Bunny Wailer - File

Bunny Wailer, original member and sole remaining lead voice from the Wailing Wailers, the Jamaican group which splintered into the outstanding fragments of Bob Marley, Peter Tosh and himself, has started a digital reissue of his solo catalogue.

It begins with the 1976 classic, Blackheart Man, Wailer having the sound updated and adding a dub version (those also coming from earlier work) to a few tracks. The reissue is being done through downloads initially, Zojak handling the distribution.

It is natural that an artiste will tour just after a full-length project is released and Wailer is going on a series of concerts in Europe shortly. It seems to be, however, more a matter of coincidence than him shoring up support for the new, improved sound version of what he says is his best album ever.

After all, Blackheart Man is already very, very popular. "When I sing pon stage is a choir out there and if I make a mistake them know," Bunny Wailer told The Sunday Gleaner.

And he says, "Tour and them thing there has not been Bunny Wailer, in support of my album. My album get support because of the values them have, not that I have been out there trying to sell them, exhibit them in that manner. When I tour is when I have been called for that specific reason."

He points out that he never did a tour for Blackheart Man in 1976 and he did not perform the songs until the Youth Consciousness concert at the National Stadium in 1982; and he did not deliver them live outside Jamaica until 12 years after the initial release.

value in waiting

"I don't like excitement and the whole heap of boost-up and push-up thing," Bunny Wailer said. There is also value in waiting, as Wailer says, "I have to make sure I am secure and prepared in delivering", adding that some performers are pushed in front of the public before they are ready.

"When an artiste don't satisfy people in their first appearances, it turns off the next appearance," Bunny Wailer says.

He made sure that he was ready in the early stages of his solo career, as "I do a lot of studying in my development. Even when Bob and Peter were available to the audience, I hold back from getting involved because I thought I was not ready enough and I never wanted to find myself learning on a professional basis. I would rather learn first, then deliver professionally."

paying attention to his daughter

He says that it has worked, in a situation where he is now delivering the Wailing Wailers, Bob Marley and Peter Tosh solo songs ("I defend them work by presenting them works just as how I present my works"), as well as his own catalogue.

There is someone else whom Bunny Wailer is paying a lot of attention to, his daughter Cen C Love, whose debut album Save The People will soon be released. He says "females go through some serious things that males don't go through in a da business ya. I have to be paying attention to her in that respect and I make sure she gets the right attention and the right treatment and the right direction."

unexpected direction

On his upcoming European tour, Bunny Wailer will be going in an unexpected direction, as he will be performing in Italy for the first time. And it is not for lack of invitation; he has avoided going there in the past.

"I did make a certain decision in myself, that based on the history of Ethiopians having always been challenged and interfered with by Italian people, out of that, as a patriotic Ethiopian, I was kinda not enthused in going into Italy. History shows us that Italy has inflicted a lot of wounds on the Motherland without any kind of a result, because they don't get anywhere doing it. They hurt a lot of people and kill a lot of people and still have to go sit back a Italy," Bunny Wailer said.

He has not forgotten those wounds, but says, "What I have learnt is that the world is changing. And it affects Ethiopians as well as Italians, during that conflict, years of conflict. It is shared by those people who have been affected. They are now sharing those afflictions, sympathising with each other's condition and the history that surrounds them having been labelled enemies."

italian show

Wailer says he has observed where Italians and Ethiopians are now mating ("you fight and you fight till you start make love"). "So I decided, based on that, for the sake of those people who are not guilty of past affliction, as far as Ethiopians and Italians are concerned, but are children now, born out of that conflict, I decide this time to go to Italy," he said.

The sole Italian show on this tour will be done "charitably", his fee to be sent mainly to Ethiopia and some to remain in Italy.

"I won't be getting paid, for you can't pay the Nazarene no time at all to go in Rome. Give unto Caesar what is due unto Caesar, give unto Ethiopia what is due," Bunny Wailer said.

"As my first appearance in Italy, it will be recorded that Bunny Wailer was not paid. Bunny Wailer would not take money from the system. Bunny Wailer gave to the system."