Customer Reviews

Rasta Revolution

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

An overlooked, underated, seminal landmark of an album, not only for the Wailers but for Reggae in general. The production (Lee Perry), musical, and vocal arrangements on this album were groundbreaking. The Wailers experimented in ways they had not done before or after. Unique, original, raw, and stripped down. If you think "Legend" is the best the Wailers had to offer then this may not be your cup of tea. But if you're a budding Wailers/Reggae fan looking to expand your horizons this would be essential for your collection.

The songs on this compilation are great, but pass on this release and go for "Soul Rebels" which is a superior collection of these tracks. "African Herbsman" also a wonderful collection of the earlier Marley stuff. "AH" is best in its remastered, 26 track form.

Bob Marley and the Wailers as Motown band. So damn groovy and brilliantly stoned. For my purposes, this weirdly-recorded version of Bob Marley and the Wailers beats the crap out of every other recording they did. "Mr. Brown" is my favorite Reggae song. Mistress Brown is a clown who rides through town in a coffin. Oh what the confusion?

"Rebel's Hop", "Try Me", "Soul Rebel", and "Cold Water" are the other standout songs. But, really, nobody should have a problem listening to this thing from beginning to end repeatedly.

Here is a real band, with a certain spark, a tautness that seems to be lacking from the mature Wailers, and from 70's reggae in general. I find their very next release, African Herbsman, already considerably less exciting. This is one of the tightest, freakiest rhythm-section recordings I've ever heard. Always that behind-the-beat feeling, but even at its most laid-back it reminds me of James Brown or something in its supple, effortless complexity, the alert sensitivity of each musician. Listen to the bass lines too closely and you are at risk of seizure. Staccatto organ and plucky, out-of-tune guitars fill out the chords, but the star of the music is the percussion. There seems to be a second guitarist who does nothing but scratch his instrument like a washboard. And the loudest thing in nearly every mix is the shaker, yes the shaker, three times louder than the vocals, which is the kind of pleasurable eccentricity you expect from a Lee Perry production.

Then there are the songs, which are great, still showing a direct influence from American R&B (there's a cover of "Try Me"), and he doesn't seem to be preaching about Jah all time, or maybe he is, but I can't understand a word of the delightfully thick dialect. The Wailers' all-male, falsetto backups have a humor to them, like singing forest animals in an old cartoon. You will recognize several of the songs ("Soul Rebel", "Duppy Conqueror", "Corner Stone", "400 Years", "Soul Almighty") from later versions, re-recorded for the U.S. market. Predictably, the versions here are far fresher.

These tracks were recorded in 1970 and originally released in '74 under the name Soul Rebel - not to be confused with a later collection called Soul Rebels - and I believe there's something else out there called Rasta Revolution - but don't be led astray, this is the one that begins with the song 'Mr. Brown'. Available domestically now, for the first time ever! I'm curious to hear the 2-disc set called Rebel Revolution, which apparently offers extended mixes of these songs and others from the same period.