by Rita Marley
Lee “Scratch” Perry, after his failed attempt at performing, had become a producer. It was he who first billed the Wailers as “Bob Marley and the Wailers.” When Chris Blackwell came into the picture, he continued to headline Bob, causing more than a little friction and confusion with the two other members, who felt as if they were losing Bob to the high-powered, high-living world of international music promotion. After their first successful tour, Bunny announced he would never again get on a plane. Peter was cooperative, though reluctantly, and never let his fury at Bob become evident. When their three-album contract with Island was finished, both Bunny and Peter decided they didn’t want to have anything else to do with Blackwell, with touring and promoting concerts. It was arranged among them who would get this or that, and who would continue to get what. This was when Bob settled with Chris for the Hope Road property instead of money. Unlike the other Wailers, Bob re-signed with Island, as Bob Marley and the Wailers, but with new people as the Wailers.
Some people took the matter very deeply. I think the breakup of the group was more stressful to Bob than to either of the other two. He took it very very hard. He felt hurt and abandoned, and he never stopped thinking about it; that sadness was always a part of him. They’d been so young when they got together as the Wailers, and it was like being deserted by your brothers, especially in Bunny’s case, since they were related through their sister Pearl. A lot of people still don’t understand that this was such a hurt in Bob’s life, that he took it with him. Because even when he was sick and losing gravity with life, he was saying they couldn’t even call him. They never called him to say, “Bob, I love you.” Peter was trying, I heard, onstage, and Bunny also, but then it was too late, when they reached out.
The Island deal finished, everybody went out on their own. They each set up their own act—Peter started his company Intel Diplomat, Bunny had his Solomonic. And Bob achieved what he achieved and they achieved what they achieved. I’m a witness to the fact that Bob worked very hard, on the road and in the studio day and night; he was very serious about his work and the future welfare of his family. His achievement, which lives on, is testimony to that. And it’s not about money, because he didn’t begin to earn money until he went to rest. Money that he had he was using to build his own thing. He had to buy studio gear, he bought equipment for the band (he had hired his own band), and he was starting to own his career.
One morning, not long after Bunny and Peter’s decision, I was in my garden at Bull Bay hanging the wash and watching Stephanie crawl around when Bob’s driver came up the road, parked, jumped out of the car, and said, “Robbie said you should come down to the studio right away.” When I asked, he insisted that nothing was wrong.
“Well,” I said, “I can’t just leave like this without any warning. What is it?”
He didn’t know, he said, only that “Robbie just said it was an emergency.”
It took a while for me to find the neighbor lady to look after Stephanie and change my clothes and everything, but I finally got it all together and drove to Hope Road, where they sent me to Harry J.’s studio in Kingston for a session.
Bob was there with some of his band members, and without revealing much he asked, “Where are your friends? Can you get your friends?”
I said, “What friends?”
“Marcia and Judy,” he said.
Someone might have told him about our performance at the House of Chen, but he hadn’t been there and if I had even mentioned it, I hadn’t talked about it much. But it turned out that with Peter and Bunny gone, he was going to need backing support for work that he was doing. There was still some mystery surrounding this “emergency,” but I said I would try to call Marcia and Judy, which I did, and they responded just as I had, as soon as they could. We went into the studio that afternoon and were told that we were supposed to be singing on a song called “Natty Dread.” Of course, Bob knew of our separate abilities, whether or not he had heard about the three of us bringing down the House of Chen. But the fact remains that he hadn’t heard us together until he heard us in the studio that day.
One thing about Mr. Marley: When you work for him, he pays you. And this was one of the respects that I always gave to him. When I was asked how much I was going to charge for this studio work on “Natty Dread,” I looked at him and he looked at me quite businesslike—as if to tell me “Say it!”—and we laughed.
So I said, “Well, whatever you’re giving Judy and Marcia, the same applies to me—and thank you!”
And he said, “No problem!” And flashed that sweet smile he had (when he wanted to use it).
Everybody loved what came out of the studio session that afternoon. And then it was finally explained that Bob had an album to deliver to Island, and now the big question was: Would we three sisters work with him? Would we go on a tour, finish the album, and work on the promotion?
After all those years with the Wailers and the Soulettes, and then the JAD thing, and singing and writing together on our own time in the little cellar studio, it was hardly new to me to work with him. But what really struck me now is that I would be paid. And I can’t dismiss the sentimental part: Being able to be with him on the road meant so much to me, because we had decided to be friends again. There was no denying the fact that we still loved each other, and so were again living as man and wife, and I had just about started to be the nagging wife: “Where you going again?” “Why you have to go?”
I knew, at that point, that whatever I chose to do, I needed to pick myself up soon and do something. “Finding Rita” meant just that—making something happen. Marcia and Judy already had established solo careers, but they were eager to work steadily. So I looked at the two of them after Bob asked the question, and simultaneously—in harmony!—we all three yelled, “Yeah!”
It was one thing to be enthusiastic in the studio, and to be planning rehearsals and all that. But then I drove home and picked up Stephanie, and got the big kids from the Bull Bay Community Center, and didn’t tell anyone anything about it, as I was still mulling over what would happen, how it could all be arranged.
Then, just as it was getting dark, Bob arrived. After the kids had climbed all over him, he pulled me down into the studio and said, oh so seriously, “You really want to come with me, Rita?”
And I said, “Well, why not?”
And he said, “Well, at least you’d be with me. We’d see each other every day.”
And I thought that was great. He wanted me to be with him, if he was really going to go that way, as a solo performer with his own band and backup group. So we decided that we could do it, although that night we didn’t expect such a tremendous reaction from audiences all over the world, or that we would tour together for seven years. And I never imagined that this would be the beginning of a long career for the I-Three, the group that Marcia and Judy and I formed.
Right then, Bob and I had only the moment in mind and were happy with the positive vibe. Nothing ventured, nothing gained, right? We figured that, hey, this is too good to stop, that even without Bunny and Peter, there was a way to go on. As the saying goes, one monkey don’t stop the whole show. And this new way, which was after all a lot like the old way, seemed like a good way for everyone.
The first tour began in 1974, when Stephanie was still a baby. Again, it was Aunty to the rescue, because once more I had to leave the children with her. In order to accommodate us, she moved to Bull Bay, where she leased a piece of land from a little old man and built a house for herself. I suppose I needn’t have worried about her being sixtysomething years old, because she was still so active. Truly an amazing lady. Aunty had two handhelpers this time, but she still built her own house. It was within walking distance of Windsor Lodge, so she would come down to the family house in the morning to run the show. A helper stayed with the children overnight, usually Miss Collins, an older lady who was Aunty’s buddy. The children loved Miss Collins, who ended up living with us a long time as the family nanny.
&nb
sp; That first tour was an experience—not just for me but for all of us—because this was big, and being sponsored by Island Records, and our group included a large entourage of press and photographers. It was also Bob’s big break, the moment he had waited for. Our billing was still “Bob Marley and the Wailers” but consisted of different personnel—I think the I-Three were then included as Wailers, so this was exciting, too. Bob used to say that anyone who worked with him was a Wailer.
As much as the tour was an experience, it was also very much a trial run. Maybe not so much for Bob, who was ready, but certainly for the rest of us, because our earlier little concerts here and there had never exposed us to these kinds of crowds. People came out to see Bob Marley and the Wailers. The tour was well put together—we had our own bus and our own hotel rooms. At first I worried that I was going to be squished in with Bob and have to stay up all night, until I got it straight with the tour manager: “No no no! Out here I must be treated like an I-Three and not Mrs. Marley!” Even though I had to do the things that a wife would do, like make sure you get the wet clothes from the last performance, make sure you get the clothes out for the next concert, make sure to ask “Have you eaten? Did you eat?” And make sure—“It’s bedtime!” Things like that—I still had to be that kind of a person on the road. But afterward I was privileged to be alone. I had my own room, I had my freedom, I could go shopping! I could do the things I wanted to do like a normal background vocalist! At the end of the day I was Rita!
So that was a wonderful experience for me, one that I really enjoyed. Naturally, there were certain things I missed. I hadn’t realized how hard it might be to be away from the children. I was so attached to them now, from spending so much time with them and having had the leisure to have real conversations with them, and I missed them badly. Still, I knew Aunty was there for them, as she had been for me. A phone call a day kept my worries at bay, and Bob’s too. At our sound check each day, first thing he’d say to me was, “Rita, you call the children? How them pickney? Them all right? How is school?” Because he was very—and always—concerned about his children. This was something I had doubted from time to time, when he’d gone into one of his disappearing acts. But he never failed to provide for them, and I learned that Bob was one father that you could close your eyes and know that Daddy’s going to make it work. He always looked out for them, and not any special one but all of them.
Phone calls sort of took care of the children, but I missed my garden, too, and my akee and salt fish, and my porridge in the mornings. To offset these cravings on that first tour, we had Gilly—a juice man and a good cook, who would fry fish, or make us some bammies, just to keep our taste buds going. And we learned to travel with our Jamaican seasonings like scallions and peppers.
We worked in Europe mainly, for about three months, and when we came back, oh, I was so happy to be home! Though missing your kids may not be fun, at the end of the tour it’s great when you’re able to bring a suitcase full of presents for them! And when you reach home, the first thing—“Mommy, what did you bring for me?” Because I always enjoyed looking for presents, pretty things for them, for the house, for myself, for my friends and my workers.
By then we had started making good money. After the first tour in Europe, when we realized that we had dollars, I said to Bob, “Why don’t you send your mother some money?”
He looked confused and said, “For what?”
I said, “For no reason, just for a surprise.” Because Aunty had brought us up like that, when you make money, you share. Buy a bread or something. And that first tour brought us more money than we’d ever seen. So Bob did send his mother some, and she was so happy—she called to say, “I knew you did that, Rita.” I also made sure that his other children got their support, that their mothers didn’t have to come and hang around and ask. None of them can say they were ever deprived of child support. Eventually, though, it was easier to take some of those children into our household. The way I thought of it was, if you have to check for their dentist, and their school, and their this and their that, you might as well just give Bob and me a cool head, give us less stress. It could be confusing, it could be just too much for us to deal with every weekend. When we decided to keep them, their mothers came to visit at Hope Road, and they would sit there and play with the children, and say, “Oh, they grow big,” and “Hi, Miz Marley,” or “Hi, Sister Rita” when they saw me. In our relationships I was always seen as the mother figure, the caretaker, even though some rumored, “Oh she wears the ring, but I have the man,” and those kinds of stories. But after a certain point there were so many I couldn’t have cared less, and I’d think, that’s my husband, whatever …
I never questioned what I was doing in this respect. I guess I carried my cross, but it seemed more about true love. About what Bob was doing, I didn’t approve, but I had no control over it. I know I tried to be a good mother and provide for my children. Most of the baby mothers were local girls, neighbor girls, maybe a one-night stand here or there, as far as I knew it wasn’t anything said to be a relationship. Sometimes Bob said he didn’t know how it had happened—crazy! But he always respected them and saw them as women, “and man mus have nuff women,” he’d say. Again Aunty was a great support, and helped to bring up the kids, though she thought it strange and couldn’t understand why I was doing it.
Then, between tours, Bob began seeing Cindy Breakspeare regularly. Cindy had been one of Chris Blackwell’s kittens, already living at Hope Road, with her brother, when Bob got the place. Chris had these little pussycats as his conveniences and she fell right into Bob’s hand as his tenant; she was actually paying him rent for a while. As much as I knew about her then, she came from one of those families in Jamaica who would rear their daughters for men who had money. They took trips, were available for weekends, they had their lifestyle. So Bob really came in to save Cindy, because he liked her, noticed that she was a nice girl, and helped to turn her life around. She was really going to be Miss … Whatever. Bob gave her ambition. He was like that—this was another good thing about Bob—he was always real to women, always one to say, “I see more in you than you are showing.” He said that to me, too.
Cindy was one of the women in his life that I couldn’t, and still can’t, understand. First of all, I didn’t like that name: Cin-dy. I’m very funny with names. When I heard about Cindy I said, “Bob, why you and this girl, Sindy?” I was speaking to him as my buds now, because we had reached the stage where we were real friends and could speak like this, because the wife and husband thing could have gone into a divorce long before. So we had overcome that, although we still maintained our relationship as the primary one. And so I said to my friend, my buds, “What the hell is this Sindy? That’s strange. Maybe she should change her name.”
And Bob said, “What you talkin’ about? You always carry things way out!”
I said, “Because I don’t think I like that name ‘Sin-dy.’ And if you’re going to be going with Sin-dy with an ‘S’ or a ‘C,’ stay away from me.” That’s how I felt at the time. I was very straight-forward with him. And he knew that, which is why sometimes he’d say, “Hey gal, you feisty.” I do tend to be feisty sometimes, I guess. It’s my only way of showing my hurt. Back then, as today, I knew I was black and beautiful—and I was proud. Like the slogan: “Say it loud, I’m black and I’m proud!” What else could I be but black and proud around all the light-skinned “book pretty” girls?
I remember being at Hope Road one day, when Cindy lived there as Bob’s tenant, and he was there, and they were carrying on their relationship. I saw her but felt calm about it, knowing that I wasn’t going to make any strife. If Bob wants that, fine; if Bob likes her—that’s his heart, he’s having a good time, fine. But I was hurt, I guess that’s normal. I remember her looking at me, and she knew I knew what was going on. But she also knew that he comes home to eat, and see his wife and children, and he stays by her sometimes. And she knows how he relies on me to keep his family
together, and makes excuses about late rehearsals.
On tours sometimes we’d go shopping, and he would say to me, “Rita, Cindy asked me to bring some things for her, for the shop.” And I’d say, “That’s nice.” But sometimes—for whatever reason, being angry at him for one thing or another, or just to test his feeling for me—I’d say, “Let me have some,” just to see how he’d react. And he’d say, “Of course, have some, or all of it if you want!” For peace … all for peace!
Women like Cindy could be a threat to your relationship, they could really take your man, and of course that is their intention. They were the ones who said, of me, “But she’s so ordinary. Why she doesn’t do this? Why she doesn’t do that? She’s so ordinary.” I was quick to realize those women were different; it wasn’t like they just “had eyes for him.” They were not about to be in a situation where a woman can be, as we now say in Jamaica, “your matey”—where you and another woman are dating the same man and you can maybe be “friends.” But after that one scene with Esther Anderson, I never again got myself into a position of arguing with a woman over him, never. I’m a fighter, but certain things I don’t fight about (though I may get sarcastic). I even began to like Cindy eventually. She would turn up at concerts in different parts of the world, and when she became pregnant, I was happy because Bob was happy.
But another thing I’ll say for Bob is that he never allowed any of these women to act disrespectfully to me. Maybe that scene with Esther Anderson taught him something too—that Rita could go crazy if she wanted to. And sometimes he used me as an example of his kind of woman. Once he told one of them that she should see my legs—how fit I am, because I train. And she told me! He’d said to her, “You look at Rita’s legs because her legs is strong like a lion!”