{"id":61104,"date":"2020-10-02T09:00:00","date_gmt":"2020-10-02T07:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/pan-african-music.com\/bob-marley-survival\/"},"modified":"2021-02-03T15:02:03","modified_gmt":"2021-02-03T14:02:03","slug":"bob-marley-survival","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/pan-african-music.com\/en\/bob-marley-survival\/","title":{"rendered":"Bob Marley’s Survival: An album for Zimbabwe!"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

On October 2, 1979, Bob Marley & The Wailers released Survival<\/em>. A Pan-Africanist work like never seen before, which included the seminal hit \u201cZimbabwe\u201d.<\/strong><\/h4>\n\n\n\n

Bob Marley held somewhat the same vision as Andr\u00e9 Gide: “If it can be saved at all, the world will be saved by rebels.”<\/em> When the Jamaican singer and songwriter looks at what he calls “the survival of the world” in the album Survival, he is still a rebel, albeit already safe from his most troubled years of his youth in the slums of Jamaica, where he was literally struggling to eat and hence, survive. In 1979, Marley is a well recognized and established artist. With his past five albums, he\u2019s been supported by the mighty Island record label and by Chris Blackwell who even offered him a huge house on 56 Hope Road, in the upmarket neighborhoods of Kingston. But to literally ensure his own survival, Marley had to leave home for several years. On December 3, 1976, he miraculously escaped an assassination attempt at his home on Hope Road, which forced him into exile in London and then on to the Bahamas. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Back to Kingston, live and alive<\/strong><\/h5>\n\n\n\n

Three years and two albums later, he returned to record in Jamaica, and finally spoke out about this landmark moment in his life on “Ambush in the Night”, the closing track on Survival<\/em>, in which Marley tells how he owes his survival to \u201cthe power of the Almighty and the hand of His Majesty [Haile Selassi\u00e9]\u201d<\/em>. A lyrical conclusion to an album which opens with the whisper: “A little more drums!\u201d<\/em> gently requested by Marley at the start of “So Much Trouble in the World”. It\u2019s as if the singer had been caught red-handed in the act of his quest for perfection, giving orders to the sound engineer before going on to sing about this world\u2019s disorder and imperfections. These sort of spontaneous outbursts are rare on a studio album, simply because this type of commentary is usually made during the mix process, when the microphones are turned off. But Marley wants to recreate a “live vibe” <\/em>on this record, a highly organic and festive atmosphere of celebration on his return “home” \u2013 to his new Tuff Gong studio. \u201cI have amazing memories of the Survival sessions,\u201d<\/em> said Dean Fraser, a highly sought after saxophonist in Kingston to this day. \u201cThere was complete harmony between us. We were all bursting with ideas and energy! We even composed a double intro for the track \u201cWake Up And Live\u201d!\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The track sounds almost like a concert in which Marley even drops the singing at one point to ask all of those present, “how is it feeling over there?”<\/em> before Fraser launches into an improvised sax solo. This free-spiritedness is probably down to the fact that Island producer Chris Blackwell withdrew more and more to allow Marley to manage his own musical affairs; but also due to the collective energy that the singer instilled in a project that he initially wanted to call “Black Survival”, before finally deciding that his music was “for everyone!”<\/em>Marley nevertheless believes that survival is inherent with being Black. He carefully avoids talking directly about Jamaica, his own country, that sees violence and murder on a daily basis, but rather his story of Survival<\/em> speaks for the whole world in the late 1970s. The apartheid era which never ceases to tarnish the image of an Africa that is beginning to heal from the wounds of decolonization. Following Angola and Mozambique, Marley tirelessly sends support to Zimbabwe and South Africa, whose liberation seems to never see the light. In July 1979, the Wailers headline the Amandla Concert at Boston\u2019s Harvard University (along with Pattie LaBelle, Eddie Palmieri and Babatunde Olatunji). The funds raised from the concert are intended to give support the anti-apartheid struggle. On stage, he declares, \u201cone day soon the whole of Africa will be free!\u201d<\/em> A few months later, in October 1979, Survival became the first record to feature flags of newly independent countries still unknown to North American audiences, with an explanatory poster as a bonus.\n\n<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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\u00ab Africans are liberated, Zimbabwe \u00bb<\/strong><\/h5>\n\n\n\n

“Bob used to come up with the titles for the albums, but I would always suggest that he used a strong word like ‘Survival’, ‘Uprising’, ‘Confrontation\u2019,\u201d <\/em>says Neville Garrick, the designer of Marley\u2019s most famous front covers. \u201c<\/em>Survival was a very political album. I was immediately drawn to the new African flags and their green-yellow-red colors. I didn’t know all the countries, so I contacted the United Nations to make sure I wouldn’t forget any! Of course, I didn\u2019t include the apartheid-run South Africa. And then I also included shots of the holds of the slave ships where the slaves were crammed into. This drawing was supposed to represent the Black diaspora outside of Africa, otherwise I would have had to wonder if I should include a flag of Jamaica or of the United States! My issue was that Zimbabwe was still called Rhodesia and had a colonial flag. I finally included the flags of the two parties fighting for the country\u2019s independence, ZANU and ZAPU.\u201d<\/em> The record also features the famous song “Zimbabwe”. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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