Customer Reviews
Genius - By: Mad Dan, 05 Sep 2008 
Probably the best album I own of any genre! It's actually two albums: Marcus Garvey, & Garvey's Ghost, which is a dub remix of Marcus Garvey. It's so good, I can't really think of anything else to say: words don't do it justice!
reggae on the slide - By: the lone voice of reason, 06 Aug 2008 
it was around this time, the mid 70's, that reggae moved away from being the accesible, joyful music that could appeal to everyone, into the darker, more politicised platform for artists like burning spear. for lillywhite listeners like me, i couldnt relate at all to the black stuggle lyrics being sung with excessively heavy jamaican accents. i still dug the music, but the lyrics & whole vibe just left me cold.
most of this album is chock full of somewhat clumsy political messages lamenting the fate of the black man. ok, fine. but give me ken booth, bob marley or desmond dekker anyday. at least when they approached sensitive subjects they did it without too much of a large chip on their shoulder, unlike burning spear, who might as well have come out with a song called 'burnin hell white devils' i mean, tell it like it is man.
musically the album is pretty sweet. nice basslines & sax. but the patois & lyrical stance isloates me from it. thankfully toward the end of the 70's we moved into the era of lovers rock which gave a nice respite from the oppresive feel of albums like this, but then of course it all went into its death throes with the advent of 'ragga' & the likes of shaggy
its a shame cos for a while there reggae was a real nice musical style that produced some wonderful songs, especially between 69-74 - with the advent of this sort of approach within the music however, it just polarized itself
Catch them Garvey - By: Mr. M. J. Cole, 27 Apr 2008 What a blissful recording, so pastoral & evocative. The first 20 seconds of Jordan River is just the most sublime reggae arrangement imaginable & I never tire of hearing it.
Still a masterpiece - By: D. Thomson, 20 Sep 2007 Winston Rodney had "enjoyed" two years of limited success at Coxsone Dodd's Studio One, beforetaking a long sabbatical from the music business. When he returned, it was on Jack Ruby's Fox label with the single "Resting Place" (not on the Jamaican pressing of the albumin 1975), followed by this album, which remains,in my view, one of the top five or six LPs ever releasedin Jamaica. the lyrical themes (restoration of the reputation of Marcus Garvey, calls to Jamaicans never forget their slave history) are well-known, & the musicianship was uniformly excellent, as is borne out by the dub set. Unusually for its time, the album consisted entirely of new songs, on purpose-made rhythms. How times change.
Timeless Classic - By: social_outcast, 21 Jul 2007 In my humble opinion, this is a better album than any by Bob Marley. Although Marley had some excellent tunes, I never thought he stretched it over a whole album.
Marcus Garvey/Garvey's Ghost is superb throughout. There is no filler on here.
Rodney's voice is plaintive, rousing, many other things that I can't put into words. If you don't feel anything listening to 'Slavery Days' then you're either deaf, or dead.
This is essential roots, especially at the price.
It's interesting to note that the dub version, Garvey's Ghost, was significantly 'lightened' as it was thought, by the record company gimps, not to appeal to European or American listeners.
I'd love to hear the album as it was originally intended.
If you're only going to have a handful of reggae albumsin your collection, make sure this is one of them.
