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GQ 21 hours ago
Exclusive: Bob Marley's Family Reunites for its First Photoshoot in Over a Decade
In a rare photo shoot, GQ Style caught up with Bob's living legacy: The Marley sons, daughters, and grandchildren who are keeping Tuff Gong tougher than ever. Ziggy Marley Age: 47 Essential Album: Conscious Party* (1988), produced by members of Talking Heads If the world's expectations ever fazed Bob's firstborn son, he's never let it show. “I don't carry any weight,” he says. “This is a family. Whatever we are is the same way we grow up—nothing has changed, really. Each individual role is important.” He sees himself less as a patriarch than as a “voice of reason.” Still, there's a clear “hierarchy of the elders, the adults, which is Cedella, me, and Sharon (the oldest). Stephen is a bridge to .....
If the world's expectations ever fazed Bob's firstborn son, he's never let it show. “I don't carry any weight,” he says. “This is a family. Whatever we are is the same way we grow up—nothing has changed, really. Each individual role is important.” He sees himself less as a patriarch than as a “voice of reason.” Still, there's a clear “hierarchy of the elders, the adults, which is Cedella, me, and Sharon (the oldest). Stephen is a bridge to the younger ones, who wasn't around Bob a lot.” If anything, his siblings' success—both in their own ventures and in shepherding the Marley brand—has freed him to be more personal in the studio. His 15th record, Ziggy Marley, is out May 20. “It's the album I've been most hands-on with: engineering, mixing, songwriting. I put all of myself into it.”
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The
glue that holds the family together, Cedella is the undisputed queen
bee, the driving force behind the many businesses that bear the Marley
name.“It's a family discussion,” she says, “but whatever business
ventures we get into, I'm the one who has to deal with whoever we
partner with on a day-to-day basis.” Although she's authored children's
books and collaborated with Puma to design the Jamaican 2012 Olympic
uniform, most of her work fits into the bigger family picture. “Anything
I do is for Marley. That's what I wake up for, to help build this
empire that I promised my parents I would from when I was, like, 10.”
That mentality underlines a fierce work ethic to match the Marleys'
creative ambition. “When Mummy and Daddy were on the road all the time,
they were workin',” Cedella says. “I didn't see them really take a day off. We weren't born with a silver spoon in our mouth. I've grown up fightin'.”
 AGE: 44 PURSUITS: Graphic arts, motorcycles Vest, $245, Boss Shirt, $385, Burberry Ring, Degs & Sal  AGE: 43 INDUSTRY: Fashion Dress, Missoni 
Born
to Tuff Gong and the beauty who won Miss World in 1976, Jr. Gong has
always been the outlier of the musical Marleys, if mostly for
generational reasons. “You have to remember,” Damian says, “Ziggy is ten
years older than me. So I grew up with dancehall and a whole different
set a influence.” Until recently, he's been more apt to use the scratchy
voice he shares with his father in a vocal style that's more rapping
than singing—laying it over a Skrillex beat, collaborating with Nas, or
spitting gritty rhymes on his instant-classic 2005 record Welcome to Jamrock, which spawned a monster hit in the title track. (You know it: Out in the streets, they call it muuuurder.)
Still, Damian says, “I was kind of missing that real live roots reggae
sound.” So his next album, due later this year, will include “more
ballads, more singing…more what you might think of hearing from my
brothers.”
The
younger of Bob and Rita's sons and our host for this photo shoot,
Stephen performed onstage with Bob at his legendary Zimbabwe
Independence concert at the tender age of 8. At Reggae Sunsplash '81—the
year Bob passed—he bravely dedicated “Sugar Pie” to “all the pretty
girls out there.” It was a precocious preview of his adult catalog,
known for smoldering duets, including “No Cigarette Smoking (in My
Room)” with Melanie Fiona and “In Love with You” on Erykah Badu's LP Mama's Gun.
Big brother Ziggy describes him as “the bridge” between the kids who
knew Bob and the Marleys who came after, and Stephen lends production to
many of his siblings' releases from his Lion's Den home studio. This
summer he's slated to drop his own album, Revelation Part II: The Fruit of Life, which just might win him his ninth Grammy.
 AGE: 44 FOUNDER OF: Marley Coffee FATHER OF: Seven children, five with Lauryn Hill Suit, $1,045, and shirt, $165, Boss  AGE: 40 MOST RECENT ALBUM: Awake (2009) Jumpsuit, $2,195, Valentino Shoes, $1,660, Berluti  Loafers $730 Gucci Age: 20 AGE: 25 PROVENANCE: Grandson of Bob, son of Stephen Shirt, $600, Jeffrey Rüdes Pants, $1,100, and shoes, $795, Salvatore Ferragamo  AGE: 40 ACTOR IN: The films Shottas and One Love Jacket, $3,495, Ermenegildo Zegna |
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