SA Men Q&A with Ziggy Marley about Marley Africa Road Trip

Marley Africa Road Trip Episode 1 aired Wednesday night on Discovery World. The series colourfully documents Ziggy Marley and his two brothers Robbie and Rohan’s travels on their trip last year through the culturally rich and unassumingly beautiful landscape of South Africa, on motorbikes, to reconnect with their father’s legacy and the impact that the legendary Bob Marley had made on the African continent.

The show is directed and produced by David Alexanian who brought you the two unprecedented series Long Way Round and Long Way Down starring Ewan McGregor.

In an interview with the five time Grammy winner, Ziggy Marley talks about his experiences and goals, in terms of Marley Africa Road Trip and his music, and provides us with some reasoning behind it all. Ziggy also shares a few thoughts about his father, and how he believes his father’s music has in some way influenced African unity.

SA Men: How far do you think Marley Africa Road Trip will go in educating the world about the actual state of affairs in Africa?

Ziggy Marley: I think it will go far, because being my first time in South Africa, even I felt very good about what I saw in South Africa, especially after hearing some skeptical news about the country, and thinking you need to wear a vest for knife attacks because it was so dangerous. So I think it will show Africa in a good light for people who haven’t been to South Africa and don’t know about it, so I think that it’s good for Africa.

SA Men: Were there any low moments on your trip?

Ziggy Marley: Let me think, that’s a tough one. Everything was pretty exciting. I think the lowest moment was when watching Ghana lose to Uruguay in the Soccer World Cup.

SA Men: What was it like filming Marley Africa Road Trip with your two brothers? Any cases of sibling rivalry or did the three of you work well together?

Ziggy Marley: We work well together but we’re kind of different, if you know what I mean? I’m into the adventure stuff. My brother Rohan is not so much; he doesn’t like camping and things like that. Robbie, he’s the quietest one of us all, so it was interesting. The trip showed different sides of us, I like roughing it, but Rohan, well, we made some friends over there, and he ended up driving in a Rolls Royce at one point. I thought we were supposed to be on bikes, roughing it, so I gave him some attitude about that. We have our differences, but we go well together, you know. We laugh. There wasn’t anything in terms of like fighting, because we’re cool as brothers, but we have our differences that people will see in us.

SA Men: Why did you choose to do your trip on motorbikes?

Ziggy Marley: You know, all three of us are fans of motorcycles, and the experience of riding a motorcycle is very mental. It’s very conscious. You have to be aware. The main thing about doing this trip on a motorcycle was to be open to the elements and to the people. It’s a much more open way to travel. The experience is more real when you travel on a motorcycle through a country. Whenever we stopped, we would get involved with the communities where we stopped in, we got to explore places and see people in a different way than if we were in a car.

SA Men: Is it true that you made a documentary about your father because you wanted to show his real and emotional side?

Ziggy Marley: Yes, we’re busy now with the documentary, and it will be coming out some time next year. What we’re trying to do is to give people a more open look into our father’s life. So many people love him around the world and they deserve to see him in a way they haven’t seen him before, which is in a more real-life way, alive, just like somebody you know. So this documentary is to let people know Bob as an artist, as a human being, as a man, and I think we’re accomplishing that.

SA Men: What was the general reaction of the local people you met along your way, once they realized it was you?

Ziggy Marley: We see African people as very friendly. They have been very welcoming. Even the people who didn’t know who we were were very welcoming. The people who did know who we were expressed their love for us and our father and his music, and what we’re doing there. It showed us just how important our father’s music was to the people in that region, through their struggles, through the apartheid, the music played a very important role to them and we heard a lot about it, and we appreciate it.

SA Men: With Bob Marley having had interests in South Africa around the 1980s, do you think he’d be proud of you having been to South Africa and having seen what you have seen?

Ziggy Marley: Yes I think he would have been happy, you know South Africa has come a long way since from when he was concerned about the situation. But I think he’d be concerned about what the next move would be, we’ve accomplished only part of the goal that has been set by the dreams of many African forefathers, even my own father. The next part of that dream is to see a united Africa in even more of a significant way than what it is today, that would have been the next part of his accomplishment.

SA Men: In a previous interview, you mentioned your wife questioned your reasons for taking this trip, joking that it may be a possible mid-life crisis. You said it was your responsibility, how so?

Ziggy Marley: Well it’s something that I feel inside, I still feel it today. I feel the idea of promoting African unity is something that I feel I have to do, it’s inside of me. It may come from the ideas of my father, but I also feel it will be very beneficial to the African continent, this idea of unification. I want to see positive things for Africa.

SA Men: About the concert that your father performed in 1980 in Zimbabwe, you were much younger at the time, and after performing recently in South Africa, what have you noticed in terms of people’s attitudes and responses towards your performance compared to his performance, anything different?

Ziggy Marley: Well I think the people are hungry for music that has a message and uplifts them, because today’s society, the music is much less about ideas, the music industry is much more frivolous, I guess the word is commercialized. So people seem to be hungry for our music. They need this music and its message. There has been a big generation change since that time, where the younger generation today is less concerned. According to my experience, I’d say that the generation today is so separated from the struggle that their concerns are much different today. There is such a gap between the struggle and this new generation. So when we played in South Africa, it filled that gap. The people today still need a message.

SA Men: If someone wanted to follow your steps by also taking a journey through Africa, what places would you recommend they go see?

Ziggy Marley: I’d say go off the beaten track, you know. You don’t have to go to the touristy places, the places that have been documented already. Try taking paths that are not so familiar, if you’re into adventure. Go with your friends, the people you enjoy being with, and people who can support you. But I’m adventurous; I never like doing the normal thing. I kept wanting to stop to look at something along the way. Be spontaneous you know, be free to explore.

SA Men: You performed with some South African artists at your concert last year, which included Tidal Waves. Can you give us a thought on the musical talent in South Africa?

Ziggy Marley: Yes, South Africa is a very rich musical place. We met the group Tidal Waves while we were there and they have a very interesting style because it’s a little bit like reggae, but it has something, I don’t know how to explain it, maybe, I’d say a sci-fi element to it, something which I really like, which is very different. I’ve known a lot of musicians out of South Africa. The first time I worked with South African musicians, was in 1988, I was in New York and I met the cast of Serafina, who were playing in New York, so I performed a song with them called Dreams of Home, from my one album, Conscious Party, and we became friends from that time onwards. When I came back to South Africa I met up with them again, it had been twenty years since I last saw them.

SA Men: What is the most important thing to you personally, about Africa?

Ziggy Marley: You know being in South Africa, and being in Africa, is a very spiritual experience for me. Africa is a land that is rich in spirit, rich in vibrations, rich in energy. It’s a very ancient land, and I feel a very strong connection to its vibrations and energy. To look on the land of Africa, is almost to look on the history of the Earth, the history of the world, because Africa is where the world began. It is where man began. So I miss being on that land where mankind started from, because there is some connection there that is not felt anywhere else in the world, and that is what I miss.

Be sure to catch the other five episodes of Marley Africa Road Trip every Wednesday at 21:05 on Discovery World and share the experience that Ziggy and his brothers had as they traced back their roots stemming from their father’s legacy in Africa.

Written by Cassandra Rowley for SA Men