Music / Legend

A legend by a legend.

Legend is a posthumous Greatest Hits Album by Bob Marley & The Wailers, released in 1984, a mere three years after his death. It's widely considered to be one of the most excellent musical compilations ever made and sold millions of copies, making it the best-selling reggae album of all-time. It's even the second longest-charting album in the history of Billboard, only surpassed by The Dark Side of the Moon (1973) by Pink Floyd. One reason for its phenomenal success is that only Marley's universal Top 40 hit singles up to that time were included, not otherwise excellent songs that just never became hits.

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Tracklist:

Side One

1. "Is This Love?" (3:52)
2. "No Woman, No Cry" (4:05)
3. "Could You Be Loved?" (3:33)
4. "Three Little Birds" (2:56)
5. "Buffalo Soldier" (5:24)
6. "Get Up, Stand Up" (3:17)
7. "Stir It Up" (3:38)

Side Two

1. "One Love/People Get Ready" (2:52)
2. "I Shot the Sheriff" (3:46)
3. "Waiting in Vain" (4:10)
4. "Redemption Song" (3:48)
5. "Satisfy My Soul" (3:45)
6. "Exodus" (5:24)
7. . "Jamming" (3:17)

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Are these tropes, are these tropes, are these tropes that I'm feeling?

• Badass Boast: "Get Up, Stand Up".
  And now we've seen the light: we're gonna stand up for our rights!
• Broken Record:
  We're jamming, we're jamming, we're jamming, we're jammming, we're jamming, we're jamming, we're jamming, we're jamming... hope you like jamming too!
• Crapsack World: "Exodus".
  We're leaving Babylon
• Confess to a Lesser Crime: "I Shot The Sherrif (but I did not shoot the deputy).".
• Cool People Rebel Against Authority: So cool he's actually named a "legend" on the album cover.
• Epic Rocking: "Get Up Stand Up" and "Exodus", the longest song on the album.
• Face on the Cover: Bob in close-up.
• Fake-Out Fade-Out: Near the end of "Satisfy My Soul".
• Fugitive Arc: "I Shot The Sherrif", in which the protagonist is on the run for being accused of murdering Sherrif John Brown, which he admits he did, though he had nothing to do with the murder of his deputy.
• The Future Will Be Better: "Get Up, Stand Up", "Three Little Birds", "No Woman, No Cry" and "Exodus".
• Greatest Hits Album: One of the best-selling of all time.
• I Just Want to Be Free: A theme in all his protest songs.
• I Will Wait for You: "Waiting In Vain".
  Cause summer is here and I'm still waiting there
  Winter is here and I'm still waiting there
• Made a Slave: "Buffalo Soldier" and "Redemption Song" mention this time period.
• Manly Tears: "Waiting in Vain":
  Tears in my eyes burn/ tears in my eyes burn/ while I'm waiting/ while I'm waiting for my turn.
• The Migration: "Exodus"
  We're leaving Babylon, we're going to our father's land
• The Missionary: Marley summarizes the central message of Rastafarianism in "Redemption Song".
• Murder Ballad: "I Shot The Sheriff".
  I shot the sheriff, but I did not shoot the deputy
• Non-Appearing Title: Legend.
• One-Word Title: Legend, "Exodus" and "Jamming".
• Pep-Talk Song: "Three Little Birds", "No Woman, No Cry''.
• The Power of Love: "Is This Love?", "No Woman, No Cry", "Could You Be Loved", "Stir It Up", "One Love", "Waiting In Vain" and "Satisfy My Soul".
• The Power of Rock: "Jamming".
• The Promised Land: Africa in this case.
• Protest Song: "Buffalo Soldier", "Get Up, Stand Up" and "Exodus"
• Rearrange the Song: Logically, since this a compilation album.
• Rebellious Spirit: "Get Up, Stand Up".
• Rule of Three: "Three Little Birds".
  • Bob sings in "Waiting In Vain" that it's been three years since he's knocking on her door.
• Shout-Out: "One Love" has a few lines referencing "People Get Ready" by The Impressions.
• Silly Love Songs: "Stir It Up".
• Small Reference Pools: Like a lot of Greatest Hits albums, it's the only Bob Marley release a lot of people own. This extends to radio airplay as well, it is extremely rare to hear any Bob songs on the radio that aren't taken from this album (even though he had various other hit singles).
• Talking Animal: The birds in "Three Little Birds" apparently are able to speak to Bob. (In reality they were a metaphor for his backing choir, the I-Threes.)
• Title-Only Chorus: "No Woman, No Cry" and "Redemption Song".

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