The Wailers 50 Years Of Positive Vibrations

The Wailers bring five decades of reggae history to Edmonton on 19 April 2026 at Midway Music Hall. Born in Kingston’s Trench Town in the early 60s, the group formed around Bob Marley, Bunny Wailer and Peter Tosh, soon joined by voices and players from the local scene. First shaped by ska and rocksteady, their close harmonies took root at Studio One, drawing on gospel, rhythm and blues and Jamaican popular music. Working with producer Lee “Scratch” Perry and the Barrett brothers, Aston “Family Man” and Carlton, they settled into a slower, stripped-back reggae pulse that set the course for what followed.

Through the 70s, sessions and tours linked Kingston and London as Island Records carried their songs beyond Jamaica. After Tosh and Bunny stepped away, the project moved into Bob Marley and the Wailers; after Marley’s death, live line-ups built around musicians from that lineage have continued under the Wailers name.

On stage today, the band spans early cuts and material shaped in the Perry era, carried by the bass-and-drum foundation the Barretts defined. The set draws on the group’s catalogue and traces the path from ska to roots reggae, played by artists who keep this history in motion.