Post by Diamond Girl on Apr 21, 2006 16:11:25 GMT -5
Four on the Floor: The Motown Sound
Lenny Kaye and David Dalton, Rock 100, Cooper Square Press, 1999
IT WAS EVER MORE THAN A RECORD LABEL. At its zenith, during a span that dominated most (if not all) of the sixties, the hit factory of Motown charged and defined the state of rhythm and blues art, offering black identity through multiracial discipline, individual independence subordinated to the needs of a vast, insatiable audience. Berry Gordy Jr., a self-defined "Mr. Hitsville," had absorbed his lessons well on the Detroit assembly lines; in the manner of Henry Ford, he conveyed a belt of sleek, chromed models from initial blueprint to final showroom display, overseeing production to suit every taste and pocketbook. Motown's approach was total, educating their performers in a virtual charm school, indoctrinating them in the "Sound of Young America" until their family heritage was unquestioned, beyond reproach.
Gordy built slowly and knowledgeably, relying on his proven instincts and the talented songwriter-producers he hired to convert fancy into chart fact. Unlike the sporadic, underfinanced and inconsistent black-owned companies that preceded it (often relying on outside distribution and ethnic support), Motown was a full-blooded corporation, promoting and delivering its own without regard to stigmatized barriers. Its social significance, turning the color wheel to face an opposing direction, was only heightened by the general excellence of its product, mixed for transistors and three-inch speakers, a brilliant synthesis that aligned beat and chambered chorus in unmistakable emphathy.
Most accepted stories of Motown's origins begin with Berry Gordy borrowing several hundred dollars to leave a Detroit car plant and form the Tammie (Tamla) record company. While surely a graphic representation of Berry's working-class roots, the story jars considerably with the string of hits he had amassed as on independent producer prior to 1959. He wrote for Jackie Wilson ('Reete Petite', 'Lonely Tear-drops', 'I'll Be Satisfied'), Mary Johnson ('You Got What It Takes') and advised William "Smokey" Robinson of the Miracles, whose first efforts he helped lease to major companies like End and Chess. Detroit had never been known as a record center — its foremost representative, Jack and Devora Brown's Fortune network, operated out of a small, dusty storefront — but the Falcons' 1959 smash of 'You're So Fine' convinced him that there was a large potential within the city itself. His sister Gwen formed the Anna label (named after another sister) and by January 1960 had netted preliminary rewards with Barrett Strong's 'Money', which Gordy had co-written. Soon after in June, 'My Beloved' by the Satintones appeared as Motown 1000.
The early years of Tamla-Motown belonged to Smokey Robinson, whose Miracles not only established the company as a major force (with 'Shop Around') but musically set the succession of styles to be embellished in later administrations. As delicate a writer as he was a performer, Robinson attributed much of his inspiration to Gordy, and has remained a staple of the company to this day, serving as vice-president and solo artist. Between 1960 and the emergence of the Supremes four years later, he accounted for a majority of Motown's success, working with the Marvelettes, Marvin Gaye, Mary Wells and the Temptations, as well as boosting the Miracles to becoming one of the most visible and prolific attractions in the pop market.
Robinson wrote with intelligence and sophistication, underplaying his lyrical hand to separate the contradictions between fantasy and reality. He was at his best within the sad, sweetly-taken ballad, the milky quality of his voice flirting with heartache and devotion, reversing images one over the other: 'The Hunter Gets Captured By The Game', 'What's So Good About Good-Bye', 'My Girl' and 'The Love I Saw In You Was Just A Mirage'. When called on to write more uptempo material, he responded with a broad grin, 'Mickey's Monkey' and 'Goin' To A Go Go', the Miracles stepping lithely around him.
Robinson was not the only bright spot. Motown had shown a willing grasp of formula nearly immediately — the Contours' 'Do You Love Me' carboned the Isley Brothers' 'Twist and Shout' — and Gordy's drive to firm the label's personality soon found him altering the existent pop theorems to his own uses. Like the New York producers of the time — Leiber and Stoller, Phil Spector — he realized that precognition was not to be camouflaged but rather singularly pursued in quest of a Sound. In consequence, Motown threw all its energies behind their 45's, concentrating statements in the smallest, most accessible form possible. Once made familiar to the public-at-large, Berry felt that the texture of each Motown record, no matter how dissimilar or varied, would subliminally clear a path toward the potential listener.
Of the first batch of performers chosen to represent this developing Sound, Gordy perfected the techniques of discovery and manipulation into an ongoing format. His artists were generally unknown, and depending on their pliability, were given greater or lesser attention in the studio. The Marvelettes, discovered at a local talent show, had the company's first number one single in 'Please Mr. Postman', but though they continued scoring hits through several years, they seemed to be passed over in favor of other, less specifically typed artists. Loyalty was also a factor: Mary Wells (left), after several appreciable successes ('My Guy', 'Two Lovers') expressed interest in freeing herself from Motown's restrictions and has seldom been heard from since.
The Temptations typified the Motown philosophy, weathering several incarnations and switches in personnel with remarkable resilience over the years. Otis Williams, Eddie Kendricks, Paul Williams, Mel Franklin and Elbridge Bryant had sung variously under the names of the Primes and the Distants, but it was not until David Ruffin (originally signed as a solo artist) replaced Bryant as lead singer and Smokey Robinson became the group's main producer that they began making an impression. Ruffin had a voice almost as fluid as Robinson's, matched by the equal strength of the other members, and the Temptations benefited from much of Robinson's best material. He wrote specifically for their tailored, urban sense of cool, the classic 'My Girl' to 'Since I Lost My Baby'. "I'd always like them and liked their sound," Robinson said of his initial involvement, "because they always reminded me of a church group, the soulful sound, from the high tenor to the low bass."
A future direction was hinted at when an Eddie Holland-Norman Whitfield composition titled 'Ain't Too Proud To Beg' roughed up their image. Whitfield stayed with the Temptations (left), assuming prominent control in the later sixties, but Holland's moment had arrived. Along with the production team of Bryan Holland and Lament Dozier, he helped to usher in what is generally regarded as Motown's golden era, beginning with Martha [Reeves] and the Vandellas and reaching their greatest heights with the Four Tops and the Supremes.
Martha Reeves typified the in-house quality of Motown's grooming. She began as a secretary in the company's A & R department, but her singing career was launched when she filled in as a back-up singer on recordings for Marvin Gaye and Mary Wells with two friends, Annetic Beard and Rosalind Ashford. Finally she was offered a contract of her own. Working with Holland-Dozier-Holland, the Vandellas first touched the charts in April 1963 with 'Come And Get These Memories', quickly following up with 'Heat Wave', 'Quicksand', the exuberant 'Dancing In The Street' and 'Nowhere To Run'. The songs were straightforward and rambunctious, tempoed by a relentless four-beat pattern that allowed Martha full vocal volume, emphasized by the Vandellas' alliterative enthusiasm.
The same sense of restrained ferocity was the keynote of the Four Tops' recordings, led by Levi Stubbs and supported by Abdul "Duke" Fakir, Lawrence Payton and Renaldo "Obie" Benton. As with the Vandellas, Holland-Dozier-Holland sought to contain Stubbs' explosiveness within a cordoned production style, conceptualizing the raw nervous energy of 'Baby I Need Your Loving', 'I Can't Help Myself', 'Standing In The Shadows Of Love' and 'Reach Out I'll Be There' into deliberate, commercial statements. The Tops, veterans of a long recording apprenticeship before they reached Motown, were more than willing to align themselves with Gordy's guiding principles, but willingness, as least as far as the Sound was concerned, was not enough. In the search for an ultimate formula, artistic strength was necessarily replaced by submissiveness and malleability, and with Holland-Dozier-Holland unwilling (or perhaps unable) to channel these groups into more diversified areas, their recordings soon became predictable and rudimentary.
The Supremes were better suited to this type of approach. The quintessential Motown combination, they were molded by Holland-Dozier-Holland into gamine-like purveyors of soul, wide-eyed and breathy. They were a trio from the Brewster Housing Project in northwest Detroit, introduced by Eddie Kendricks to enhance the then-Primes, as the Primettes. Their early releases were in the mode of a softer Marvelettes, but with 'Where Did Our Love Go' in June 1964, Diana Ross, Florence Ballard and Mary Wilson were transformed into all their new name hinted. Having perfected studio technique through the Vandellas and the Tops, Holland-Dozier Holland turned their attention to the shaping of artists. The gritty tension of 'Heat Wave' gave way to a smooth, effortless pitch, removed from blandness by the sultry tenderness of Diana's vocal intimacy.
The records were slick, impressively conscious of their arrangements and hooks (the Motown rhythm section is one of the unsung heroes of modern rhythm and blues), and H-D-H ran their operation like a glorious machine. The spare use of Motown instrumentation suffered little in its expansion to orchestral depths, and through a string of ten number-one singles and several top-ten contenders, the Supremes were rigorously abstracted, glossed, rebuilt in the archetype of Gordy's Motown Sound. Holland-Dozier-Holland further elaborated as they went along, churning the group through 'Baby Love' and 'Stop! In The Name Of Love' to the more ornate 'You Keep Me Hanging On'. The last represents a high-water mark for the Supremes and their producers; following its success in 1966, even the formula showed signs of limitation, as Holland-Dozier-Holland took solace in shock gimmickry and fad effects (the mechanical overtones of 'Reflections').
It was a problem that was predictable in light of Motown's leaning toward singles and obedience. While attention was paid to performing careers, artists were encouraged to move in the direction of nightclubs and acceptable "family" entertainment. On their albums, which were seen more as vehicles for further circulating singles than as complete portraits, the result was shallow recuts of show tunes and pop medleys; live, between succulent hits, equally inappropriate material was showcased. Often performers were given a hit — Gladys Knight and the Pips' 'I Heard It Through The Grapevine', Brenda Hollaway and 'Every Little Bit Hurts', Jimmy Ruffin's 'What Becomes Of The Broken Hearted' — and then seemingly forgotten, left to lie fallow. Others were regarded as perennial second liners, a Junior Walker or an Edwin Starr, and despite an average spacing of hits, were made to feel at home in their niche.
By subordinating artist development to corporate growth, Motown found itself unbalanced, potentially troubled should misfortune strike the writing and production staff. Such was the case in 1967, when Holland-Dozier-Holland left the label to form their own company, creating a vacuum that was not helped by a subtle shift in Motown's previously inviolable stature as industry frontrunner. Music itself was changing, absorbing Gordy's breakthrough to raise a host of new contenders in the realm of black pop, felt most apparently through Memphis' Stax Records, sporting Otis Redding. Sam and Dave, Booker T and the MG's. In a business once ruled by producers, the artist was again regaining control, and Motown's rigid proclivities tumbled in the public's favor.
Gordy was placed, for the first, in the position of pursuing trends. He admirably acquiesced to the situation, diversifying even as he continued to make money. Diana Ross was separated from the Supremes, and after a short attempt to funkify her roots ('Love Child'), reappeared as a glittering show business queen, culminating in her intense portrayal of Billie Holiday in the film and soundtrack of Lady Sings The Blues. The Temptations were formally deeded to producer Norman Whitfield, and in the absence of David Ruffin, he streamlined their rhythms to total danceability, grafting socially persuasive lyrics in a freewheeling array. It was a debt owed to Sly Stone if not to Whitfield's unique genius (brought to patented perfection in his 1972 masterpiece of 'Papa Was A Rollin' Stone').
The Greening of Motown, as it came to be called, also reacted favorably on an artistic level. Both Stevie Wonder and Marvin Gaye, associated with the company for several years with a commensurate lineage of hits, were suddenly given the power to choose their own directions. Unleashed, following divergent paths, they became by the early seventies two of Motown's most highly regarded innovators, superstars whose early frustrations only heightened their creative desire and commitment.
The confidence this augured was especially fitting for Stevie Wonder, whose multi-instrumental talents had often gone begging at Motown. Blind since birth, he had been signed up at the age of twelve. Gordy's search for a pint-sized Ray Charles was rewarded by "Little" Stevie's first hit single, 'Fingertips', a live 'exhibition of his crowd-pleasing capabilities recorded at the Apollo. His maturity was taken in stride with 'Uptight (Everything's Alright)' and 'A Place In The Sun', jazzily preened with 'For Once In My Life' and 'My Cherie Amour'. Entering self-production with the Signed, Sealed and Delivered album, he embarked on a discovery of personal worth, a mist of subdued rightness that brought him to the realizations of Music Of My Mind, Talking Book, Innervisions, Fulfillingness' First Finale.
Wonder's technical judgment was flawless and his composing abilities boundless, encapsulating the gregarious pull of disco-rock ('Superstition') to torching ballads ('All In Love Is Fair'). His voice attacked notes from above and below, stretching and snapping them back into place, pounding his keyboard with uncanny precision.
Gaye similarly came into his own, shedding his previous career with not a glance backward. Marvin's hits had been among the most pronouncedly pop of Motown, beginning with 'Stubborn Kind Of Fellow' in 1962. Once a temporary member of the Moonglows, his light vocal mannerisms prompted many producers to frame him in steady beatific swingers like 'Hitch Hike' and 'Pride and Joy'. Only in his duets with Motown starlet Tammi Terrell (following earlier successes with Mary Wells and Kim Weston) was he allowed to draw on his considerable emotional resources. Their best-known collaboration, 'Ain't No Mountain High Enough', was written by another of Motown's up-and-coming production teams, Nick Ashford and Valerie Simpson,
The untimely death of Terrell touched Gaye deeply, and when he came out of seclusion, it was with a new sense of purpose. What's Going On was not the stereotyped realism of the later Temptations; he offered a world view unseamed by instrumental transitions, a symphony of the black urban experience percussed softly and hypnotically. Gaye was one of the luckier ones. Many Motown artists unable to adjust to this change in values, especially those who relied on production support, were forced to seek refuge outside the label. For Gladys Knight and the Pips, Martha Reeves and the Four Tops, the relocation proved a boon, as each breathed greater life into non-Motown careers.
Yet the family pattern, bolstered through marriage — Gaye to Anna Gordy, for instance — remained intact. Even when Motown left Detroit for Los Angeles in the early seventies, it retained the corporate identity Gordy had implanted. The tight unity of the Jackson Five, brothers and sisters from Gary, Indiana, only confirmed the strength of the company as a whole, polished and professional, with leader Michael not far removed from his preteens. The Jacksons' riotous stage show coupled with Motown's never-forgotten flair for making records opened the Sound to a new, budding audience. Old combinations were reshuffled — Eddie Kendricks was boosted to solo prominence; the Supremes returned to the charts again — and branching out, Motown began signing white artists on a regular basis. Indivisible, as Gordy might say, with liberty and justice for all.
© Lenny Kaye and David Dalton 1977
excerpted from Rock 100, Cooper Square Press, 1999
Lenny Kaye and David Dalton, Rock 100, Cooper Square Press, 1999
IT WAS EVER MORE THAN A RECORD LABEL. At its zenith, during a span that dominated most (if not all) of the sixties, the hit factory of Motown charged and defined the state of rhythm and blues art, offering black identity through multiracial discipline, individual independence subordinated to the needs of a vast, insatiable audience. Berry Gordy Jr., a self-defined "Mr. Hitsville," had absorbed his lessons well on the Detroit assembly lines; in the manner of Henry Ford, he conveyed a belt of sleek, chromed models from initial blueprint to final showroom display, overseeing production to suit every taste and pocketbook. Motown's approach was total, educating their performers in a virtual charm school, indoctrinating them in the "Sound of Young America" until their family heritage was unquestioned, beyond reproach.
Gordy built slowly and knowledgeably, relying on his proven instincts and the talented songwriter-producers he hired to convert fancy into chart fact. Unlike the sporadic, underfinanced and inconsistent black-owned companies that preceded it (often relying on outside distribution and ethnic support), Motown was a full-blooded corporation, promoting and delivering its own without regard to stigmatized barriers. Its social significance, turning the color wheel to face an opposing direction, was only heightened by the general excellence of its product, mixed for transistors and three-inch speakers, a brilliant synthesis that aligned beat and chambered chorus in unmistakable emphathy.
Most accepted stories of Motown's origins begin with Berry Gordy borrowing several hundred dollars to leave a Detroit car plant and form the Tammie (Tamla) record company. While surely a graphic representation of Berry's working-class roots, the story jars considerably with the string of hits he had amassed as on independent producer prior to 1959. He wrote for Jackie Wilson ('Reete Petite', 'Lonely Tear-drops', 'I'll Be Satisfied'), Mary Johnson ('You Got What It Takes') and advised William "Smokey" Robinson of the Miracles, whose first efforts he helped lease to major companies like End and Chess. Detroit had never been known as a record center — its foremost representative, Jack and Devora Brown's Fortune network, operated out of a small, dusty storefront — but the Falcons' 1959 smash of 'You're So Fine' convinced him that there was a large potential within the city itself. His sister Gwen formed the Anna label (named after another sister) and by January 1960 had netted preliminary rewards with Barrett Strong's 'Money', which Gordy had co-written. Soon after in June, 'My Beloved' by the Satintones appeared as Motown 1000.
The early years of Tamla-Motown belonged to Smokey Robinson, whose Miracles not only established the company as a major force (with 'Shop Around') but musically set the succession of styles to be embellished in later administrations. As delicate a writer as he was a performer, Robinson attributed much of his inspiration to Gordy, and has remained a staple of the company to this day, serving as vice-president and solo artist. Between 1960 and the emergence of the Supremes four years later, he accounted for a majority of Motown's success, working with the Marvelettes, Marvin Gaye, Mary Wells and the Temptations, as well as boosting the Miracles to becoming one of the most visible and prolific attractions in the pop market.
Robinson wrote with intelligence and sophistication, underplaying his lyrical hand to separate the contradictions between fantasy and reality. He was at his best within the sad, sweetly-taken ballad, the milky quality of his voice flirting with heartache and devotion, reversing images one over the other: 'The Hunter Gets Captured By The Game', 'What's So Good About Good-Bye', 'My Girl' and 'The Love I Saw In You Was Just A Mirage'. When called on to write more uptempo material, he responded with a broad grin, 'Mickey's Monkey' and 'Goin' To A Go Go', the Miracles stepping lithely around him.
Robinson was not the only bright spot. Motown had shown a willing grasp of formula nearly immediately — the Contours' 'Do You Love Me' carboned the Isley Brothers' 'Twist and Shout' — and Gordy's drive to firm the label's personality soon found him altering the existent pop theorems to his own uses. Like the New York producers of the time — Leiber and Stoller, Phil Spector — he realized that precognition was not to be camouflaged but rather singularly pursued in quest of a Sound. In consequence, Motown threw all its energies behind their 45's, concentrating statements in the smallest, most accessible form possible. Once made familiar to the public-at-large, Berry felt that the texture of each Motown record, no matter how dissimilar or varied, would subliminally clear a path toward the potential listener.
Of the first batch of performers chosen to represent this developing Sound, Gordy perfected the techniques of discovery and manipulation into an ongoing format. His artists were generally unknown, and depending on their pliability, were given greater or lesser attention in the studio. The Marvelettes, discovered at a local talent show, had the company's first number one single in 'Please Mr. Postman', but though they continued scoring hits through several years, they seemed to be passed over in favor of other, less specifically typed artists. Loyalty was also a factor: Mary Wells (left), after several appreciable successes ('My Guy', 'Two Lovers') expressed interest in freeing herself from Motown's restrictions and has seldom been heard from since.
The Temptations typified the Motown philosophy, weathering several incarnations and switches in personnel with remarkable resilience over the years. Otis Williams, Eddie Kendricks, Paul Williams, Mel Franklin and Elbridge Bryant had sung variously under the names of the Primes and the Distants, but it was not until David Ruffin (originally signed as a solo artist) replaced Bryant as lead singer and Smokey Robinson became the group's main producer that they began making an impression. Ruffin had a voice almost as fluid as Robinson's, matched by the equal strength of the other members, and the Temptations benefited from much of Robinson's best material. He wrote specifically for their tailored, urban sense of cool, the classic 'My Girl' to 'Since I Lost My Baby'. "I'd always like them and liked their sound," Robinson said of his initial involvement, "because they always reminded me of a church group, the soulful sound, from the high tenor to the low bass."
A future direction was hinted at when an Eddie Holland-Norman Whitfield composition titled 'Ain't Too Proud To Beg' roughed up their image. Whitfield stayed with the Temptations (left), assuming prominent control in the later sixties, but Holland's moment had arrived. Along with the production team of Bryan Holland and Lament Dozier, he helped to usher in what is generally regarded as Motown's golden era, beginning with Martha [Reeves] and the Vandellas and reaching their greatest heights with the Four Tops and the Supremes.
Martha Reeves typified the in-house quality of Motown's grooming. She began as a secretary in the company's A & R department, but her singing career was launched when she filled in as a back-up singer on recordings for Marvin Gaye and Mary Wells with two friends, Annetic Beard and Rosalind Ashford. Finally she was offered a contract of her own. Working with Holland-Dozier-Holland, the Vandellas first touched the charts in April 1963 with 'Come And Get These Memories', quickly following up with 'Heat Wave', 'Quicksand', the exuberant 'Dancing In The Street' and 'Nowhere To Run'. The songs were straightforward and rambunctious, tempoed by a relentless four-beat pattern that allowed Martha full vocal volume, emphasized by the Vandellas' alliterative enthusiasm.
The same sense of restrained ferocity was the keynote of the Four Tops' recordings, led by Levi Stubbs and supported by Abdul "Duke" Fakir, Lawrence Payton and Renaldo "Obie" Benton. As with the Vandellas, Holland-Dozier-Holland sought to contain Stubbs' explosiveness within a cordoned production style, conceptualizing the raw nervous energy of 'Baby I Need Your Loving', 'I Can't Help Myself', 'Standing In The Shadows Of Love' and 'Reach Out I'll Be There' into deliberate, commercial statements. The Tops, veterans of a long recording apprenticeship before they reached Motown, were more than willing to align themselves with Gordy's guiding principles, but willingness, as least as far as the Sound was concerned, was not enough. In the search for an ultimate formula, artistic strength was necessarily replaced by submissiveness and malleability, and with Holland-Dozier-Holland unwilling (or perhaps unable) to channel these groups into more diversified areas, their recordings soon became predictable and rudimentary.
The Supremes were better suited to this type of approach. The quintessential Motown combination, they were molded by Holland-Dozier-Holland into gamine-like purveyors of soul, wide-eyed and breathy. They were a trio from the Brewster Housing Project in northwest Detroit, introduced by Eddie Kendricks to enhance the then-Primes, as the Primettes. Their early releases were in the mode of a softer Marvelettes, but with 'Where Did Our Love Go' in June 1964, Diana Ross, Florence Ballard and Mary Wilson were transformed into all their new name hinted. Having perfected studio technique through the Vandellas and the Tops, Holland-Dozier Holland turned their attention to the shaping of artists. The gritty tension of 'Heat Wave' gave way to a smooth, effortless pitch, removed from blandness by the sultry tenderness of Diana's vocal intimacy.
The records were slick, impressively conscious of their arrangements and hooks (the Motown rhythm section is one of the unsung heroes of modern rhythm and blues), and H-D-H ran their operation like a glorious machine. The spare use of Motown instrumentation suffered little in its expansion to orchestral depths, and through a string of ten number-one singles and several top-ten contenders, the Supremes were rigorously abstracted, glossed, rebuilt in the archetype of Gordy's Motown Sound. Holland-Dozier-Holland further elaborated as they went along, churning the group through 'Baby Love' and 'Stop! In The Name Of Love' to the more ornate 'You Keep Me Hanging On'. The last represents a high-water mark for the Supremes and their producers; following its success in 1966, even the formula showed signs of limitation, as Holland-Dozier-Holland took solace in shock gimmickry and fad effects (the mechanical overtones of 'Reflections').
It was a problem that was predictable in light of Motown's leaning toward singles and obedience. While attention was paid to performing careers, artists were encouraged to move in the direction of nightclubs and acceptable "family" entertainment. On their albums, which were seen more as vehicles for further circulating singles than as complete portraits, the result was shallow recuts of show tunes and pop medleys; live, between succulent hits, equally inappropriate material was showcased. Often performers were given a hit — Gladys Knight and the Pips' 'I Heard It Through The Grapevine', Brenda Hollaway and 'Every Little Bit Hurts', Jimmy Ruffin's 'What Becomes Of The Broken Hearted' — and then seemingly forgotten, left to lie fallow. Others were regarded as perennial second liners, a Junior Walker or an Edwin Starr, and despite an average spacing of hits, were made to feel at home in their niche.
By subordinating artist development to corporate growth, Motown found itself unbalanced, potentially troubled should misfortune strike the writing and production staff. Such was the case in 1967, when Holland-Dozier-Holland left the label to form their own company, creating a vacuum that was not helped by a subtle shift in Motown's previously inviolable stature as industry frontrunner. Music itself was changing, absorbing Gordy's breakthrough to raise a host of new contenders in the realm of black pop, felt most apparently through Memphis' Stax Records, sporting Otis Redding. Sam and Dave, Booker T and the MG's. In a business once ruled by producers, the artist was again regaining control, and Motown's rigid proclivities tumbled in the public's favor.
Gordy was placed, for the first, in the position of pursuing trends. He admirably acquiesced to the situation, diversifying even as he continued to make money. Diana Ross was separated from the Supremes, and after a short attempt to funkify her roots ('Love Child'), reappeared as a glittering show business queen, culminating in her intense portrayal of Billie Holiday in the film and soundtrack of Lady Sings The Blues. The Temptations were formally deeded to producer Norman Whitfield, and in the absence of David Ruffin, he streamlined their rhythms to total danceability, grafting socially persuasive lyrics in a freewheeling array. It was a debt owed to Sly Stone if not to Whitfield's unique genius (brought to patented perfection in his 1972 masterpiece of 'Papa Was A Rollin' Stone').
The Greening of Motown, as it came to be called, also reacted favorably on an artistic level. Both Stevie Wonder and Marvin Gaye, associated with the company for several years with a commensurate lineage of hits, were suddenly given the power to choose their own directions. Unleashed, following divergent paths, they became by the early seventies two of Motown's most highly regarded innovators, superstars whose early frustrations only heightened their creative desire and commitment.
The confidence this augured was especially fitting for Stevie Wonder, whose multi-instrumental talents had often gone begging at Motown. Blind since birth, he had been signed up at the age of twelve. Gordy's search for a pint-sized Ray Charles was rewarded by "Little" Stevie's first hit single, 'Fingertips', a live 'exhibition of his crowd-pleasing capabilities recorded at the Apollo. His maturity was taken in stride with 'Uptight (Everything's Alright)' and 'A Place In The Sun', jazzily preened with 'For Once In My Life' and 'My Cherie Amour'. Entering self-production with the Signed, Sealed and Delivered album, he embarked on a discovery of personal worth, a mist of subdued rightness that brought him to the realizations of Music Of My Mind, Talking Book, Innervisions, Fulfillingness' First Finale.
Wonder's technical judgment was flawless and his composing abilities boundless, encapsulating the gregarious pull of disco-rock ('Superstition') to torching ballads ('All In Love Is Fair'). His voice attacked notes from above and below, stretching and snapping them back into place, pounding his keyboard with uncanny precision.
Gaye similarly came into his own, shedding his previous career with not a glance backward. Marvin's hits had been among the most pronouncedly pop of Motown, beginning with 'Stubborn Kind Of Fellow' in 1962. Once a temporary member of the Moonglows, his light vocal mannerisms prompted many producers to frame him in steady beatific swingers like 'Hitch Hike' and 'Pride and Joy'. Only in his duets with Motown starlet Tammi Terrell (following earlier successes with Mary Wells and Kim Weston) was he allowed to draw on his considerable emotional resources. Their best-known collaboration, 'Ain't No Mountain High Enough', was written by another of Motown's up-and-coming production teams, Nick Ashford and Valerie Simpson,
The untimely death of Terrell touched Gaye deeply, and when he came out of seclusion, it was with a new sense of purpose. What's Going On was not the stereotyped realism of the later Temptations; he offered a world view unseamed by instrumental transitions, a symphony of the black urban experience percussed softly and hypnotically. Gaye was one of the luckier ones. Many Motown artists unable to adjust to this change in values, especially those who relied on production support, were forced to seek refuge outside the label. For Gladys Knight and the Pips, Martha Reeves and the Four Tops, the relocation proved a boon, as each breathed greater life into non-Motown careers.
Yet the family pattern, bolstered through marriage — Gaye to Anna Gordy, for instance — remained intact. Even when Motown left Detroit for Los Angeles in the early seventies, it retained the corporate identity Gordy had implanted. The tight unity of the Jackson Five, brothers and sisters from Gary, Indiana, only confirmed the strength of the company as a whole, polished and professional, with leader Michael not far removed from his preteens. The Jacksons' riotous stage show coupled with Motown's never-forgotten flair for making records opened the Sound to a new, budding audience. Old combinations were reshuffled — Eddie Kendricks was boosted to solo prominence; the Supremes returned to the charts again — and branching out, Motown began signing white artists on a regular basis. Indivisible, as Gordy might say, with liberty and justice for all.
© Lenny Kaye and David Dalton 1977
excerpted from Rock 100, Cooper Square Press, 1999