Ziggy Marley Brings Bass, Love and a Message to Downtown Raleigh
Brightside Under a Harvest Moon: Ziggy Marley Brings Bass, Love and a Message to Downtown Raleigh
Ziggy Marley and Gov’t Mule — Dreaming the Same Dream Tour
Red Hat Amphitheater — Raleigh, North Carolina — September 26, 2026
Review by The Reggae Network
RALEIGH, N.C. — Some concerts are remembered for the songs. Others for the performance, the crowd or the setting.
Every once in a while, everything aligns.
For Ziggy Marley’s September 26 appearance with Gov’t Mule at Red Hat Amphitheater in downtown Raleigh, the music arrived on an almost impossibly beautiful North Carolina evening: comfortable temperatures, a golden sunset across the Raleigh skyline, and then a brilliant full Harvest Moon rising into the night sky with Saturn appearing nearby.
And underneath it all came the bass.
Big, round, rolling, body-shaking reggae bass.
The result was a night that felt less like another stop on a national tour and more like one of those concerts that becomes permanently attached to a particular place and time.
A Personal Circle Back to the Beginning
For me, this performance also carried a much deeper personal history.
The first time I saw Ziggy Marley perform live was nearly four decades ago, when he was still a teenager performing with the Melody Makers and backed by the Ethiopian band Dallol. My memory places the show around 1986, either at the Santa Monica Civic Auditorium or the Long Beach Arena. After all these years, the exact venue escapes me, but the impression never did.
At the time, I was writing for a reggae publication called Jah Guide, while beginning to find my own way into the business as a reggae promoter and booking agent. Ziggy was essentially of my generation, still at the beginning of what would become an extraordinary career. His siblings were there, along with members of the Marley family, including his mother Rita Marley and grandmother Cedella Booker.
Watching him command the stage in Raleigh all these years later inevitably brought some of those memories back.
So did Pablo Stennett.
Pablo’s performance at Red Hat transported me straight back to the Los Angeles reggae scene of those earlier years, when I remember him playing with Bass Culture and Yard Core, working the clubs and helping drive rooms with the kind of bass that did not merely support a band — it moved the entire house.
That same quality was present in Raleigh.
His bass was deep, rolling and physical, but also musical. Every note carried weight. Hearing him anchor Ziggy’s band all these years later created one of those rare moments when the present suddenly connects with an earlier chapter of your life.
Watching George Hughes Jr. brought back another piece of that history.
His father, George “Jawge” Hughes Sr., became a fixture of the Los Angeles reggae scene through his work with the Unknown Band, and seeing the younger Hughes perform carried an unmistakable sense of continuity.
Son like father.
The musicianship, timing and riddim were immediately recognizable.
For someone who experienced that earlier era firsthand, the Raleigh concert was therefore more than another Ziggy Marley performance. It was also a reminder of how many musicians, families and relationships have carried reggae forward from one generation to the next.
Nearly forty years had passed since I first watched a teenage Ziggy Marley perform with the Melody Makers.
Now, beneath a full Harvest Moon in downtown Raleigh, there he was again — older, seasoned and firmly established in his own legacy — while musicians connected to some of those same formative years supplied the riddim behind him.
For a few moments, the distance between then and now seemed remarkably small.
Ziggy Marley — Looking Forward, Not Living in the Past
The Dreaming the Same Dream Tour paired Ziggy Marley with Gov’t Mule, led by legendary guitarist and songwriter Warren Haynes.
The tour’s name carries its own musical history. Marley and Haynes previously wrote “Dreaming the Same Dream” together, one of two songs the pair composed during a songwriting session in Los Angeles. The released version was recorded by the Warren Haynes Band and appeared on the 2012 live album Live at the Moody Theater.
The Raleigh show, however, was not built around an onstage Marley-Haynes collaboration. The artists performed distinct sets, allowing each musical identity to stand on its own.
For Ziggy, that identity was unmistakable.
Yes, he honored the monumental catalog of his father, Bob Marley. “One Love,” “Small Axe,” “Jammin’” and “Could You Be Loved” produced some of the evening’s most instantly recognizable moments.
But anyone expecting a Bob Marley tribute show missed the point.
The overwhelming character of Ziggy’s performance came from his own decades-long catalog — from the Melody Makers era through his solo career and into the new Brightside material.
That distinction matters.
More than four decades into his professional career, Ziggy Marley possesses a substantial musical legacy of his own, and Raleigh heard a remarkably broad cross-section of it.
Among the selections were “JAH We Give Glory,” “Why Let the World,” “Hey People Now,” “Personal Revolution,” “Be Free,” “See Dem Fake Leaders,” “Racism Is A Killa,” “Justice,” “Circle of Peace,” “Wild and Free,” “Love Is My Religion,” “Look Who’s Dancing” and the evening’s culminating title track, “Brightside.”
Taken together, the songs almost read like a declaration:
JAH We Give Glory.
One Love.
Personal Revolution.
Be Free.
Reject fake leaders.
Racism is a killer.
Justice.
A circle of peace.
Wild and free.
Love is my religion.
This was reggae functioning in one of its deepest traditions — not merely as dance music, but as music carrying a message.
Peace, Unity, Freedom and an Unmistakable Message Against Racism
Throughout the performance, Ziggy repeatedly returned to themes of peace, unity, love, freedom and human dignity, while directly confronting racism, division and hatred.
The newer material fit naturally alongside songs written years and even decades earlier because the philosophical thread has remained remarkably consistent.
“Racism Is A Killa” was direct and uncompromising.
“See Dem Fake Leaders” brought a harder edge.
“Personal Revolution” turned the message inward, emphasizing individual responsibility and transformation.
Then songs such as “Circle of Peace,” “Wild and Free” and “Love Is My Religion” brought the performance back toward reconciliation, freedom and love.
The result was uplifting without being lightweight.
There was joy in the music, but there was substance behind it.
Pablo Stennett Makes the Ground Move
And then there was Pablo Stennett.
The bass sound that night deserves special mention.
Stennett’s rolling bass lines did not merely accompany the songs. At times they seemed to lead the physical experience of the entire concert.
Through Red Hat Amphitheater’s powerful and exceptionally clear sound system, the bottom end remained enormous without becoming muddy. The bass maintained definition. Individual notes could be heard and felt even while producing enough low-frequency energy to seemingly shake the venue.
There are sound systems that are loud.
This one was powerful and clear.
That distinction matters enormously in reggae, where poorly configured low end can turn a bass line into indistinct rumbling. At Red Hat, Stennett’s tone retained its shape, depth and musicality while hitting with tremendous physical force.
Even more impressive, Stennett later told The Reggae Network that he had been feeling under the weather.
From the audience side of the stage, you would never have known it.
Carlton “Santa” Davis Was Sorely Missed
One unmistakable absence was veteran drummer Carlton “Santa” Davis.
According to information shared with The Reggae Network, Santa recently suffered a leg injury and had to seek treatment, preventing him from appearing in Raleigh.
His absence was noticeable because the Stennett-Davis rhythm partnership has been such an important component of Ziggy Marley’s live sound.
Santa was sorely missed.
But the drummer filling his chair stepped into an unenviable assignment with confidence.
He struck the drumheads and cymbals with authority while remaining tightly connected to Stennett’s bass. At its strongest, the rhythm section operated almost like a single instrument — Pablo supplying the deep rolling foundation while the drums punched, cracked and shimmered above it.
The reggae heartbeat remained fully intact.
A Set That Belonged to Ziggy
Perhaps the strongest evidence of Ziggy Marley’s artistic independence was simply the set list itself.
“Justice” and “Look Who’s Dancing” reached back into the Ziggy Marley and the Melody Makers era.
“Love Is My Religion” represented one of the defining statements of his solo career.
“Wild and Free” carried another chapter of Ziggy’s songwriting.
Then came the current material from Brightside.
Rather than structuring the evening around one Bob Marley classic after another, those familiar songs were woven into a much larger Ziggy Marley story.
When “One Love” or “Jammin’” appeared, they felt like acknowledgments of an extraordinary musical inheritance rather than substitutes for Ziggy’s own catalog.
And when the performance ultimately arrived at “Brightside,” the title track from his new album, the evening had traveled from Marley history directly into the present.
The booming rhythm section drove the final stretch toward a genuine climax.
Red Hat Amphitheater Was Part of the Show
It would be impossible to fairly review this particular concert without discussing Red Hat Amphitheater itself.
The venue was exceptional.
Red Hat sits directly inside downtown Raleigh, surrounded by the city rather than isolated from it. Multiple downtown streets wrap around the amphitheater, and the venue feels almost woven into the surrounding blocks.
That placement completely changes the concert experience.
Walk the surrounding streets and the music can be heard clearly for several blocks. The concert does not feel sealed off from Raleigh. It spills outward into the city.
That is part of the venue’s charm.
Inside, there is remarkably little separation between artist and audience for a venue capable of hosting major national touring acts.
The sight lines are excellent.
The seating feels close enough to preserve intimacy.
The acoustics are first-rate.
And the sound system is among the strongest aspects of the entire venue.
The music was loud enough to deliver the necessary physical impact without sacrificing clarity. Vocals remained intelligible. Instruments retained separation. The bass could thunder without swallowing everything around it.
From a pure listening standpoint, Red Hat delivered.
A Staff That Let the Concert Be the Concert
The staff also deserves recognition.
Concert security and venue personnel can dramatically affect an evening, sometimes by becoming more intrusive than the circumstances require.
That was not the experience at Red Hat.
The staff was accommodating, respectful, kind and unobtrusive.
They were present when needed without making themselves part of the show.
Entry was straightforward.
Moving throughout the venue was easy.
Exiting was easy.
The atmosphere was relaxed.
There was no sense of being herded through an impersonal entertainment complex. People came to hear music, spend time together and enjoy themselves, and the venue largely stayed out of the way and allowed that to happen.
The best word for the overall atmosphere may simply be:
Chill.
Compare It With the Big-City Concert Experience
Anyone accustomed to attending major concerts in places such as Los Angeles will immediately understand the contrast.
A large metropolitan concert can become an all-day logistical ordeal before the first note is played: freeway traffic, remote parking structures, long walks, security bottlenecks, complicated entrances, expensive transportation and then the reverse process when thousands of people attempt to leave simultaneously.
Sometimes the effort required to attend the show becomes nearly as memorable as the show itself.
Red Hat felt almost like the opposite.
You are already downtown.
Restaurants are nearby.
Hotels are nearby.
Bars, restaurants and other downtown amenities are within easy reach.
The concert is integrated into the city rather than separated from it.
You get in.
You find your place.
You hear a tremendous sound system.
You enjoy the concert.
And when it ends, you walk directly back into downtown Raleigh.
After experiencing a major touring act in this environment, some of America’s enormous suburban and big-city concert complexes begin to feel unnecessarily difficult.
From this reviewer’s perspective, considering sound quality, seating, atmosphere, convenience and simple enjoyability, Red Hat Amphitheater belongs in the conversation among the best outdoor concert experiences in America.
Not because it is the biggest.
Not because it is the most elaborate.
But because of the question that ultimately matters to the person buying the ticket:
How enjoyable is it actually to see a concert there?
At Red Hat, the answer was simple.
Very.
Raleigh Provided Its Own Light Show
Then nature decided to contribute.
As daylight disappeared and the warm glow of sunset reflected from the buildings around downtown Raleigh, a brilliant full Harvest Moon rose into the evening sky.
Saturn appeared nearby.
The weather could scarcely have been better.
Cool evening air.
Clear skies.
Downtown Raleigh glowing around the amphitheater.
A full moon overhead.
Saturn nearby.
And reggae rolling through the city streets.
No lighting designer could have improved upon it.
The setting became part of the memory.
A Night Bigger Than Nostalgia
It is impossible for Ziggy Marley to walk onto a stage without carrying history with him.
His father changed music.
The Marley name is permanently connected to Jamaica, reggae, resistance, spirituality, peace and unity.
But the Raleigh performance demonstrated why Ziggy should not be viewed merely through that inheritance.
He has his own history now.
His own songs.
His own body of work.
His own musicians.
His own message.
His own audience.
Hearing “One Love,” “Small Axe,” “Jammin’” and “Could You Be Loved” beneath a full Harvest Moon was undeniably special.
But so was hearing “Justice.”
So was “Personal Revolution.”
So was “See Dem Fake Leaders.”
So was “Racism Is A Killa.”
So was “Circle of Peace.”
So was “Wild and Free.”
So was “Love Is My Religion.”
And so was the booming arrival of “Brightside.”
That is ultimately what made the Raleigh performance work.
It acknowledged where Ziggy Marley came from without becoming trapped there.
Pablo Stennett’s bass shook the amphitheater. The drums answered. Ziggy danced, sang and delivered his message of peace, freedom, unity and love without allowing the message to overwhelm the music.
The crowd moved with him.
Then the music escaped the amphitheater and rolled outward through downtown Raleigh.
Above it all hung the Harvest Moon.
For one September night, the music, the city, the weather and the sky seemed to arrive at the same conclusion:
Find the bright side.
Ziggy Marley — Raleigh Set List
- JAH We Give Glory
- Why Let the World
- Hey People Now
- One Love
- Personal Revolution
- Be Free
- See Dem Fake Leaders
- Small Axe
- Racism Is A Killa
- Justice
- Circle of Peace
- Jammin’
- Wild and Free
- Love Is My Religion
- Could You Be Loved
- Look Who’s Dancing
- Brightside