Post by timmy84 on Oct 25, 2007 15:35:18 GMT -5
Guess the saying's true, things are better when you have more than eight or nine songs from a collection.
Marvin Gaye's genius has always been overlooked (people think you have to do more than sing to be a genius but I feel he's a genius on that element alone). Anyway, his fabulous 1981 album, "In Our Lifetime", the historic final album in his storied 20-year tenure with Motown Records, showcased a man in transition.
By 1979, Marvin Gaye had been two years without a pop hit though he still occasionally hit the R&B charts. After the failure of his previous album, the analytic "Here, My Dear" double-LP, Marvin went back to the studio to work on what he had envisioned to be a funk record full of party anthems.
He was going to call the album, "Love Man", and he started recording sessions in his famed Marvin's Room studios. However, the album hit an ebb in flow when tax problems, drug addictions and marital difficulties forced the soul singer to move out of the continental USA and settle first in Hawaii then in London.
He worked on "Love Man" in both Hawaii and London but felt his messages were limiting so instead of issuing the album, he shelved it and worked on different elements for a brand new album now titled "In Our Lifetime?" which was "Love Man" but with a different philosophical message. Much like "...Dear", the album was an autobiographical look into the singer's complicated and troubling life. He had originally presented the album as demos to Motown's LA offices. It seems, however, that Motown was satisfied with what they got when the demos were presented in September of 1980. Then on January 15, 1981, Motown released "In Our Lifetime" in an edited form.
It was something Marvin was not pleased to hear. Not only had they re-edited portions of the songs without permission but they had also taken the question mark out of the album and issued it half-heartedly to fulfill the singer's multi-million dollar contract with them. However, Marvin - the perfectionist - accused the label for sabotaging his work. He later lented his frustration to biographer David Ritz in which he told him "would you release a painting Picasso hadn't declared finished, hell no!" Marvin had had difficulty with the label after "Here, My Dear" was released which had strained relations between Marvin and Motown due to the fact the album attacked the label president's sister and Marvin's ex-wife Anna and Marvin had felt used to promote the album which stopped in early 1979.
Marvin didn't feel the need to promote the unfinished record (its final mixing was in Odyssey Studios in London, England; the unfinished Air Studios mix was the final product) and saw the album languish on the charts quickly being forgotten. After over 20 years being with a company where he had gained early fame as a session musician and songwriter before becoming the label's flagship male singing star, Marvin asked for a release from the label, which was finally brought out by Larkin Arnold, who signed the 42-year-old Marvin to Columbia Records in early 1982 finally terminating his relationship with Motown for good.
More than twenty-six years later and twenty-three years after the singer's untimely 1984 death, "In Our Lifetime?" was brought back to life: original title, unedited mixes and the real final mix of the album's tracks.
Both discs cover Marvin's troubled yet still optimistic psyche as he battled against the goods and evils his life had surrounded him as he struggled to find his voice again. It also showcases the musical growth he had acquired on both his "Love Man" sessions and the "In Our Lifetime" sessions producing a rare berth of earthy funk, testimonial soul and a post-psychedelic dance groove that brings in something in Marvin's music probably never heard before. Oddly, the album that ended his relationship with Motown was the album that is one of his most revealing and most blunt productions.
All in all, I feel "In Our Lifetime?" makes the point even more clearer: Marvin Gaye was truly one of a kind.
Marvin Gaye's genius has always been overlooked (people think you have to do more than sing to be a genius but I feel he's a genius on that element alone). Anyway, his fabulous 1981 album, "In Our Lifetime", the historic final album in his storied 20-year tenure with Motown Records, showcased a man in transition.
By 1979, Marvin Gaye had been two years without a pop hit though he still occasionally hit the R&B charts. After the failure of his previous album, the analytic "Here, My Dear" double-LP, Marvin went back to the studio to work on what he had envisioned to be a funk record full of party anthems.
He was going to call the album, "Love Man", and he started recording sessions in his famed Marvin's Room studios. However, the album hit an ebb in flow when tax problems, drug addictions and marital difficulties forced the soul singer to move out of the continental USA and settle first in Hawaii then in London.
He worked on "Love Man" in both Hawaii and London but felt his messages were limiting so instead of issuing the album, he shelved it and worked on different elements for a brand new album now titled "In Our Lifetime?" which was "Love Man" but with a different philosophical message. Much like "...Dear", the album was an autobiographical look into the singer's complicated and troubling life. He had originally presented the album as demos to Motown's LA offices. It seems, however, that Motown was satisfied with what they got when the demos were presented in September of 1980. Then on January 15, 1981, Motown released "In Our Lifetime" in an edited form.
It was something Marvin was not pleased to hear. Not only had they re-edited portions of the songs without permission but they had also taken the question mark out of the album and issued it half-heartedly to fulfill the singer's multi-million dollar contract with them. However, Marvin - the perfectionist - accused the label for sabotaging his work. He later lented his frustration to biographer David Ritz in which he told him "would you release a painting Picasso hadn't declared finished, hell no!" Marvin had had difficulty with the label after "Here, My Dear" was released which had strained relations between Marvin and Motown due to the fact the album attacked the label president's sister and Marvin's ex-wife Anna and Marvin had felt used to promote the album which stopped in early 1979.
Marvin didn't feel the need to promote the unfinished record (its final mixing was in Odyssey Studios in London, England; the unfinished Air Studios mix was the final product) and saw the album languish on the charts quickly being forgotten. After over 20 years being with a company where he had gained early fame as a session musician and songwriter before becoming the label's flagship male singing star, Marvin asked for a release from the label, which was finally brought out by Larkin Arnold, who signed the 42-year-old Marvin to Columbia Records in early 1982 finally terminating his relationship with Motown for good.
More than twenty-six years later and twenty-three years after the singer's untimely 1984 death, "In Our Lifetime?" was brought back to life: original title, unedited mixes and the real final mix of the album's tracks.
Both discs cover Marvin's troubled yet still optimistic psyche as he battled against the goods and evils his life had surrounded him as he struggled to find his voice again. It also showcases the musical growth he had acquired on both his "Love Man" sessions and the "In Our Lifetime" sessions producing a rare berth of earthy funk, testimonial soul and a post-psychedelic dance groove that brings in something in Marvin's music probably never heard before. Oddly, the album that ended his relationship with Motown was the album that is one of his most revealing and most blunt productions.
All in all, I feel "In Our Lifetime?" makes the point even more clearer: Marvin Gaye was truly one of a kind.