Photo Credit: Tim Cadiente
We’d love to introduce eight-time Grammy award-winning musician and reggae icon Ziggy Marley as Haute Living‘s newest ambassador! Marley, the son of reggae icon Bob Marley, released his seventh full-length solo studio album, Rebellion Rises, on May 18th through Tuff Gong Worldwide. Fully written, recorded and produced by Marley, this passionate and indelible new collection of music encourages people to stand together in activism through love. Here, Marley shares his top five favorite albums of all time.
ZIGGY MARLEY: MY TOP 5 FAVORITE ALBUMS OF ALL TIME
1. BOB MARLEY: SURVIVAL. The first album comes to mind is the album that has the most impact on me and that would be one of my father’s albums and it’s called Survival It was an album I listened to a lot during high school. It was part of my education. I had it on replay. As a teenager it gave me a direction in terms of revolutionary ideas, Afrocentric ideas which is not typical of teenagers when I was growing up. It helped me to have a different view on life than my peers would. To me it was a revolution album. It made me want to explore. What I was learning in school at the time was more of a colonial point of view. This album made me want to explore about the true history of Africa. It made me want to accept more than what the school was teaching.
2. MICHAEL JACKSON: THRILLER. The reason for that one was the first time I bought a record player when I was a teenager too, it was the first album I went to a record store and bought. My friends were into Michael Jackson more than I was. They were dressing up. I wasn’t; I was just into the music. But the album came out at the same time I got the record player. I’ve been a fan of Michael and the Jackson 5 since I was a kid, and I like all of his music, but it was the first album I ever bought so it’s memorable to me.
3. MILES DAVIS: BITCHES BREW. What is important about that album to me is that it was much different than any other thing he had done before. As an artist, Miles Davis for me and that album was setting an example for me about how brave I needed to be in my own music in terms of exploring it. This was revolutionary music, doing something different from what people expect, and it was the same journey I was on at the time. Being an artist for me bitches brew helped me and encouraged me and also gave me the confidence that this is what real artists do. Real artists take chances, go outside of the box and don’t give a damn what other people are saying about them, they’re going to express themselves. The impact that had on me long term.
Photo Credit: Tim Cadiente4. ZIGGY MARLEY: REBELLION RISES. One of my albums is one of my favorites, my new album. I’m not just saying that to promote it because it just came out, but because I really like it. I have this ability within me to look at things outside of myself as a neutral person. I can listen to my own stuff as a neutral person without my ego being involved. With this album I really enjoy it over and over again. Sometimes I get tired of listening to myself but this is one album where I really like listening to myself. I like it as a listener of music. It’s one of my favorite albums. I like it lyrically and musically. I like the song Your Pain Is Mine. It’s very emotional and exposes a part of me that is not covered up and has not been overshadowed by what I want people to think of me but what I really am. So not by ego, but by the true me
5. KENDRICK LAMAR: DAMN. I like rap music and every now and then I feel like I need to listen to some rap music. I like Kendrick in general. Kendrick seems to be honest to me. I can relate to that, to what he’s saying, to him as a person and so it’s one of the few rap albums that I will listen to one song after the other. There is honesty to it and social consciousness, reasons and causes in it. When he raps he comes across as his true self. I relate to it.
