Search - Bob Marley & Wailers :: Wailers And Friends: Top Hits Sung By The Legends Of Jamaica Ska

A bunch of other people AND THE WAILERS!!

Tom Plum | Roswell, NM United States | 08/12/2005

(4 out of 5 stars)

"Well, we have many albums that are called "Bob Marley & the Wailers" well this album features a variety of artists AND THE WAILERS, maybe it should be called A bunch of other people and the Wailers; often the Wailers nucleus of Bunny Livingston Wailer, Bob Marley and Peter Tosh adding harmony on the different tracks. In a few cases the Soulettes are added into the mix and lastly one duet of Bob and Marcia Griffiths is present too.



Now, I wish to make this point clear, vs. the track listing shown above with the audio samples, every song save tracks 5 and 13 which are duets have appended on each song as a certain artist's name "and the Wailers." I note above too, track 8 "Where's Sammy gone" does not even include the name of any artist. It is sung by Lord Brynner and the Wailers. Brynner hails from Trinidad and the liner notes state that whenever you see the name Lord used, it often means the artists comes from that other Caribean island.



I thought this CD would be like an old Bob Marley CD I had "Soul Shakedown", his early stuff, Trojan record label type of stuff, I was right in that it was some of the early Wailers music, but it actually involves a wide range of performers and has performances that expand approximately the years of 1964-1966 or so. It is rich in that context and I think any reggae/ska fan would find this to be a valuable collection even though song by song, I wonder if it is all that strong. Bob Andy's "I've got to go home" is one of the best reggae songs ever, but that one song does not make this collection the best of collections available. For Reggae Ska fanatics though it has historical value.



I had heard of Junior Braithwaite, an early Wailer but had not been exposed to any of his music previously. Sadly, like Peter Tosh, he also lost his life in a violent way, Braithwaite losing his life in 1999.



This album features a variety of performers and singers. I've read music reviews on Marcia Griffiths praising her as the Queen of Reggae Music and to be fair, I know other artists have been honoured with the same title. Her duet with Bob Marley, "Oh my darling" though, is a good enough song, a bit in a bluesy vein, a bit in the vein of some of those ol' '50s/early '60s types of love songs. But just when I think, well maybe she is the true Queen with those fine vocals, I listen to Rita Marley's 2 or 3 songs on this album and they seem equally good. That should give you an idea about the diverse selection of songs this album features in its 18 different tracks. Pictures of the old 45 singles are shown in the booklet included in the CD. I was not aware of Heartbeat records out of One Camp Street, Cambridge Massachussets. Rather impressive. As far as Bob himself goes, "Tell them Lord" is one of the standout songs of this compilation with a nice hook in the horns.



So many of the big names are here and the selection so diverse; it would almost seem to be unfair to forget some while speaking of others, however, "A time to cry" by Jackie Opel rings a bit like gospel music, a bit like Sam Cooke's "Long time coming." The Jamaican dialect of which many of us have come familiar with is present with the Rita Marley song "A deh pon dem", translate it for yourself. Reggae foreshadowing seems to be in songs such as Delroy Wilson's and the Wailers "I want justice"; but without a doubt still SKA.



Without a doubt songs like "That ain't right" are pure SKA, the horn sections are very prominent on this album, reggae like guitar rhythm is here too but you might have to track it down. Horn players again include too many names to mention almost, but they are there, some Skatalites, some others; Tommy McCook, Roland Alphonse even some Don Drummond on Trombone. "Jerk all night", is an excellent tune and the booklet explains that it was a dance back then, in the US and other places. This was Jamaica's contribution to that fad, however, it has a rhythm that sounds some what like that AM hit, "Waitin' for my Ya Ya"; but not as pop with coolly blown Ska horns performed by Delroy Wilson & The Wailers. On that same topic, I'd like help on this one. "Friends and Lovers" sung by Rita Marley, the Wailers and the Soulettes I believe has a touch of the Sand Pipers version of "Guantanamera", the Cuban song in it. I am not criticizing them for this. Jamaican, Reggae artists have sung the song "Guajira Guantanamera." It is such a great song, I'm sorry they did not do not do a straight ahead version of it but not only that about this song,in the song credits, "Sloopy II" is listed and truly, it seems to have some of the rhythm of "Hang on Sloopy" as well, if that should sound odd enough, it is! And with that, speaking in regards to recording quality, it seems that each of the 18 tracks from Studio One have been well done though the liner notes may mention something about records being used in the event the original tapes could not be found.



Worthy of consideration to add to any Ska or Reggae collection but in it's overall strength I can't give it a 5 star rating. The opener is Bob Andy, reknown as the song writer with the golden pen singing what the liner piece calls a masterpiece "I've got to go back home" which sounds like the groundation of Mighty Diamonds sorts of medleys, Bunny Wailer and Constantine Walker singing a harmony you've got to hear. I heard over twenty years ago, the instumental appearing on Sly Dunbar's "Sly-Go-Ville", "The River Niger"; Throughout all this time, I had heard a lot of music, maybe not as much as some but to me, that song was the best I had heard. Now, I think this Bob Andy song is right up there as well."