A Veterans in Action concert has become a highly anticipated event on the local calendar, giving seasoned reggae fans something special to look forward to every Veteran’s Day, November 11, and every February, for the yearly celebration of Bob Marley’s birthday.

The latest in the nostalgia-laden series found Jamaican stalwarts Yami Bolo and Junior Reid delivering a truck load of “Stanna-nitchy-woys” and “Tu-tu-tways” to a packed BAA gymnasium on Saturday night.

The Bob Marley tribute was mostly handled by local deejays Juggling Jason and DJ Donnie playing a heavy dose of the legendary artist’s innumerable hits.

The crowd bobbed and swayed to the vibes the whole night, creating an atmosphere of positive Irations and decidedly Irie Ights (it was a real nice scene for those who don’t know Rastaspeak).

As I’ve raved elsewhere, the BAA gymnasium is the perfect setting for these wonderful concerts. The building has not changed in 30 years, which makes going to one of these events like stepping into a time machine and being transported back to when you were young and the world was that much less harsh.

Saturday night literally felt exactly like the Supercat concert I attended at BAA back in 1988 (when I was still in high school); it’s just the absolute ideal setting for concerts featuring reggae luminaries from the 80s and 90s.

Another very salient feature of these concerts is the demographic that they attract. The patrons of Veterans in Action are grown, mature, and refined, which adds to the familial, nostalgic vibe.

The quality of the performers featured doesn’t hurt either, and the most recent line-up was a more than adequate addition to the series.

Yami Bolo took the stage just after 12.30am to a chorus of applause and a sea of raised lighters. He opened with the stunning White Mice classic True Love, before smoothly merging in to his excellent cover of the Madonna standard La Isla Bonita. There was copious singing along at this point.

Mr Bolo rounded out his 30 minute set with solid renditions of his Ital anti-violence hit Weapon of Destruction, the sweet When A Man’s in Love, and a simply sublime rendering of the Sam Smith smash Stay With Me.

This relatively short set provided many of the evening’s overall highlights, including the stirring encore performance of the Stevie Wonder opus Isn’t She Lovely. Short, sweet, and succinct; Mr Bolo packed CD quality vocals and a handful of classic hits into a very engaging Veterans in Action moment and was showered with admiration by the extremely knowledgeable crowd.

Junior Reid hit the stage a bit after 1am and immediately dove into his most recognisable hit. This was probably the moment many patrons were most looking forward to, which begged the question, why would he open with this?

Indeed, when I heard the familiar opening notes of the massive One Blood the question did cross my mind, but soon the bewilderment was gone, washed away in a wave of bassline-fuelled euphoria.

Mr Reid never replicated the heights he hit with One Blood, making Saturday night somewhat of a microcosm of his entire career. He did deliver nice renditions of hits like You Haffi Fit, Foreign Mind, and This is Why I’m Hot, but once his opening salvo had been received and absorbed there was really not much more for him to do.

Overall, Mr Reid’s 40-minute set was nice, but his opening eight minutes were outstanding, and because he opened with his juggernaut, closing was always going to be, well, less than satisfying.

He was rapping during his encore. Then he sang the chorus to One Blood once more and exited the stage a few minutes before 2am. There were a few grumbles of discontent lingering throughout the crowd at that point, but the live performances were generally quite well received.

The remainder of the night saw DJ Donnie juggling vintage reggae hits featuring a heavy dose of Bob Marley. Bob would have been 80 this year, and his music is still as relevant today as it ever was.

Happy belated birthday Mr Marley and a big thank you to the Veterans in Action crew for helping us celebrate the great man’s birth in style once again.