A searing portrait of Bob Marley and the making of Exodus, Time ’s best album of the twentieth century—and an acutely perceptive appreciation of his musical and spiritual legacy   “Finely reported, vividly written, and politically astute, Vivien Goldman travels with Bob Marley on the intimate journey that led him to become the voice of the Exodus.” —Mariane Pearl, author of A Mighty Heart: The Brave Life and Death of My Husband, Danny Pearl Reggae superstar Bob Marley is one of our most important and influential artists, and his 1977 album Exodus is the most lasting testament to his social conscience. Recorded in London after an assassination attempt on his life sent Marley into exile from Jamaica, it remains a masterpiece of spiritual exploration. 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 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, 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. Goldman thoroughly examines what Time proclaimed album of the twentieth century, Bob Marley's Exodus , undertaken at a time when Marley had relocated to London, where he wrote and recorded Exodus , after becoming a gunshot victim during an invasion of his Kingston, Jamaica, home. Goldman navigates the myriad political, social, and religious complications in Marley's life then, all of which he dealt with in "The Heathen," "So Much Things to Say," and the album's title song, whose naming was no throwaway gesture. Marley felt especially spiritually attached to the second book of the Old Testament, and Goldman cites his frequent quotation of scripture within the context of him giving form to his most political album. Since Goldman accepts at face value Marley's belief in dream communication and prophecy, his fans will be rewarded by a satisfying heavy dose of the "Natural Mystic" philosophy of Rastafarianism, too. Excellent insight into the genesis of a transporting piece of music; as fellow reggae immortal Lee "Scratch" Perry would say, "Righteous oily." Mike Tribby Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved “Vivien Goldman is a soldier who understood where we were coming from with our music and spread the message with her writing. She is on the Zion Train.” —Aston “Family Man” Barrett, cofounder and bass player of the Wailers “Finely reported, vividly written, and politically astute, Vivien Goldman travels with Bob Marley on the intimate journey that led him to become the voice of the Exodus . A fundamental human conflict, Exodus expresses the eternal quest for land, identity, and in Marley’s case, a quest for harmony.” —Mariane Pearl, author of A Mighty Heart: The Brave Life and Death of My Husband, Danny Pearl Vivien Goldman is a writer, broadcaster, and musician who has devoted much of her work to Afro-Caribbean and global music. She is the adjunct professor of punk and reggae at NYU’s Clive Davis Department of Recorded Music. Originally from London, Goldman now resides in New York City. This is her fifth book. Chapter 1 SEND US ANOTHER BROTHER MOSES “I was a stranger in a strange land,” said Bob Marley to me softly. He quoted the biblical verse of Exodus 2:22 almost to himself, intimately, as if the verse had been a familiar friend during his London exile following the attempted assassination on his life that had happened three years before, just yards away. The brand-new blond wood studio we were sitting in for this interview for a 1979 cover story for the oldest British rock weekly, Melody Maker, indicated that Marley was at a height of his career, artistically and professionally. Personally, too—we could hear children shouting excitedly as they played outside his house at 56 Hope Road, Kingston. He was about to record Survival, the first album he would ever make in his own studio, and it had taken h