The Wailers
The Wailers | |
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Bob Marley and The Wailing Wailers at the Summer of '80 Garden Party at the Crystal Palace Concert Bowl on June 7, 1980 |
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General information | |
Genre (s) | Reggae , roots reggae , ska , rocksteady |
founding | 1963 |
Website | www.wailers.com |
Founding members | |
Bob Marley († 1981) | |
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 .
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 placements (Year, title, rankings, weeks, awards, notes) |
Remarks | ||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
DE | AT | CH | UK | 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
UK
|
US171 (5 weeks) US |
First published: April 13, 1973
Sales: + 200,000 |
Burnin ' | - | - | - |
UK-
silver
UK
|
US151
gold
(6 weeks)US |
First published: October 19, 1973
Sales: + 660,000 |
|
1974 | Natty Dread | - | - | - |
UK43
gold
(5 weeks)UK |
US92 (28 weeks) US |
First published: October 25, 1974
Sales: + 200,000 |
1976 | Rastaman vibration | - | - | - |
UK15th
gold
(13 weeks)UK |
US8th
gold
(22 weeks)US |
First published: April 30, 1976
Sales: + 707,500 |
1977 | Exodus |
DE-
gold
DE
|
AT21 (4 weeks) AT |
- |
UK8th
platinum
(58 weeks)UK |
US20th
gold
(24 weeks)US |
First published: June 3, 1977
Sales: + 1,500,000 |
1978 | Kaya |
DE-
gold
DE
|
- | - |
UK4th
gold
(24 weeks)UK |
US50
gold
(17 weeks)US |
First published: March 23, 1978
Sales: + 1,450,000 |
1979 | Survival |
DE40 (23 weeks) DE |
- | - |
UK20th
silver
(6 weeks)UK |
US70 (14 weeks) US |
First published: October 2, 1979
Sales: + 510,000 |
1980 | Uprising |
DE5
gold
(66 weeks)DE |
AT6 (6 weeks) AT |
- |
UK6th
gold
(17 weeks)UK |
US45
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
(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 on May 30, 1980 live during a concert at the Hallenstadion in Zurich , Switzerland .
Peter Tosh on the Bush Doctor Tour, 1978.
Bunny Wailer at the Smile Jamaica Concert , 2008.
- Robert "Bob" Nesta Marley , lead vocals / rhythm guitar / percussion (1963–1981)
- Winston Hubert McIntosh "Peter Tosh" , vocals / lead guitar / organ / keyboard (1963–1974)
- Neville O'Reilly Livingston "Bunny Wailer" , vocals / percussion (1963–1974)
- Franklin Delano Alexander "Junior" Braithwaite , vocals / bass (1963–1965)
- Beverley Kelso , background vocals (1963–1965)
- Cherry Smith , background vocals (1963-1965)
Bob Marley and the Wailing Wailers (1965-1974)
Aston Barrett in Tucson , Arizona on March 22, 2008.
- Robert "Bob" nesta Marley , lead vocals / rhythm guitar / percussion (1963–1981)
- Winston Hubert McIntosh "Peter Tosh" , vocals / lead guitar / organ / piano (1963–1974)
- Neville O'Reilly Livingston "Bunny Wailer" , vocals / percussion (1963–1974)
- Aston "Family Man" Barrett , bass guitar / percussion (1969–1981)
- Carlton "Charlie" Barrett , drums (1969–1981)
- Earl "Wire" Lindo , keyboard / organ (1972–1974)
Bob Marley and the Wailing Wailers (1974-1981)
Judy Mowatt at a concert in the amusement park Gröna Lund in Stockholm , Sweden on June 15, 1977.
Al Anderson , Cardiff , 1978
- Robert "Bob" Nesta Marley , lead vocals / rhythm guitar / percussion (1963–1981)
- Aston "Family Man" Barrett , bass guitar / percussion (1969–1981)
- Carlton "Charlie" Barrett , drums (1969–1981)
- Earl "Wire" Lindo , keyboard / organ (1978–1981)
- Albert "Al" Anderson , lead guitar (1978–1981)
- Donald Hanson Marvin Kerr Richards Junior "Junior Marvin" , lead guitar / back vocals (1977–1981)
- Tyrone Downie , keyboard / synthesizer / back vocals (1975, 1977–1980)
- Alvin "Seeco" Patterson, percussion (1974–1981)
-
I-Threes :
- Alpharita Constantia Marley Anderson "Rita Marley" , back vocals (1974–1981)
- Marcia Griffiths , Backgesang (1975–1978, 1980–1981)
- Judy Mowatt , Backgesang (1974–1981)
The Wailers Band (1981-present)
- Donald Hanson Marvin Kerr Richards Junior "Junior Marvin" , lead vocals (1981–1997, 2005-present)
- Gary "Nesta" Pine , lead vocals (1997-2005)
- Aston Francis "Family Man" ("Fams") Barrett , bass guitar (1981-present)
- Carlton "Charlie" Lloyd Barrett , drums (1981–1987)
- Albert "Al" Anderson , lead guitar (1981-present)
- Earl "Wire" Lindo , keyboard / organ (1981-present)
- Alvin "Seeco" Patterson, percussion (1981-present)
Guest members
- Joe Higgs , vocals / percussion (1973, after Bunny Wailer's departure)
- Constantine Vision Walker , Backgesang (1966 with some appearances in the USA)
- The Upsetters , additional volume for reinforcement (1967–1969; Upsetters at that time still with the Barrett brothers)
- Andrew McIntyre , rhythm guitar (1989–1994)
- Patrick Merchant Grundner, lead vocals (Summer 1998, European tour)
- Earl "Chinna" Smith , lead guitar (1976)
- Donald Kinsey , lead guitar (1976, 1979)
- Ian Wynter , keyboard (1980, on the short Uprising tour of the USA in September)
- Bernard "Touter" Harvey , keyboard (1974, on the Natty Dread album)
- Lee Jaffe , harmonica (1975, at the beginning of the Natty Dread tour)
- Neville Garrick , percussion (1978–1980; actually light effects, percussion at open air concerts)
- Devon Evans , percussion (1979, on the survival tour)
- Glen Da Costa , tenor saxophone (1979)
- David Madden , trumpet (1979)