In April 1979 I attended a live concert of reggae musicians Bob Marley and The Wailers that was part of the Babylon By Bus Tour, featuring songs like “Positive Vibration”, “I Shot The Sheriff”, “No Woman, No Cry”, “Lively Up Yourself”, “Is This Love?”, “Get Up, Stand Up” and “Exodus”.
It was an afternoon concert at Easter, at the Western Springs Stadium in Auckland, New Zealand.
I was actually in Auckland with a van full of other students from Massey University in Palmerston North, selling “capping magazines” – a collection of largely rude jokes with a list of that year’s graduates in the centre.
The entrance area to Western Springs was an ideal place to offer the magazines – at 50 NZ cents each – to passersby on their way to the concert.
When the time was right, we stopped selling, went in and enjoyed the concert, then carried on again afterwards as the crowds slowly headed off to cars and buses.
This was the same venue where exactly two years earlier I had experienced the Alice Cooper “Welcome To My Nightmare” concert, and in December 1978 David Bowie (“Station To Station”), so it was interesting to see it in the daytime.
The setlist of the Babylon By Bus Tour reflected the album of the same name, which the tour through Asia and Oceania (New Zealand, Australia, Hawaii) was promoting.
These are the more well known songs from the album and tour (well, more well known to me at least…).
“Positive Vibration” (sometimes called “Rastaman Vibration”:
“Rastaman Vibration”:
“I Shot The Sheriff”:
“No Woman, No Cry”:
“Lively Up Yourself”:
“Is This Love?”:
“Get Up, Stand Up”:
“Exodus”:
More than anyone else Bob Marley is identified with reggae music, and I guess I was privileged to see him in 1979 – just over two years later he died. The legacy remains.
Paul