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Bunny Wailer, a reggae star who was the last remaining founder of the legendary group The Wailers, died Tuesday in his native Jamaica. He was 73.
Wailer, a baritone singer whose birth name is Neville Livingston, founded The Wailers in 1963 with the late superstars Bob Marley and Peter Tosh while living in a slum in the capital of Kingston. They catapulted to international acclaim with the album “Catch a Fire” and also helped popularize Rastafarian culture among wealthy Jamaicans from the 1970s onwards.
“Jah-B has been a vanguard who has always pushed the boundaries of expression, be it in vocals, style or spoken word,” said Brian Paul Welsh, a local reggae musician known as Blvk H3ro. “There was and can be only one, Neville Livingston.”
Wailer died at Andrews Memorial Hospital in St. Andrew’s Jamaican parish of complications from a stroke he suffered in July, manager Maxine Stowe told The Associated Press.
His death was mourned worldwide as people shared music, memories and photos of the famous artist.
“The death of Bunny Wailer, the last of the original Wailers, ends the most vibrant period of Jamaica’s musical experience,” Jamaican politician Peter Phillips wrote in a Facebook post. “Bunny was a good, conscious Jamaican brother.”
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Jamaica’s Prime Minister Andrew Holness also paid tribute to Wailer, calling him “a respected elder statesman of the Jamaican music scene” in a series of tweets.
“This is a great loss for Jamaica and for Reggae Bunny Wailer will no doubt always be remembered for his outstanding contribution to the music industry and Jamaican culture,” he wrote.
As Wailer toured the world, he felt more at home in the mountains of Jamaica and enjoyed farming while writing and recording songs on his label, Solomonic.
“I think I actually love the country a little bit more than the city,” Wailer told The Associated Press in 1989. ″ It has more to do with life, health and strength. The city sometimes takes that away. The land is good for meditation. It has fresh food and a fresh atmosphere – that’s what keeps you going. ″
A year earlier, in 1988, he had chartered a jet and flew to Jamaica with food to help the victims of Hurricane Gilbert.
″ Sometimes people pay less attention to those things (food), but those turn out to be the most important things. I am a farmer, ”he told the AP.
He was the third and last original Wailer. Marley died of a brain tumor in 1981 at the age of 36, and Tosh was fatally shot in Jamaica in 1987 at the age of 42.
