Bob Marley
Uprising Live! (Eagle Vision/Rockpalast)In Dortmund, Germany, on June 13, 1980, Bob Marley had less than a year left to live. Uprising, culmination of the singer’s revolutionary ska/pop/reggae since the early Sixties, was three days old. His band of Wailers were midway through a European tour, and as seen and heard on the DVD/2-CD Uprising Live!, the bandleader’s sweet soul tenor evidenced little of the elasticity or raw verve that took him from the ghetto to international acclaim. 2011’s Live Forever: The Stanley Theatre, Pittsburgh, PA, September 23, 1980, documents Marley’s last concert on double-disc audio with heartbreaking hoarseness, his body breaking down via the cancer consuming him from the toes up, but three months’ separation here makes all the difference. Catching fire halfway through his 70-minute performance with “Jamming,” Marley then bears down on “Exodus,” and “Natty Dread” bobs with life. Uprising touchstones “Zion Train,” “Work,” and “Coming in From the Cold” remain precious audio documents, but the revelation is the DVD, where even though the 35-year-old frontman looks a couple decades older than that, he’s hypnotic. The I Threes (wife Rita Marley, Judy Mowatt, and Marcia Griffiths) delay gratification by opening the CDs, but that same slot on video frontloads the show, battened down by surviving Wailer Aston “Family Man” Barrett on bass and his late, wiry brother Carlton beating rhythmic bewitchment. Manhandling the mic stand like James Brown, Marley’s deep trance on “Zion Train” begs your deep abiding praise to Jah.
This article appears in December 19 • 2014.
