The Wailers

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The Wailers
Bob Marley and The Wailing Wailers at the Summer of '80 Garden Party at the Crystal Palace Concert Bowl on June 7, 1980
Bob Marley and The Wailing Wailers at the Summer of '80 Garden Party at the Crystal Palace Concert Bowl on June 7, 1980
General information
Genre (s) Reggae , roots reggae , ska , rocksteady
founding 1963
Website www.wailers.com
Founding members
Bob Marley († 1981)
Vocals, lead guitar , piano , organ
Peter Tosh († 1987)
Vocals, drums
Bunny Wailer
singing
 Junior Braithwaite († 1999)
Beverley Kelso
Background vocal
 Cherry Smith († 2008)

The Wailers (also known as The Wailing Wailers , Bob Marley and the Wailing Wailers or today The Wailers Band ) is a Jamaican roots reggae band. To this day it is the best known and most successful reggae formation .

history

In the early 1960s, Franklin Delano Alexander Braithwaite (aka Junior Braithwaite ) and backing singers Beverley Kelso and Cherry Smith formed a band called The Teenagers and shortly thereafter renamed them The Wailing Rudeboys .

The musician Joe Higgs brought Peter Tosh to play the guitar. Through him, Tosh met Robert Nesta Marley (aka Bob Marley ) and Neville O'Reilly Livingston (aka Bunny Wailer ) in the early 1960s , who had moved to Kingston with their families from the small village of Nine Miles .

Together the three founded the band The Wailers (later also The Wailing Wailers ) with The Wailing Rudeboys in 1963 .

Driven by Higgs, The Wailers worked on arrangements. Encouraged by him, they finally got at the end of 1963 for an audition date with Clement Seymour "Sir Coxsone" Dodd in his Studio One .

The result was a number of successful releases on Studio One such as the first song Tosh sang, Hoot Nanny Hoot or One Love. In February 1964, The Wailers even landed a number one hit in Jamaica with Simmer Down (although this was still Ska style ). Many well-known songs followed until Junior Braithwaite and the two backing singers left The Wailers in 1965. Because of this, The Wailers soon broke with Clement Dodd's record company and signed to Rainford Hugh's "Lee Scratch" Perry label , Upsetter Records . Although this collaboration did not pay off financially, it brought all three musically further, and so The Wailers remained the most successful group on the island.

In 1970 two new musicians joined the band: the brothers Aston Francis "Family Man" ("Fams") Barrett and Carlton Lloyd "Carlie" Barrett , who acted as bassist and drummer, respectively. During this time, the music that had been dominated by ska changed to rocksteady to what went down in music history as roots reggae .

The mutual ways with Perry separated in 1972. The Wailers signed a contract with the Englishman Chris Blackwell and with his label Island Records .

The band's own label, Tuff Gong

By that time they had already started their own label called Tuff Gong . They set up the studio at 56 Hope Road in Bob Marley's house.

On April 13, 1973 the album Catch a Fire , one of the first roots reggae works, was released and raised reggae to a completely new level. Songs like Trenchtown Rock , Stir It Up or the Tosh-Marley co-production Get Up, Stand Up made the Wailers world-famous musicians.

However, as international success grew, so did the tensions within the group. Tosh in particular didn't trust Blackwell and also noticed that Marley was becoming a big star, while the other Wailers are in his shadow. The highlighting of Marley's later also leads to the renaming of the band Bob Marley And The Wailing Wailers . After Tosh and Livingston were mostly only allowed to appear as backing singers on the album Burnin ' , irreconcilable rifts arose which led to their separation in 1974. Tosh left the band.

Bunny Wailer always remained on friendly terms with Bob Marley. The background vocal trio I-Threes formed , consisting of Bob Marley's wife Alpharita Constantia Marley Anderson (alias Rita Marley ), Marcia Griffiths and Judy Mowatt . In addition, some new musicians were added to the band.

Even after Marley's death in 1981, The Wailers continued their tours; Since 1963 until today the band has changed several times in almost all positions, but is still active on tour and mainly plays the old songs of Marley at their concerts. Without Bob Marley, however, The Wailers quickly sank into insignificance outside of the reggae scene and are barely noticed by the general public. In 1987 Carlton Barrett was shot and Peter Tosh murdered, suspected of having private or financial disputes, as well as political motives. On June 2, 1999, Junior Braithwaite was murdered.

In 1986 the album Jerusalem was released , which emerged from a collaboration with Alpha Blondy and was produced by Tuff Gong .

Discography

Studio albums

year title Top ranking, total weeks, awardChart placementsChart placementsTemplate: chart table / maintenance / without sources
(Year, title, rankings, weeks, awards, notes) 		Remarks
DE DE AT AT CH CH UK UK US US
1965 The wailing wailers - - - - -
First published: 1965
1970 Soul Rebels - - - - -
First published: December 1970
1971 Soul Revolution - - - - -
First published: July 1971
1972 African Herbsman - - - - -
First published: July 27, 1972
1973 Catch a Fire - - - UK-
gold
gold
UK 		US171 (5 weeks)
US
First published: April 13, 1973
Sales: + 200,000
Burnin ' - - - UK-
silver
silver
UK 		US151
gold
gold

(6 weeks)US
First published: October 19, 1973
Sales: + 660,000
1974 Natty Dread - - - UK43
gold
gold

(5 weeks)UK 		US92 (28 weeks)
US
First published: October 25, 1974
Sales: + 200,000
1976 Rastaman vibration - - - UK15th
gold
gold

(13 weeks)UK 		US8th
gold
gold

(22 weeks)US
First published: April 30, 1976
Sales: + 707,500
1977 Exodus DE-
gold
gold
DE 		AT21 (4 weeks)
AT 		- UK8th
platinum
platinum

(58 weeks)UK 		US20th
gold
gold

(24 weeks)US
First published: June 3, 1977
Sales: + 1,500,000
1978 Kaya DE-
gold
gold
DE 		- - UK4th
gold
gold

(24 weeks)UK 		US50
gold
gold

(17 weeks)US
First published: March 23, 1978
Sales: + 1,450,000
1979 Survival DE40 (23 weeks)
DE 		- - UK20th
silver
silver

(6 weeks)UK 		US70 (14 weeks)
US
First published: October 2, 1979
Sales: + 510,000
1980 Uprising DE5
gold
gold

(66 weeks)DE 		AT6 (6 weeks)
AT 		- UK6th
gold
gold

(17 weeks)UK 		US45
gold
gold

(23 weeks)US
First published: June 10, 1980
Sales: + 1,500,000
1983 Confrontation DE31 (16 weeks)
DE 		AT18 (4 weeks)
AT 		- UK5 (19 weeks)
UK 		US55
gold
gold

(15 weeks)US
First published: May 23, 1983
Sales: + 600,000

gray hatching : no chart data available for this year

Tours

  • Catch a Fire Tour
  • Burnin 'Tour
  • Natty Dread Tour
  • Rastaman vibration tour
  • Exodus tour
  • Kaya tour
  • Babylon by Bus Tour
  • Survival tour
  • Uprising tour

Band members

The (Wailing) Wailers (1963-1965)

Bob Marley and the Wailing Wailers (1965-1974)

Bob Marley and the Wailing Wailers (1974-1981)

The Wailers Band (1981-present)

Guest members

Web links