Bunny Wailer, a founding member of the Wailers and a giant of reggae music whose career spanned seven decades, has died at the age of 73.
Wailer’s manager, Maxine Stowe, confirmed that Wailer died Tuesday at Medical Associates Hospital in Kingston, Jamaica (via the Jamaica Observer). No cause of death was given, but Wailer has been in and out of the hospital since suffering his second stroke in 2020. A representative of the musician did not immediately respond to Rolling clip‘s request for comment.
Wailer, born Neville Livingstone – before adopting his famous monk, also known as Bunny Livingstone – was a member of the original Wailers trio with Bob Marley and Peter Tosh.
Livingstone, born April 10, 1947 in Jamaica’s Nine Mile District Ann Parish, was a friend of Marley’s from an early age; After the death of Marley’s father, Norval, in 1955, Marley’s mother, Cedella, lives with Livingstone’s father, Thaddeus, in Trench Town, making Bunny and Bob almost stepbrothers.
While Marley and Livingstone are accompanied by Joe Higgs, ‘the Godfather of Reggae’, they meet Higgs’ fellow student Peter Tosh; the then trio ventured to Kingston. Shortly afterwards, singer Junior Braithwaite and rugby singers Beverley Kelso and Cherry Smith joined them. After a series of name changes that included the Teenagers and the Wailing Wailers, the Wailers came in line with Coxsone Dodd’s sound system and Studio One label – which employed songwriters and producers such as Lee “Scratch” Perry and Jackie Mittoo – and has the Marley-penned “Summer Down,” a number one hit in Jamaica.
Braithwaite, Kelso and Smith soon left the Wailers, leaving the core of Marley, Livingstone and Tosh intact; that trio recorded the band’s debut LP, 1965s The lamentations, a collection of tracks that the band recorded during the mid – 1960s. The Wailers then went to bed when Marley married his wife Rita and joined his mother in Wilmington, Delaware; during this period, Livingstone served a year-long sentence for possession of marijuana. However, the three principle Wailers reunited with Marley’s return to Jamaica.
While Marley and Tosh served as the primary singers and songwriters of the Wailers, Livingstone played an indispensable role in providing harmonies in the songs of the trio. The Wailers then collaborated with Perry and his Upsetters for the 1970s. Soul Rebels and 1971s Soul Revolution; around that time, Livingstone wrote and recorded one of his distinctive songs, “Dreamland,” a track he revisited when he released his solo LP. Blackheart Man in 1976.
A collection of Wailers songs recorded by the trio for producer Lesley Kong’s Beverley label has been released Best of the Wailers In 1971. Thanks to the success of reggae performances such as Toots and the Maytals and Jimmy Cliff, Jamaican music found an international audience by that time, and the Wailers embarked on a British tour with American reggae singer Johnny Nash.
In 1972, the Wailers signed with producer Chris Blackwell and his Island Records, resulting in their classic debut in 1973 and the biggest label, Catch a fire. Although the album and its similar sequel, 1973s Brand in ‘, helped drive the Wailers to international fame, following the release of Fire in ‘, both Tosh and Wailer left the group as Blackwell wanted to reduce their roles and rename the Wailers as Marley’s background group, as well as plan a tour of the USA that tested Tosh and Wailer’s strict Rastafarian faith. After resigning, Wailer was soon replaced by Higgs when the Catch a Fire tour came to America in the spring of 1973. Catch a fire was later number 126 in the rankings Rolling clip‘s 500 largest list of albums, with Fire in ‘ number 319 instead.
After retiring from the Wailers, Livingstone – now known as Bunny Wailer – began his solo album Blackheart Man; while creatively sitting back in the Wailers, the LP allowed Wailer to establish himself as his own artist, with Wailer writing, producing and singing starring throughout Blackheart Man, which also features contributions from the backbone of Wailers and reggae legends such as Sly and Robbie and Aston “Family Man” Barrett. The album features songs such as ‘Dreamland’ and ‘Burning Down Sentence’, inspired by his prison style.
‘The tracks in Blackheart Man was very symbolic and significant for the whole development of reggae music, ”Wailer told Reggaeville in 2017. Blackheart Man to be one of those albums on which the universal reggae world should be focused. ”
Blackheart Man was the beginning of a fruitful and fruitful solo career for Wailer, who would win the 1991 Grammy for Best Reggae Album in the 1990s. Time will tell: a tribute to Bob Marley, 1995’s Important! Roots Classics, and the 1997 all-star Hall of Fame: A Tribute to Bob Marley’s 50th Anniversary.
Regarding his career in 2016, Wailer told Afropop: ‘The Wailers are responsible for the Wailers sound. Bob, Peter and I: we are entirely responsible for the Wailers sound, and what the Wailers brought to the world, and left behind as a legacy. ”