From the vantage point of fifty years, it seems altogether quaint to be reminded that Island Records’ Chris Blackwell judiciously edited the Wailers’ fifth album Catch A Fire. In his role as co-producer (with the titular leader and chief songwriter of the band Bob Marley), the co-founder of the label hired Muscle Shoals guitarist Wayne Perkins to overdub his guitar playing on the record.
The man who had once auditioned to join the Rolling Stones–in replacement of Mick Taylor circa Black and Blue–did yeoman’s work in applying an authentic rock patina to “Concrete Jungle,” “Baby We’ve Got A Date (Rock It Baby)” and “Stir It Up” (a hit for Johnny Nash with whom the Wailers had just toured prior to beginning the sessions for their group’s label debut )
On the first of those numbers, he was joined by Robbie Shakespeare on bass, while the first two aforementioned selections featured Tyrone Downie on keyboards (as well as John ‘Rabbit’ Bundrick, who also contributed to Free’s Heartbreaker album of 1973 and post-Keith Moon Who records and tours). These slightly more conventional recordings of Marley and company are very distinct from the more skeletal, haunting likes of “400 Years”
Hearkening to the R&B influences at the heart of the reggae style–besides foreshadowing the next Wailers record Burnin’– the intricately arranged harmony and counterpoint vocals there (supplemented by Rita Marley and Marcia Griffiths) also distinguish “All Day All Night,” one of the two cuts that, along with “High Tide or Low Tide,” are absent from the modified nine-track collection.
The infectious nature of such numbers suggests the decisions of the label’s founder/owner were sound, though perhaps for the wrong reasons: the reggae genre’s soon-to-be-global influence on music and culture seems inevitable with five decades of hindsight. Nevertheless, the end effect of the long-player (s) primed the world for that paradigm shift.
The mainstream popularity of Eric Clapton’s watered-down interpretation of “I Shot The Sheriff” the very next year doubtless helped in that regard. Still, Slowhand’s cover version sorely lacks the ominous air-pervading cuts like “Stop That Train,” not to mention the generally hypnotic, eminently danceable (and witty) quality of “Kinky Reggae.”
The forward-thinking Blackwell’s open-minded approach carries over into the Catch A Fire Deluxe Edition. It’s quite telling that the first disc of the double-CD set contains the album in all its spacious authenticity, with a playing time actually eight minutes or so longer than the thirty-six plus duration of the appended version. The salient point arising from both, however, is the palpable sense of band unity: this is the work of the Wailers, not Bob Marley and…
After all, Guitarist Peter Tosh composed two of the more overtly-political numbers (the aforementioned “Train” and “Years”) both of which are harbingers of things to come during his solo career. Such topical material also pervaded much of the latter-day timeline of Marley with a reconfigured lineup of Wailers (also missing original member Bunny who would depart after the next LP).
Within the archive package too is a replication of the first limited edition cover design by graphic artists Rod Dyer and Bob Weiner (credited solely to ‘The Wailers’). The original was actually hinged to open like a Zippo lighter to reveal the vinyl LP, while the alternate cover shot– Marley puffing on a giant spliff–festoons the front of the twenty-eight-page booklet in the vault set.
Essentially depicting both sides of the same exotic coin, inside and out, this configuration of Catch A Fire accurately mirrors the music it contains, sounds that have continued to reverberate with increasing profundity in the half-century since first issued.
