IT was an early morning drive with a legend that inspired a reggae classic.

Anthony ‘Sangie’ Davis, 70, recalls the inspiration behind Wake Up and Live, a song from Bob Marley and the Wailers’ 1979 album, Survival.

Davis and Marley are credited as the track’s writers.

“It was early one Sunday morning … about 5:30…6:00, Bob come wake mi up. Him did just come back [to Jamaica]. Mi neva see him fi about two years due to the shooting at him house,” Davis recalls. “This was about ’78.”

Davis was born in the gritty community of Denham Town in west Kingston, and says he first met Marley in his earlier years in Trench Town. He was living in Grants Pen when the singer visited him.

“‘Bob sey, ‘Sangie, you nuh get yuh [drivers] licence yet?’ and I said: “Me get it Thursday,” says Davis, who currently performs as part of the Inna de Yard Band.

He recalls Marley handing him the keys to his yellow Volkswagen van and they headed to his (Marley’s) birthplace in Nine Miles, St Ann with two other friends.

On reaching Washington Boulevard, Davis says there was a massive road reconstruction project under way.

“They were widening the road, it was rocky and bumpy with potholes… and there were a whole heap of little signs like ‘Detour’,” he remembers.

“I don’t know how the inspiration come, but mi just sey: ‘Life is one big road with a lot of signs, so when you riding through the ruts, don’t you complicate your mind’.”

It was the song’s opening stanza.

On reaching what is now Mandela Highway, he says the inspiration continued.

“When we reached the vicinity of Ferry police station, I saw an Andrew’s [antacid] billboard with the words: ‘Wake Up and Live’.”

The song’s chorus was born.

“So, Bob sey: ‘Sangie, a one bad tune dat. By the time yuh done it, mi a go sing it’.”

Davis and Marley added lyrics to Wake Up and Live along the way and it was all memorised.

“By the time we reached Guinness factory, the song done,” says Davis.

Wake Up and Live is one of the popular songs from Survival, which Marley dedicated to freedom fighters in colonised Africa.

“I wrote three other songs for Bob… Babylon Feel This One, She Used to Call Me Daddy and Jingling Keys which were demos which came out after his death. Jingling Keys, I sang on that one,” he says.

Davis is also credited as writer of Make Ends Meet by Dennis Brown; Starvation, and Young One by Nadine Sutherland; Sophia George’s Girlie Girlie; and Tinga Stewart’s No Wey No Better Dan Yard.

Marley died in May, 1981 at age 36. He would have been 68 on Wednesday.