king in Ethiopia as the real as
Speaker 1: the common of another christ like individual in that philosophy,
Speaker 1: and that in that idea, a lot of people in
Speaker 1: Jamaica found are really independence, a full break from the
Speaker 1: colonialist not only the political independence, but the mental independence.
Speaker 1: And that was a rise of the Rastafaria culture and
Speaker 1: the connection with Ethiopa, with this king who within the
Speaker 1: Bible is still represented because he is a lineage of
Speaker 1: King Salomon and in the Bible say he will come
Speaker 1: again with the name King of Kings, Lord of Lord,
Speaker 1: Cankernana Tribal Judah. And this was the title that this manner,
Speaker 1: this manner has And so that strong connection to Ethiopia
Speaker 1: is far true that because Exodus, you know Barbad Alum
Speaker 1: called Exodus, and Exodus obviously is a relation to the
Speaker 1: struggraph is the israel people coming over to Egypt. And
Speaker 1: so we had a strong connection with that whole thing,
Speaker 1: with David and Salomon and um. So Rastafari come through
Speaker 1: that connection with its last i as a descent that
Speaker 1: of Salomon, and so Eupia was a big It was
Speaker 1: like oh um, Jerusalem or Mecca or whatever, you know, Yeah,
Speaker 1: that was it was like that for for Rastafari culture.
Speaker 1: So your siblings have crafted their own music careers. Um,
Speaker 1: the questioner asks, what is the relationship between your siblings
Speaker 1: both musically and and how you relate to each other today?
Speaker 1: So we grew up, all right, So we grew up.
Speaker 1: Let's come back home. We grew no. Because it's very
Speaker 1: important because all right, my father was married to my mother,
Speaker 1: but he had children with a wedlock, right, because obviously
Speaker 1: the wedlock is a colonial thing, and we don't deal
Speaker 1: with colonial things, you know, we're free or whatever. So
Speaker 1: that was my father's you know philosophy. After you learned things,
Speaker 1: they need us free yourself anyway. But so we always
Speaker 1: grew up, you know, when my father would take us
Speaker 1: to visit, like I'm the oldest son, right, so he
Speaker 1: would take me and sometime my brother Stephen, you know
Speaker 1: there's a new there was a new baby or a
Speaker 1: new you know, he would drive us to the host
Speaker 1: where where my brother, my other brother was who was
Speaker 1: not of my mother, and you know, he would visit
Speaker 1: and we would meet, you know, came on here, I
Speaker 1: meet Robbie or meet Roan or whoever it was. And
Speaker 1: my mother, now, which is the most important part of this,
Speaker 1: was always she was like the mother of all of them,
Speaker 1: like she was a mother of the children who she
Speaker 1: wasn't the mother of basically, so everybody would come to us,
Speaker 1: and you know, my mother would be the one who
Speaker 1: kind of take care of bob children, whether it was
Speaker 1: his child or not. And she is the one whenever
Speaker 1: she never taught us to like be like vindictive, our
Speaker 1: head full, our reason full of my father, are of
Speaker 1: the other children in no way we were just one family.
Speaker 1: So that's how we that's the lesson we have learned. Nobody.
Speaker 1: Nobody taught us that. Or you shouldn't like that guy
Speaker 1: because he's not your mother's son. We never learned that.
Speaker 1: So that's all we still are today. We get together
Speaker 1: every now and again, but we have a such a
Speaker 1: strong connection that we don't have that emotion, that deep
Speaker 1: emotional sadness are like oh I missed my thing or
Speaker 1: my brother or something like that. You know, we never
Speaker 1: grew up that way. We'll go up a little bit
Speaker 1: less emotional, I would say. So we don't have that
Speaker 1: in us. But we do have a connection um and
Speaker 1: a love for each other and I respect for each other.
Speaker 1: We never fight each other whenever, you know, we'll understanding
Speaker 1: each other and everybody understand each other. So that's how
Speaker 1: we live. Musically, me and my brother Steve, and we
Speaker 1: share out of music Demon. Steve is the one who
Speaker 1: nurtured Demon. We nurtured each other music basically, each of us.
Speaker 1: I hope Steve when he was young, Steve that his
Speaker 1: younger brother, and we just keep nurturing each other. So
Speaker 1: that's how it is. Final question has to do and
Speaker 1: there are several people who ask questions about musical collaborations.
Speaker 1: Is there anyone you would have liked to see your
Speaker 1: father have collaborated with that he did not get to
Speaker 1: And how do you feel about musical collaborations? Who would
Speaker 1: you like to collaborate with? No? Musical collaborations are good
Speaker 1: thing right? In some ways it is expanding each of
Speaker 1: the artists reach to other audiences, which is good. It
Speaker 1: is showing a true example of unification in a way
Speaker 1: where it can be two different types of music blending
Speaker 1: together to bring to make something new. I'm a very
Speaker 1: shy person, so I don't like to ask people a thing.
Speaker 1: I don't want to really like to ask people, you know,
Speaker 1: like hey can you do this something? You know? So
Speaker 1: I'm very shy like that. But for some reason this year, UM,
Speaker 1: during the COVID thing, I've done the most collaborations I've
Speaker 1: ever done in ten years, which is very strange. It's
Speaker 1: a very interesting time for me, um and how those
Speaker 1: come about. Where the first collaborations that I did last
Speaker 1: year was from my kids album, and I think when
Speaker 1: I the children music, I find it's a different a
Speaker 1: different state of mind. When I do the other other music.
Speaker 1: I don't know. Somehow I feel more um more comfortable
Speaker 1: with asking somebody to do something for children music, and
Speaker 1: it has something to do with that we have a
Speaker 1: charitable element to it, um, and so I'm much more
Speaker 1: comfortable doing that. So I did. I did a few
Speaker 1: big collaborations with Um being harp Sheryl Cruel, Alanis Morris said,
Speaker 1: Angelie Kidjo, Tommarella, Bust Rhymes. So my Kids album over
Speaker 1: like a bag of collaboration, which we really enjoy doing.
Speaker 1: And how I work collaboration is that we have a
Speaker 1: favorite connection. It can just be like a corporate deal.
Speaker 1: It can't be like, you know, just have a contractual relationship.
Speaker 1: It has to be something real. And that is why
Speaker 1: I haven't done a lot of collaboration. But all of
Speaker 1: these artists that are on that album I've done for years.
Speaker 1: We've done music together. You know, we talk and we
Speaker 1: take or whatever. So that's how I like to do collaborations.
Speaker 1: For Bob, I can't speak of late and that I do.
Speaker 1: I don't want to speak later. And that Bob, you know,
Speaker 1: he was in a collaborative band the way as he
Speaker 1: collaborated Peter and Bonny and I know, Um, Stephen won
Speaker 1: the Johnleman stage. I think the collaboration and there was
Speaker 1: also what's his name came back sage what the beatle
Speaker 1: dynam George Harrison. So I feel like, um Bob collaboration,
Speaker 1: collaborational spirit was one where if he was on stage
Speaker 1: and somebody wanted to come up, he would well come
Speaker 1: them up. Collab. He's a he's a social person, come
Speaker 1: on up and seeing. I don't nature about caught in. Um,
Speaker 1: I don't know about that, and there's no way I
Speaker 1: can't imagine it. I can't have a speak of it
Speaker 1: on that. Well, thanks for joining us, Ziggy Marley, and
Speaker 1: thank you Malcolm Gladwell for chatting with Ziggy. All right,
Speaker 1: welcome times, Well take care, let see if guys. Thanks you, Zicky,
Speaker 1: bye bye. Thanks to Ziggy Marley for sharing so many
Speaker 1: fascinating details about his life with Bob. The book he currated,
Speaker 1: Bob Marley Portrait of the Legend is available now and
Speaker 1: to hear a playlist of our favorite Bob and Ziggy
Speaker 1: Marley songs, check out the playlist we created at Broken
Speaker 1: record podcast dot com. Be sure to subscribe to our
Speaker 1: YouTube channel at YouTube dot com slash Broken Record Podcast,
Speaker 1: where you can find extended cuts of new and old episodes.
Speaker 1: You can follow us on Twitter at broken Record. Broken
Speaker 1: Records produced Helpful Lea Rose, Jason Gambrel, Martin Gonzalez, Eric Sandler,
Speaker 1: and Jennifer Sanchez, with engineer and help from Nick Chafee.
Speaker 1: Our executive producer is miil Bell. Broken Record is a
Speaker 1: production of Pushkin Industries and if you like the show,
Speaker 1: please remember to share, rate, and review us on your podcast.
Speaker 1: To app our theme music spect Kenny Beats, I'm justin
Speaker 1: Richmond Peace