“The room was full of smoke… I said, ‘Bob, my name’s Ronnie.’ and he just looked through me”: Ronnie Wood’s strange encounter with Bob Marley when they jammed together in California

Two classic 1979 images of two icons: Ronnie Wood [left] plays a custom-made Zemaitis single-cut; Bob Marley wears a blue denim shirt and sings into the mic.

Ronnie Wood is a good guy to have in the Rolodex. He is a good guy, period. When the phone rang on a November’s afternoon in 1979, Al Anderson from the Wailers was on the other end of the line, and he was in a jam.

Bob Marley and the Wailers had a gig in Oakland, California, and someone had stolen his guitar. He asked Wood if he could help and sure enough he could. That the Rolling Stones guitarist was in a different city entirely didn’t matter. Consider it done. He didn’t need to think about it twice.