Bob who?

It was 1979 and Craig an I were sharing a house in our third year of University, Craig’s brother Alan whom we shared a house with the previous year had decided that Engineering wasn’t working for him and so did not return to school to finish his degree.

I remember that Alan was on one of his flying visits for the weekend and crashing with us, he mentioned to Craig and I that we should go see this great band that was going to be in Melbourne the following week, he assured us even though it was mid-week it would be worth the trip...   Al always had a story, which was accompanied by loads of hype and enthusiasm, and I must admit it was a bit infectious!

Without another word, Alan shows up our place on the designated day of the concert ready to pick us up for the trip to Melbourne.  In those days the drive to Melbourne was about an hour and a half to two-hours depending on the partly completed freeway, but given that it was a Tuesday night we thought that the traffic wouldn’t be too bad so we gave ourselves lots of time.

It was on the drive down that we discovered that we didn’t have tickets per see, but Alan assured us that he would get us some tickets and not to worry.  At this point I still had no idea who we were going to see except that Alan was mad keen to see them.

Arriving into Melbourne just before 7:00 pm, we found a park a few blocks away we made our way toward Festival Hall, which in those days was “the” venue in Melbourne for all major musical performers. 

The original Festival hall was built in 1915 but destroyed in 1955 by fire before being rebuilt to host both the Gymnastics & Wrestling for the 1956 Melbourne Olympic Games.  Over its storied history it’s seen every major musical act that’s toured Australia, including the Beatles, Frank Sinatra, Johnny Cash, Oasis and more recently Red Hot Chilli Peppers but to name a few.   Its also seen its fair share of World Championship boxing bouts, wrestling, roller-derby, ball-room dancing and even the first Indoor Tennis exhibition in Australia featuring John McEnroe and still going strong to this day.

As soon as we approached the venue we noted the large crowd forming outside, as Alan quickly disappeared to go find tickets, at which point Craig and I checked out the talent (yes, the ladies!), and as I recall it was both plentiful and spectacular. J

 We noticed that the concert was for a guy named Bob Marley and the Wailers?   I remember saying to Craig “I hope this guy is okay?”...

I saved my ticket stub from the concert

Sure enough, true to his word Alan reappears with a huge grin and clutching three tickets in his hand. 

We entered via the Dudley Street entrance but not really knowing the layout of the venue we weren’t sure about our tickets until we walked in and were ushered to...the fourth row, floors! 

Now, other than the fact that we were so close to the stage and you could feel the sweat from the performers splash on you from the stage when they were moving around, the place was thick with the blue haze of marijuana smoke, as you can imagine it was pretty thick.  J      What would a Bob Marley concert be without the ever-present “ganga” man...I mean c’mon?  In those days it was still considered normal to smoke in public venues like this, but for the non-smokers like me, it was exceptionally hard on the lungs.

The Russell Morris band played first, who in those days was a bit of an Australian music legend and it was bonus to see him as well, especially that close.  

Absolute pandemonium broke out when Bob Marley and the Wailers came out on stage. This was to be their final concert appearance of the “Babylon By Bus Tour” in Australia.  The month long tour had started in Japan April 5^th with the final concert being scheduled for Lahaina, Hawaii the following weekend, and they put everything into that show...I mean everything!

Babylon By Bus Album cover

I instantly fell in love with his music and the overall vibe, I was literally knocked off my feet they were that good.  Over the course of his set they played all the usual classics, of which my favourite and really the only song I recognized up until that night was “I shot the Sheriff”, and he had everyone on their feet dancing - the place was absolutely electric!

Zach is a big Jimmy Hendrix fan, and so tonight when he came over he asked if he could watch a documentary on Bob Marley.  “No worries” I said, and disappeared upstairs to go find the ticket stub from the concert in 1979.   Sure enough I found them and brought them down to show him. 

I must say even he was impressed to see the original ticket stub from the concert...a piece of musical history right in the palm of his Dad’s hand...”I guess he is cool after all I could imagine him thinking to himself?”

I feel exceptionally fortunate to have seen the concert with Craig and Al, especially since he only toured Australia once before his premature death from Cancer in May 1981 at the age of 36. 

He was a true musical legend and I witnessed history – how awesome is that? J