Bob Marley and the Wailers ‘Satisfy My Soul’ 7” Single Sleeve Watercolour 1978

This piece was commissioned by Island Records for a 7” single cover. ‘Satisfy My Soul’ was used to promote the Album ‘Kaya’.

The music on Kaya was more easy going and less political than the previous album ‘Exodus’ with the songs revolving around Love and especially love for ‘Mary Jane’. The title track ‘Easy Skanking’ kind of gives the game away.

Chris Neville from Ian Fleming and Associates got me the commission after presenting various portfolios to Island. I forget the name of the Graphic Designer who supervised the project, he was in South Kensington and the initial brief was to create a portrait of Bob Marley as a Lion (Lion of Judah). I spent a lot of hours over two weeks on this, using earth-tones with the result that it made Bob look like the Lion from ‘Wizard of Oz’. This was rejected and I was mortified, especially since it was my first serious commission and quite well paid. It was decided to let me do another version and I would get paid for both. This time they said just do a Lion with dreadlocks, same colours. It just looked weird. Second rejection. To save the project I suggested a ‘ Henri Rousseau’ naive approach, something new to me but I remembered a friend at Canterbury who did naïve paintings, Mark Copeland, and also the American illustrator Dave Mcmacken who did an album cover for the band Weather Report, ‘Black Market’. A tight deadline, late nights and lots of coffee, finally it was accepted…third time lucky…phew! And three fees as well. The Graphic Designer was very generous and gave me sole credit.

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These are the best scans I have for now. They will be replaced once I track down the originals.

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I also pinched this from an online blog and will replace it eventually. Jim Capaldi was the drummer with Traffic.

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