A Rolling Stone Gathers No Moss:

Comparing Rolling Stone Magazine and A Brief History of Seven Killings

Kalycia Hodge

English 397: An Empire of Islands

Professor Jules Law

April 20, 2023

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Abstract

This paper intends to use commentary from Marlon James’s A Brief History of Seven
Killings to evaluate the representation of Jamaica in Rolling Stone magazine, particularly as it
pertains to the Jamaican politics of 1970. The rising popularity of Rolling Stone corresponds to a
significant amount of pop-cultural influence over the American public; the perception of Jamaica
in America can be largely attributed to the magazine at this time. This makes representation
significant, for the sake of Jamaica being appropriately presented to magazine consumers.
Literary analysis of these articles shows a significant level of racism, infantilization, and
exoticization of Jamaica, at the fault of reckless writing from Rolling Stone.
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1970s Jamaica featured extreme violence and national insecurity. This period was highly

publicized, most notably through musical publications, as reggae music began to reach an

international audience. A Brief History of Seven Killings, by Marlon James, provides a fabricated

narrative of the violence surrounding the attempted assassination of Bob Marley and the Wailers.

James’s account depicts a politically divided Jamaica from multiple different perspectives,

mostly Jamaican, though also featuring a few outsiders, most relevantly fictional Rolling Stone

reporter Alex Pierce. Although James’s novel offers fictionalized reports of this time, there is an

uncanny resemblance between Pierce’s articles and those of topical 1970s Rolling Stone. Of the

few articles Rolling Stone released about Jamaica, most focused on the politically charged events

of the 1970s with a disingenuous “counterculture” perspective. “Counterculture,” for the

purposes of this paper, involves any specifically political ideology that supports marginalized

identities, against a more popular oppressive regime (anti-establishment, etc.). The magazine

commodified Jamaica and dehumanized its people for the purpose of their own success and

popularity.

1972 was a historically significant year for Jamaican politics, marking a shift in

international political alliances (Adams 2018, 100). During this period of uncertainty in Jamaica,

two distinct political parties aggressively opposed one another: the People’s National Party

(PNP) and the Jamaica Labour Party (JLP). “...[W]hile the JLP’s leader Edward Seaga was

aligned with the capitalist ideas of the US, the PNP charted a new path, which leader, Michael

Manley, declared as Democratic Socialism in 1974” (Adams 2018, 100). However significant

the political fight and public discernments between both parties became, the overall retrospective

sentiment argues that their supportive audiences had such significant overlap, that “…both of

them, when saddled with the responsibility to govern, adopted roughly similar methods to attain
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roughly similar ends” (Foner 1973, 54). The PNP and JLP constantly usurped each other as the

main holder of political power, with JLP leading from 1962-72, and PNP winning the 1972

election (Foner 1973, 53).

It is around this time, the 1970s, that Rolling Stone magazine experienced their first major

rise in popularity. Most of this was highly attributed to major events within the United States,

such as the Summer of Love in San Francisco during 1967. The 60s and 70s served as a catalytic

period for the magazine, where the combination of music and political movement allowed

founders Jann Wenner and Ralph Gleason to easily cover a significant amount of popular,

relevant bands, while simultaneously being minimally controversial through the slight reference

of current politics. The main musical focus of the magazine was (and still is) rock; specifically,

rock in the continental United States, and the bands that played there. This expands to include

bands from outside of the country with substantial American audiences. Reggae music, or any

other genre, just as we might see now, were minorities in comparison. Therefore, the addition of

reggae music to the Rolling Stone roster seems a suspiciously calculated choice.

Rolling Stone was wary of being genuinely divisive in their approach, sufficiently being

controversial enough to state countercultural takes, but not to adopt a counterculture identity,

which would offer the magazine up for negative scrutiny and opposition. Jann Wenner himself

stated, in “A Letter from the Editor” from one of Rolling Stone’s very first installments, “You’re

probably wondering what we’re trying to do. It’s hard to say: sort of a magazine and sort of a

newspaper. The name of it is Rolling Stone, which comes from an old saying: "A Rolling Stone

gathers no moss…” (Wenner 1967, 2). This perfectly encompasses the non-committal, politically

allusive, musical report Wenner and Gleason ended up creating.

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Within A Brief History of Seven Killings, fictitious Rolling Stone reporter Alex Pierce

finds himself exhibiting a strong indifference to Jamaican tragedy. He describes having a

tokenized, preconceived expectation of what Jamaica will be like, only for this to be disrupted by

its similarities to the America he just left.

But hey, it's Jamaica. At least everybody should be pumping some Big Youth and Jimmy

Cliff. And yet when I get here, first time in a year, the only thing playing on the radio is

More More More, How Do You Like It How Do You Like It, and I’m thinking this rep is

bogus, … Even Abba gets more play than reggae here. (James 2014, 59)

Though Pierce is meant to be a fictionalized imagination of a Rolling Stones reporter, his attitude

parallels that of a real article. He lacks the integrity to write about Jamaica the way he

experiences it, criticizing what he finds, and disrespecting a country he does not understand, for

the sake of a misguided expectation. There is an apathetic disappointment that Pierce approaches

his articles with, as he finds ways to make the Jamaica that he experienced align better with the

one he is finding ways to sell.

Pierce’s apathy is animated in the 1976 Rolling Stone article “The Rastas Are Coming

the Rastas Are Coming!” by Michael Thomas. The article title comes across as insensitive but

fitting, considering its content; an inappropriately comedic recount of the shooting of Jamaican

PNP official, Michael Manley’s chauffeur. The article sports multiple instances of ill-fitting,

indifferent, and frankly crass writing, such as, “Probably some JLP (Jamaica Labour Party)

sportboy did it, although plenty of people had reason….” (Thomas 1976, 32). Thomas makes a

mockery of this political conflict, reducing it to the effect of a random drive-by, and not making

a point to explicitly express the dangerous reality of the situation. “Inter-gang warfare was a

postcolonial political phenomenon engineered by a segment of the emerging national political

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class. Inter-gang warfare was thus from its genesis, political warfare,” (Hutton 2010, 29). While

the prevalence of gang-behavior is significant, and rampant at this time between the PNP and

JLP, Thomas fails to appropriately report the culturally relevant importance of this event.

Later in the article, while attempting to elaborate on the reasons that Manley’s chauffeur

could have invited this violence upon himself, Thomas wrote, “Apparently this cowboy used to

pull it out wherever he was – at a cocktail party, or at a King’s House reception for the Cuban

hospital committee…” (Thomas 1976, 32). His writing turns the death into a spectacle that is

grossly implied to be deserved. The article isn’t meant necessarily to be sympathetic for the

actual victim. Rather, it is a clear attempt to reference political official Michael Manley and

cover events of significance that satellite him. However, it somehow still finds a way to be

actively reductive and uncompassionate to the event itself.

The depths of Alex Pierce’s apathy are furthered by the article he later begins to write,

which takes on a much darker, uncompassionately voyeuristic tone. A portion of it reads:

The Third World slum is a nightmare that defies beliefs or facts, even the ones staring

right at you. A vision of hell that twists and turns on itself and grooves to its own

soundtrack. Normal rules do not apply here. Imagination then, dream, fantasy. You visit

a ghetto, particularly a ghetto in West Kingston, and it immediately leaves the real to

become this sort of grotesque, something out of Dante or the infernal painting of

Hieronymus Bosch. It’s a rusty red chamber of hell that cannot be described so I will not

try to describe it. It cannot be photographed because some parts of West Kingston, such

as Rema, are in the grip of such bleak and unremitting repulsiveness that the inherent

beauty of the photographic process will lie to you about just how ugly it really is. Beauty

has infinite range but so does wretchedness and the only way to accurately grasp the full,
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unending vortex of ugly that is Trench Town is to imagine it. You could describe it in

colors, red and dead like old blood, brown like dirt, clay or shit, white like soapy water

running loose down a too narrow street. Shiny like new zinc holding up a roof or a fence

right beside old zinc, the material itself a living history of when last the politician did the

ghetto a favor. Zinc in the Eight Lanes shines like nickel. Zinc in Jungle is riddled with

bullet holes and rusted the color of Jamaican rural dirt. To understand the ghetto, to

make it real, one should forget seeing it. Ghetto is a smell. (James 2014, 81)

It is clearly a reimagination, and it is easy to assume that the real article would be less direct,

however the language so staunchly matches that of Rolling Stone through the embellishment of

poverty and accentuation of squalor. Nonetheless, Pierce reflects on this writing, allowing

Marlon James to produce a commentary and not simply a satirical parody of Rolling Stone’s

reporting. Pierce rebuts his own writing: “Fucking hell. Shit sounds like I’m writing for ladies

who lunch on Fifth Avenue. Unending vortex of ugly? Holy sensationalism, Batman! Who the

fuck am I writing for?” (James 2014, 82).

Written without any self-reflection, reporter Ed McCormack opens his 1976 Rolling

Stone article, Bob Marley with a Bullet, with a quote presumably written in Jamaican vernacular.

“It I dream, mon, every Rastamon’s dream, to fly home to Ethiopia and leave a-Babylon, where

de politicians doan let I an’ I brethren be free an’ live we own righteous way,” (McCormack

1976, 37). The necessity of this is unclear, as the alternative might have the negative effect of

changing the original voice of the quote. Though, this use of vernacular pervades the rest of the

article which appears to take on a mocking tone towards the men McCormack interviews. The

article begins with a conversation between McCormack and “Chris Blackwell, the young

Jamaican Caucasian heir to a tea and spice plantation who founded Island Records, and Michael
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butler, the “hip millionaire” who backed ‘Hair’...” (McCormack 1976, 37). Butler is quoted

saying “New Yawk” (McCormack 1976, 38), instead of “New York”, which hardly appears

necessary to the integrity of the individual in the way the opening quote might arguably be.

Instead, it leaves a crude impression, as though the presence of Butler’s accent is something

magazine consumers should be entertained by. There is a portion of the article later where

McCormack covers the movement to legalize marijuana, and ventriloquizes a local Jamaican

term, “ganga” (more commonly spelt, “ganja”), and it blares obviously and awkwardly from his

voice in the article.

Aside from the uncomfortable tone-deaf nature of McCormack’s quotes throughout the

article, he frequently evokes language similar to “poverty porn,” describing the “squalor” he

observes throughout the streets of Jamaica. Ed McCormack wrote:

“Is this the area they call Trench Town?” I asked the cab driver, gawking out the back

window at the endless pathetic claptrap shanties and tin-roofed shacks. “Noooooo, mon,”

he said, swerving to avoid a stray goat, “Trench Town is a bad place. Dat be in de

ghetto.” Unfortunately, the distinction was lost on me. For not even the most strident

protests of Marley, Tosh and other reggae artists, or the reggae cult film, The Harder

They Come, had prepared me for the absolute squalor I saw along the narrow Casbah

thoroughfares where sullen Caribbean Staggerlees stood on Catfish Row corners outside

funky, blasting juke-joints with paint-potched Red Stripe Beer signs dangling down.

Nothing had done justice to this pace, I realized, staring dejectedly out the window at too

many ragged urchins with spidery limbs and swollen bellies swarming through the

Casbah swelter, scattering all my palmy tourist-brochure preconceptions along that

dismal roadside. Then, my spirits lifted momentarily when the first real live Rastafarian I
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had ever seen breezed by on a motorbike, dreadlocks flying like freakflags. (McCormack

1976, 39)

Much of the cruelty in this quote lies in that not only does McCormack’s writing accentuate and

call attention to the unfortunate state Jamaica finds itself in at the time, but it also simultaneously

disrespects the home in which Jamaicans were presently living. He treats it like a zoo, looming

out of his window at the icky misfortune outside, claiming that he has no ability to differentiate

between what his driver refers to as the “bad part of Jamaica” and the part he is viewing at the

time. His depiction of this conversation implies the driver is unintelligent. The jarring contrast in

speech between McCormack and his driver, through the abrasive uses of vernacular, imply that

he must be too dumb, or used to his life in Jamaica to recognize that the area they are driving

through seems undesirable.

Although McCormack is explicitly not referencing the ghetto, his inability to differentiate

makes this quote applicable, “The current confinement of the lower stratum of the Kingston

population into ghettos that are “chamber[s] of hell” speaks to the enduring plantation rationale

of denying basic necessities because of a belief in their animality, idleness, and immorality, not

to mention a corresponding belief in the insanity of their unreasonableness…” (Lettman 2022,

132). The quote is drawn from a much more nuanced argument regarding philosophical analysis

of the epigenetic colonized consciousness; it still functions to expose a darker connotation of

McCormack’s representation. It shows that the language used to represent Jamaica in this article

has the lasting effect of reinforcing post-colonial colonized mindsets, and the racist fantasy

stereotypes of minorities that continue to pervade modern society.

In addition, McCormack describes likely impoverished Jamaicans as “ragged urchins

with spidery limbs.” This is excessively dehumanizing, as he refers to them through the lens of
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animals, insects, and anything but people. Disappointed that it doesn’t live up to its vacation

destination reputation, McCormack continues to make a spectacle out of Jamaica and her people,

referring to a Jamaican man as a “real live Rastafarian.” The phrase “real live” implies a sense of

mythicality, and although few of us outside of Jamaica are frequently conversing, or simply

seeing, any Rastafarians, they are not any less people. This only furthers the significance of the

Lettman quote in this reading, as the rampant racism covert in McCormack’s article proves to be

extraordinarily harmful.

Rolling Stone magazine’s representation of Jamaica is irresponsible, supporting the

dehumanization, infantilization, and unfortunate commodification of a community not often

heard from. When given the opportunity to represent a country experiencing a substantially

troubled time, not necessarily in need of anything but compassion and human connection from

the rest of the world, Rolling Stone squanders it. Instead, they appeal to the problems the country

is facing for entertainment. This reckless writing in turn communicates to Rolling Stone’s

growing audiences that Jamaicans are unintelligent and slovenly; in the same breath asserting

that they are too unintelligent to be aware that the state they are living in is uncomfortable. The

magazine’s unfeeling imperialistic journalism does not go unnoticed by Jamaica, but surely it is

overlooked in favor of an advantageous approach to editorial, supporting Rolling Stone in

creating a strong and ever-present successful magazine.

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