One Love/People Get Ready

I am doing non-website writing today, and not much is going on in the world, but I do have some heavier pieces to discuss in the next few days. But why not start off the year with a song—or two?

The Bob Marley hit “One Love” was called “One Love/People Get Ready” when issued in 1977, combining the Marley title with that of the famous Curtis Mayfield song. But there is little Mayfield in the Marley song—just enough to force Marley give it a composite title according to copyright law.  Both songs, however, are masterpieces, and both are religious.

Wikipedia gives the backstory for Marley’s double title.

The famous version of “One Love” that appears on their album Exodus was recorded in 1977 for Island Records under the title of “One Love/People Get Ready”. This version credits Curtis Mayfield (as Island Records wanted to avoid copyright problems), and it gives co-authorship credits to both Marley and Mayfield as it contains an interpolation of the Impressions‘ song “People Get Ready“, written by Mayfield. As the main artist, Marley and his group were credited as Bob Marley and the Wailers. It was not released as a single until 16 April 1984, to promote the forthcoming greatest hits album Legend. However, the single became one of his biggest hits and has been included on many of Marley and the Wailers subsequent compilation albums. The original recording of the song does not credit Mayfield’s song and is simply titled “One Love”; this is because copyright law was not enforced for Jamaican recordings at this time. The original song was published in the key of B♭ major, but it has since been transposed so it is in the key of C major.

Here is the famous version of the Marley song, recorded on June 3, 1977. It is a work of genius, marred for me only by the toy-piano-like introduction, which even sounds a bit off key. When I listen to Marley, I always remember that he died at only 36, of metastatic skin cancer that he could have prevented by having his big toe amputated. (He refused.) It’s sad but futile to think about what musical paths he would have traversed had he just allowed the doctors to sever his toe.

I forgot that Greg posted this song two years ago, so go back and see his comments  But you should definitely listen to it.

Below: The Marley lyrics.  When I read the above, I played the Mayfield song back in my mind and tried to remember which bits of Marley could have been lifted from “People Get Ready”. I remembered one line (the third bolded line below), but when I listened to “People Get Ready” after several Mayfield-less years, I discovered four bits of “One Love” that Marley took from “People Get Ready”. They are all in bold, and you can hear the Mayfield song below. They don’t constitute word-for-word plagiarism except for the third bolded line—the one I rememberd:

[Chorus]
One love, one heart
Let’s get together and feel alright
Hear the children cryin’ (One love)
Hear the children cryin’ (One heart)
Sayin’, “Give thanks and praise to the Lord and I will feel alright”
Sayin’, “Let’s get together and feel alright, woah-woah-woah-woah”

[Verse 1]
Let them all pass all their dirty remarks (One love)
There is one question I’d really love to ask (One heart)
Is there a place for the hopeless sinners
Who has hurt all mankind just to save his own beliefs?

[Chorus]
One love (What about the one heart?), one heart (What about the—)
Let’s get together and feel alright (As it was in the beginning)
One love (So shall it be in the end), one heart (Alright)
Give thanks and praise to the Lord and I will feel alright
Let’s get together and feel alright, one more thing

[Verse 2]
Let’s get together to fight this Holy Armagiddyon (One love)
So when the Man comes, there will be no, no doom (One song)
Have pity on those whose chances grows thinner
There ain’t no hiding place from the Father of Creation, singing

[Chorus]
One love (What about the one heart?), one heart (What about the—)
Let’s get together and feel alright (I’m pleadin’ to mankind)
One love (Oh, Lord), one heart (Woah)
Give thanks and praise to the Lord and I will feel alright
Let’s get together and feel alright
Give thanks and praise to the Lord and I will feel alright
Let’s get together and feel alright

In 2021, Rolling Stone named “People Get Ready” the 122nd greatest song of all time. The song was included in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame’s 500 Songs that Shaped Rock and Roll. “People Get Ready” was named as one of the Top 10 Best Songs of All Time by Mojo music magazine, and was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame in 1998. In 2015, the song was selected for preservation in the National Recording Registry due to its “cultural, historic, or artistic significance”. Martin Luther King Jr. named the song the unofficial anthem of the Civil Rights Movement and often used the song to get people marching or to calm and comfort them.