I’m so grateful for Peter Tosh who put everything he had into his art- emotion and wisdom. He was killed in 1987. He’s been a great teacher to me.

One day a Rasta friend said to me, “Music is the best tool for waking people up. When people listen to music, their defenses are down.”

My journey with reggae music began when my life partner and I graduated high school and we went on a road trip to Martha’s Vineyard for the summer. He had a Bob Marley’s Greatest Hits cassette tape. We listened to that cassette tape over and over and over again. Whenever we were in the car, which was almost always, we listened to that cassette tape. We memorized every sound and every word. I remember how free I felt that summer. I was free from the ball and chain of public school that I wore for 12 years, and I was out of my parents’ house. There was no one to tell me what to do. That cassette tape permeated through me and contributed to my freedom in a big way. Looking back, I was angry then. When you see through our society like I always did, it’s easy to be angry. Bob sung about the ills of society in an uplifting way. That Bob Marley tape became like a home to us.

We wore that Bob Marley tape out that summer, and it wasn’t until years later that I picked reggae music back up again in a real way. This time I immersed myself in it. Songs about the Babylon system confirmed all my instincts about the society I lived in. Babylon is a biblical reference, but it’s one word to describe all the ills of the modern system. Malidoma Some calls it “modernity,” Anarchists call it “the state.” It’s an all-encompassing term.

Terms like “bald head” (a straight-laced person, or a person who works for the Babylon system) helped me to see the people in my society for what they really are. They don’t sugarcoat or mince words. Politicians are “vampires.”

They had been persecuted in real, tangible ways, whereas in my society people are unaware of their persecution. The Rastas speak of the slavery of the African people. My society is under the illusion that they’re free. The people around me are living in mental slavery.

Roots reggae music was a safe place for me to go, and it was a sanctuary for me. With all of its depth it took me deeper than my anger and disillusionment. It validated my intuitive feelings about my society and the people around me. It was one of the only places I got validation for these thoughts and feelings. I felt I belonged more to these radical Rastafarians from 2,000 miles away than to my own family or anything my society could offer me. They got me.

Tarrus Riley

I became obsessed with certain musicians as I found them. Tarrus Riley’s gentleness, softness and loving nature changed my vibration. I listened to his music daily for over a year.

Songs like Peter Tosh’s Steppin’ Razor and Tarrus Riley’s Lion Paw taught be to be strong in my wisdom- a force to be reckoned with, secure in my good values, standing up for freedom.

Songs about being strong are prevalent in roots reggae music. Songs like “Pick Myself Up” by Peter Tosh gave me strength through many hardships. (Peter Tosh is one of my favorites because he’s one of the most radical Rastas.)

Reggae music taught me about all facets of life including interpersonal relationships. I came to songs like Peter Tosh’s “That’s What They Will Do.” for sanctuary from my ill society. I would turn on “Lion Paw” as loud as I could and listen to it on repeat until I regained my strength against the “snakes in the grass” who always came my way.

I’m emotional as I write this, looking back at these songs that have changed my life so much. I lost my library of thousands of songs I had meticulously collected over ten years time. I feel such an emotional connection to these songs. They were some of my first teachers. As I listen to them again I realize they’re such a part of me and are such an integral part of how I became who I am. The message of love, spirituality and radicalism.

As one of my favorite teachers, Mark Passio says, raising someone means to lift them up from a state of spiritual unconsciousness, to turn the unconsciousness into an awake and aware, responsible condition to a conscious condition. In this way, reggae music raised me.

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