Marley's Ghosts

By CHRISTOPHER JOHN FARLEY

There's a natural mystic blowing through the air. --Bob Marley

There is something mystical about the man and his music. Before Bob Marley, reggae was an island; after Marley, reggae was global. And almost 20 years after his death, Marley's influence is still growing. A dance remix of his hit Sun Is Shining is the No. 1 song in U.S. clubs. Next month an all-star tribute to Marley will be held in Oracabessa Bay, Jamaica, featuring performers ranging from Sarah McLachlan to Busta Rhymes (it will air on TNT Dec. 19). And next month Bob Marley: Soul Rebel (Thunder's Mouth; 144 pages; $22.95), by former Billboard reporter Maureen Sheridan, will be released, detailing the stories behind Marley's songs. Earlier this year a Marley-themed restaurant/ club opened at Universal Studios CityWalk in Orlando, Fla. The menu features Caribbean cuisine, and the decor is based on Marley's home in Kingston.

A Bob Marley restaurant? Strange. But listen to the music. "There's a natural mystic blowing through the air..."

One of the coolest new additions to the Marley catalog is the just-released CD Chant Down Babylon (Tuff Gong/Island). The album features duets with Marley and some of today's best hip-hop performers, including Lauryn Hill and Busta Rhymes. The hip-hoppers supply new vocals, while Marley's are drawn from alternate takes in decades-old recording sessions. "We got the idea, well, from Daddy basically," says Marley's son Stephen, who served as executive producer. "It was one of his dreams to get to the urban youth of America."

Marley's musical message is having no trouble finding new audiences. Legend, the Jamaican singer-songwriter's greatest-hits album, is, after 15 years and 10 million copies sold, still on the Billboard charts. Songs of Freedom, a four-CD boxed set of Marley's music, has been reissued after selling out its initial limited-edition run of 1 million copies. Chris Blackwell, head of the multimedia-entertainment company Palm Pictures and the man who signed Marley to Island Records, says Marley's lasting appeal is rooted in his approach to music. "His music was never overexposed at the time he was making it," says Blackwell. "He always maintained an underground feel, and so each new listener has that sense of discovery. That's what keeps him on the edge. That and the fact it's incredible music."

Marley, who died of cancer in 1981 at age 36, brought the Third World to the whole world. The dirt streets of the Jamaican slum of Trench Town, the myths and tales of the Caribbean, the wisdom and fire of the Old Testament--he drew from it all, creating reggae music, rebel psalms, that rang with poetry and prophecy. Romance, for him, was not incompatible with revolution; bullets and ballads were both the stuff of his work. He envisioned a world beyond this one but never lost sight of the horrors and joys of the here and now. "If you know what life is worth," he sang, "you will look for yours on earth."

A wide range of young performers, from Rage Against the Machine to Wyclef Jean, cite Marley as a role model. His legacy is a lot to live up to. Stephen Marley, who performs alongside his brother Ziggy in the reggae band the Melody Makers, says he has come to terms with it. "The thing is you have to accept that these songs are yours," he says. "Me having kids now, I know that any song I have is really my children's. Like my shoes, like my pants. Once they can fit in them, it's theirs. So that is the way I look at it."

The music on Chant Down Babylon slips on easily, like a father's shirt. Projects that pair living stars with dead ones can and should inspire a bit of terror in music fans; such endeavors leave artists we love posthumously vulnerable to pairings with Celine Dion. Fortunately, the matches on Chant Down Babylon, smartly managed by Stephen Marley, are both engaging and respectful. One standout: Lauryn Hill and Bob, sharing laughs and warmth across decades on Turn Your Lights Down Low. "It didn't feel as if I was recording with someone who wasn't there," says Hill, who has two children by Rohan Marley, one of Bob's sons. "It felt very contemporary." Stephen says during the recording of the CD, he could feel his father's spirit, even smell his sweet paternal presence in the studio.

Reggae ghosts? Spiritual aromas? Strange. But listen to the music.

"There's a natural mystic blowing through the air... "