Vivien Goldman – författare

Here is an unforgettable portrait of Bob Marley and an acutely perceptive appreciation of his musical and spiritual legacy.

Reggae superstar Bob Marley is one of the world’s most important and influential artists. Exodus, named by Time magazine as “Album of the Century,” is Bob Marley’s masterpiece of spiritual exploration. Recorded in London after an assassination attempt on his life sent Marley into exile from Jamaica, Exodus is the most lasting testament to his social conscience.

Vivien Goldman was the first journalist to introduce mass white audiences to the Rasta sounds of Bob Marley. Throughout the late 1970s, Goldman was a fly on the wall as she watched reggae grow and evolve, and she charted the careers of many of its superstars, especially Bob Marley. So close was Vivien to Bob and the Wailers that she was a guest at his Kingston home just days before gunmen came in a rush to kill “The Skip.” Now, in The Book of Exodus, Goldman chronicles the making of this album, from its conception in Jamaica to the raucous but intense all-night studio sessions in London.

But The Book of Exodus is so much more than a making-of-a-record story. This remarkable book takes us through the history of Jamaican music and Marley’s own personal journey from the Trench Town ghetto to his status as global superstar, as well as Marley’s deep spiritual practice of Rastafari and the roots of this religion. Goldman also traces the biblical themes of the Exodus story and its practical relevance to us today, through various other art forms, leading up to and culminating with Exodus.

Never before has there been such an intimate, first-hand portrait of Marley’s spirituality, his political involvement, and his life in exile in London, leading up to his triumphant return to the stage in Jamaica at the Peace Concert of 1978.

''Essential reading: the making of history as it was happening. Vivien was there'' JARVIS COCKERVivien Goldman was the first, most passionate and indubitably the most elegant chronicler of reggae, funk, free jazz and Afrobeat music: a pioneering female writer who shaped the Golden Age of music journalism in her image. Rebel Musix, Scribe on a Vibe collects Goldman''s extraordinary output from 1975 onwards and features encounters with everyone from Brian Eno to the Sex Pistols, Patti Smith to Fela Kuti, Curtis Mayfield to Can - and of course, her good friend Bob Marley. It is both an unrivalled window onto late twentieth century counterculture and the indispensable chronicle of a legendary ''Punk Professor'' who single-handedly changed the course of music writing forever. No music fan should be without it.