{"id":3164,"date":"2014-01-01T22:21:10","date_gmt":"2014-01-01T22:21:10","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/jazzusa.com\/damian-marley-righteousness-overcome\/"},"modified":"2011-01-01T22:21:10","modified_gmt":"2011-01-01T22:21:10","slug":"damian-marley-righteousness-overcome","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/jazzusa.com\/?p=3164","title":{"rendered":"Damian Marley – Righteousness Overcome"},"content":{"rendered":"\n\n
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Damian Marley
<\/font>Righteousness Overcome<\/font><\/b>
\t\tBy Derek Beres<\/p>\n

<\/font> There is no irony, perhaps, that doctrine is defined as a \u201cprinciple or body of principles presented for acceptance or belief, as by a religious, political, scientific, or philosophic group,\u201d and it\u2019s societal employment, indoctrination, can be found as \u201cteaching someone to accept doctrines uncritically.\u201d When you factor in an alternate meaning of the first word, \u201cA statement of official government policy, especially in foreign affairs and military strategy,\u201d and weigh in the religious concerns of followers of doctrines such as the Bible and Koran, a very hygienic, prescribed notion of spirituality arises.<\/p>\n

That is, the misinterpretation of original teachings in what existed before the indoctrination process, the pages without letters, those written through experience not typography. When Bob Marley said, \u201cExperience teacheth wisdom, but there\u2019s a natural mystic flowing through the air,\u201d he was grasping the heart of Rastafarian belief, one of the only \u201creligions\u201d existent today yet to see doctrine, propelling the idea of a hands-on life rather than one intellectualized through words and numbers.<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\u201cWe as Rastas don\u2019t really consider Rastafari a religion, it\u2019s more a way of life,\u201d says Damian Marley, the youngest son of the legendary reggae prophet. \u201cYou have the people who read who don\u2019t know Rastafari, know what I mean, because every man can start reading, even as a psalm was written in the book of life. The book of life that we\u2019re speaking of is not really written words but is in the soul of man, you understand. Yes, so you know, every man has his own relationship with God, so there can really be no outline that every man has to follow, understand.\u201d<\/p>\n

The young Rasta, already years into a prosperous reggae career at 23, was bred into a spirituality \u0096 and music \u0096 that remains pure. Evidence of this can readily be noticed on Halfway Tree, his first release on Motown, an exquisite amalgam of dancehall, hip-hop, and roots reggae. Spread over the album\u2019s 16 tracks are serious lessons on unity and love, hardship, and most importantly, the righteousness to overcome.<\/p>\n\n\n
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\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\u201cReggae is on the verge, is on the research, know what I mean,\u201d continues Marley. \u201cIf you listen to even to some of Timberland\u2019s beats, they\u2019re very close to dancehall beats, what\u2019s recorded in Jamaica. You can listen to Foxy Brown and the dancehall influence on her new album. Gwen Stefani, she loves the dancehall thing too.<\/p>\n

\u201cA few years ago Jamaica got cable. I know that\u2019s opened up the minds of the youth, being exposed to pop music, know what I mean. Hip-hop artists in general have been showing an interest in Jamaica over the last couple of years. The music comes from the same elements, and if you check the background of hip-hop, it really emerged out of Jamaican culture. The music is really the same as it is with the street youths, it is a real music, music of the people.\u201d<\/p>\n

Named after the geographic intersection of Jamaica where the privileged and the poor convene, Halfway Tree is a very mature, patient album, addictive and danceable, laden with modern psalms. It is medicine, the type of healing elements existent in the realm of the invisible world of sound, and Marley, coming from a lineage of shamans, teachers, and the thousand other names, continues along that worn but eternal path.<\/p>\n

\u201cWith our music we always draw people closer to the most high, know what I mean, about the strive for perfection, yes, so you know, that goes in all areas of life, whether it be the relationship you have with your fellow brethren, or the relationship with God I, whatever it be, that\u2019s really what the message is all about.\u201d<\/p>\n

And messages like that are even so much more the necessary today, in the wake of the war that phonetically doubles as the exploitation of natural resources by western governments. When his father reinterpreted Haile Selassie\u2019s speech that became \u201cWar,\u201d he sang \u201cUntil the philosophy which holds one race superior and another inferior is finally and permanently discredited and abandoned, everywhere is war,\u201d a doctrine without doctrine, he was speaking the truth American culture is just now awakening to. <\/p>\n

\u201cThe main changes I see is that people are more alert now, know what I mean, and more conscious of what\u2019s going on with international relations,\u201d Marley says. \u201cBut two wrongs don\u2019t make a right. Everything works hand in hand. Most expect America to retaliate, but then you really start evaluating why do people hate America in the first place. We as righteous musicians realize certain things because we\u2019ve been singing righteous songs for years. And then all of a sudden a big tragedy happens and you see all kinds of artists coming together and doing these songs that we\u2019ve been doing for years. You don\u2019t really want to give the real righteousness a push, know what I mean, they always wait until something happens and then you see, you know, they try to push this unity thing and what have you, the soul of Rastafari. They didn\u2019t listen, so, you know what I mean.\u201d<\/p>\n

If you don\u2019t know, check out Halfway Tree. Tracks like \u201cIt Was Written\u201d and \u201cEducated Fools\u201d will show you while you dance along. Updated interpretations of \u201cSlavedriver\u201d via \u201cCatch A Fire\u201d and \u201cCould You Be Loved\u201d by way of \u201cAnd Be Loved,\u201d along with appearances by Bunny Wailer, Eve, Treach, and Stephen Marley, all add strong flavor to this exquisite curry. This all comes as no surprise, as recent political events only push our artists and musicians further into themselves and, subsequently, ourselves, as is the role of the soothsayer, to produce doctrines without paper, molded wax and plastic that carry the sounds of eternity into the modernity of today\u2019s stereo.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat\u2019s going on is affecting the music industry, it affects everything, it affects record sales, it affects the message in the music,\u201d Damian continues. \u201cA lot of people weren\u2019t really dealing with righteous music before, you hear them coming out with a few righteous songs now, it\u2019s everybody\u2019s life therefore it will affect everything. When we perform, you can see how we experience the music. There\u2019s the energy and the essence, and so you experience it because it is life, you understand.\u201d<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t(get underneath global mediocrity, visit Derek’s website <\/a>www.cyniscurity.com<\/b><\/a>) \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t
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Damian MarleyRighteousness Overcome By Derek Beres There is no irony,<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3164","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/jazzusa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3164","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/jazzusa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/jazzusa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jazzusa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jazzusa.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3164"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/jazzusa.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3164\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/jazzusa.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3164"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jazzusa.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3164"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jazzusa.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3164"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}