WORDS OF
WISDOM
"Everybody thought that everything was Bob, they didn't realise that Familyman was
the man that did all the arranging of the songs. He was the man that played most of the
parts on the songs. And it was a team effort, Bob saw himself as a part of the team, not
the leader of the team. In fact the leader of the band has always been Familyman, even in
Bob's time. But it wasn't something that we went out and publicly said to anyone, so
people always felt that Bob was everything and we were just a bunch of guys behind him.
But he would just write the chords ans we would finish the songs for him." Junior
Marvin, London 1989.
"It is man's duty to do what is righteousness, and that will elevate the body and the
spirit. It is not my duty to put you in a religion, because this is not a religion -most people
think it is- it's a way of life. It's not to wear dreadlocks that makes you a Rastaman. It's
not to eat ital food alone that makes you a Rastaman. It's not to play reggae music that
makes you a Rastaman. It's to live the divinity, and the divine principles before you can be
a Rastman." Peter Tosh, Africa 1983.
An Italian journalist commented "You praise Haile Salassie, the king for you
Jamaican's but I was told that he was a dictator and he killed students". To
which Bob replied: "In Italy only the Mafia exist and all Italians eat is
just pizza. Is this true? "No" the journalist replied and Bob said "This is
what the newspapers write about you abroad. Do not believe everything you
hear and read" Italy 1980
".Me have to laugh
sometimes when dem scribes seh me like Mick Jagger or some superstar like that. Dem
have to listen close to the music, 'cos the message not the same." Bob Marley,
Rolling Stone, 1976
".Anything can
happen in music, we only experiment. It's never wise to limit yourself. Them people think
I should do the same thing this year as last! Maybe them people don't like it, but new
people like it. You can't stay in one place" Bob Marley - 1974
"Government
sometimes maybe not like what we have to say because we say it too....plain." Bob
Marley - June, 1975
"Me don't want fight
no guy with no guns. Me mustn't fight for my rights, my rights must come to me. You
stand up for your right and don't give up the fight, but you don't fight for your
right." Bob Marley - 1975
"I have a duty to tell
the truth as I have been told it. I will keep on doing it until I am satisfied the people have
the message that Rastafari is the almighty and all we black people have redemption just
like anyone else. Not for money will I do anything man, but because I have something to
do." Bob Marley - June, 1976
"Is God who make
everybody, and him make a way for the black man that the white man have to follow,
because out of the black man came the white man, all white men." Bob Marley -
July,1978
"My greatest
influence was the drifters - "Magic Moment", "Please Stay", those
things. So I figured I should get a group together." Bob Marley - February, 1973
"They don't want fe
trick you, them want fe trick your mind, that's the thing I don't like. You have eyes, you
have ears, you can talk, you can smell and yet him want fe trick your mind. Is better
somebody ask you for something and get it rather than try to trick me fe take it. I know
who God is, so how can you trick me? I'm no fool." Bob Marley - 1980
When asked, do you fear
anything? "Me? Nah. Well, me don't swim too tough so me don't go in the water
too deep." Bob Marley - July, 1975
"We have a song
called 'Jah Live'. Them on the news say that our God is dead. But, you know, is them
don't understand. Them don't understand. We have a name, 'Crazy Baldheads', and we
have one named 'Roots'. We're gonna chase those crazy baldheads outta town. That's
about the system and the things what happen around here. Like, for instance, we build the
cabin, we plant the corn, our people slave for this country. Now, you know what I mean,
today they look upon me with a scorn. Yet, them eat up all our corn. So we have to chase
those crazy baldheads outta town. Ain't nuthin' else we could do. We can't stand and let
them bury us. Enough of that sheet! Because we plant the corn, yuh know. We build the
cabin, we plant the corn and we build the country. Yet you have guys that look for
Rastaman and say, 'You know Rasta, deh no good!' It's our sweat that walk on every day.
Our blood and sweat." Bob Marley -1976
"It's no great
pleasure to sing about suffering because me no feel like people should really suffer and it
is not a great thing to sing about suffering. But you have to sing about it cause it a go
on." Bob Marley - February, 1978
"What we really
need is the right to be right and the right to be wrong" Bob Marley - June, 1976
"Why people drink is
they want feeling I get when I smoke herb. Everybody need to get high but some people
getting high with the wrong things. When you smoke herb it reveals you to yourself. All
the wickedness you do is revealed by the herb - it's you conscience and gives you an
honest picture of yourself." Bob Marley - June, 1976 & September, 1980
"Overcome the
devils with a thing named Love." Bob Marley - June, 1975
"You find that most
people, when they get money, they get withdrawn and foolish. Money is not my richness.
My richness is to live and walk on the earth barefoot." Bob Marley - October, 1975
"I Have a sister, ya
know. My father was her father but she has a different mother. I knew about her since I
was a youth, and alla time I search for her. Once time, when I was in my twenties, I find
her. She was workin' in a dry cleaners in Kingston. I talked with her for just a few
minutes and then we said goodbye, me thinking I was gonna see her again. But when I go
back a few days later she is gone. I never found her again. It was a painful thing, not to
know her." Bob Marley - August, 1978
"If God had'na given
me a song to sing, I wouldn't have a song to sing. The song comes from God, all the
time." Bob Marley - June, 1976
"I don't see how you
can leave your roots. As long as you write a song and play it, it must be roots.."
Bob Marley - June, 1976.
"God never made no
difference between black, white, blue, pink or green. People is people, y'know. That is
the message we try to spread." Bob Marley - June, 1976.
"Plenty people have
the wrong idea about this locks thing. Like I read in a magazine: 'Marley came onstage
with his waxed locks'. Now that is very much a lie because I could never sit down and put
wax in my hair, my wool, to keep it together. It would be clammy and stink man. Them
blind man! This come natural." Bob Marley - June, 1975
"I've been here
before and will come again, but I'm not going this trip through." Bob Marley -
1979
"We need positive
vibrations. 'Cause first thing you cannot be ignorant you have to be very intelligent. Want
to cut the negative thing out entirely, negative, outside. Have to be positive. It's what your
mouth say, kill you. And the greatest thing is life." Bob Marley - June
1975
" Music is the
biggest gun, because it save. It nuh kill, right? The other gun lick off ya head!" Bob
Marley - June 1978
"When the time
comes, people will seek the truth in all things. They get it when they are ready to hear
it." Bob Marley - August 1978
"A certain word can
hold you out from the truth a long while; like people can use the word Babylon and have
no understanding of what Babylon is. So he becomes an idiot, he becomes more chained
'cause a thing is right or wrong. If you're right you're right, if you're wrong you're
wrong." Bob Marley - July 1975
"What is there to
benefit from badness? I wondered, looked at it and thought bwais, bloodclaat, if I thump
this man here, I feel the contact too. And then I said it's the same God that lives in my
hand and that means it's not him I thump, it's God I'm really thumping." Bob
Marley - July 1979
"It's not music right
now, we're dealing with a message. Right now the music not important, we're dealing
with a message. 'Rastaman Vibration' is more like a dub kinda album and it's come
without tampering y'know. Like 'War' or 'Rat Race', the music don't take you away, it's
more to listen to. Rastaman Vibration's gonna cover the earth! Like the water cover the
sea!" Bob Marley - June, 1976
"We call ourselves
de Wailers because we started out cryin'"
Bob Marley - 1972
"Me love farming.
Me wanna live 'pon a farm later. Me no really wanna live in a flat and go to a club every
night and come back, and then do it again"
Bob Marley - April 1977
"Don't look on
people as something else, look on people just as people. God's creations. I don't check the
paper or check the book, I just go on feelings."
Bob Marley - June, 1976
"My music will go
on forever. Maybe it's a fool say that, but when me know facts me can say facts. My
music will go on forever."
Bob Marley - June, 1975
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