Rolling Stone mag names 4 Rock acts among ‘500 greatest’
Four Jamaican acts have made Rolling Stone Magazine’s The 500 Greatest Albums of All Time, which was released by that publication on December 31.
This is the fourth edition of the series which previously came out in 2003, 2012 and 2020.
The albums are Exodus by Bob Marley and the Wailers at #48, Catch A Fire by The Wailers at #140, Original Soundtrack The Harder They Come at #174, Toots And The Maytals’ Funky Kingston at #344, and Red from Black Uhuru at #466.
All the albums were distributed by Island Records.
The number of Jamaican reggae albums on the current table increased by two since the last ‘500 Greatest Albums’. Legend, the 1984 compilation by Marley and The Wailers, was #48 three years ago, with Exodus at #71 and Catch A Fire at #140.
What’s Going On, Marvin Gaye’s powerful statement album from 1971, again topped the list. Pet Sounds, the 1966 set from The Beach Boys, also retains its #2 slot.
Recorded in the United Kingdom, Exodus was released in 1977 by Island Records.
Marley left Jamaica in December 1976 after he was shot at his Kingston home in what many believed was a politically-motivated incident.
The 10-song set includes staples such as the title song, Natural Mystic, So Much Things to Say, Jamming, Waiting In Vain, Three Little Birds, and One Love/People Get Ready.
In 1999, Time magazine named Exodus Best Album of The 20th Century.
“As the title suggests, this album wasn’t recorded in Jamaica; after Bob Marley took a bullet in a 1976 assassination attempt, he relocated the Wailers to London. But tracks such as Jamming are still suffused with the deep essence of reggae and life at home. Three Little Birds, for example, had been written on the back step of Marley’s home in Kingston, where he would sit and smoke herb. Each time Marley rolled a spliff, he would discard the seeds – and the birds of the song’s title would pick them up. ‘The music have a purpose,’ Marley said, and his spiritual intent was never clearer than on the anthem One Love, with its message of redemption and revolution,” read the Rolling Stone review.
