MOTOWN SPOTLIGHT – JULY 1974
We’re still in the seventies but three years earlier than last month. I’m talking about 1974 when Smokey Robinson released his debut solo single “Just My Soul Responding”; when Diana Ross reached the grand old age of thirty; when Jean Terrell and Lynda Lawrence left The Supremes to be replaced by Cindy Birdsong and Scherrie Payne, and when the Tamla Motown label introduced a steady string of re-issues. However, we’re concentrating on July, a month that saw two mega albums and one debut album released, the latter kickstarting an incredible career for a group and later its lead singer.
Motown/EMI were noted for introducing different labels to cover special, deluxe, and cheap albums, alongside the selected few adopted from America. The STMA series was opened in 1971 with the “Diana!” television soundtrack. During July 1974 a couple of significant, high-profile albums appeared – Marvin Gaye’s “Live” and Stevie Wonder’s “Fulfillingness’ First Finale”. It was generally considered bad form to promote material from two top acts in the same month, so I can’t remember what happened here or why.
Anyway, before talking about Marvin Gaye’s “Live” album, here’s a reflection on how it came to be. Janis Hunter was in Marvin’s life, something he kept from the public because he had temporarily ‘retired’ following the death of Tammi Terrell – and Jan was a teenager. This worried him more, bearing in mind the public backlash over Jerry Lee Lewis marrying his thirteen-year-old cousin. Marvin’s continued determination to keep Jan within arm’s length was heightened when she miscarried their first baby. The loss brought them closer together, while the chance of Marvin returning to pick up the threads of his career was fading fast. The outside world constantly beckoned, but Marvin ignored all the requests, determined to stay with his young love in Topanga Canyon in Los Angeles.
These weeks spent in isolation with Jan were probably some of the happiest in his life, but even paradise comes with a cost. The inevitable happened: his money dried up. The quickest way he knew to refill his purse was to return to the stage. It was this that got him to agree to perform at the Oakland Coliseum in California. It had been two years since he’d performed a full-length show and to be honest, this Oakland concert terrified him. So much so, that its original November 1973 date was postponed until he gave the thumbs up for January, leaving the promoters with little time to advertise it. With such short notice, the concert was disorganised from start to finish. During the afternoon prior to the performance, Marvin completed his soundcheck in the empty Coliseum while Motown personnel – who shrugged off the singer’s non-co-operative attitude towards them – rallied round to rectify the chaos by organising the thirty-three musicians, lighting and sound technicians, stage hands, assistants…and their assistants!
Following Ashford & Simpson’s superb opening act, Marvin’s paranoia of appearing in public was heightened sufficiently for him to send his young lookalike brother Frankie on stage to test the audience’s reaction. The response was deafening, leaving Marvin wired up to hit the stage. Taking a leaf out of the Bay City Rollers’ fashion book, he wore faded denim jeans, high platform silver army boots, woollen cap to hide his balding crown, and one earring. “The actual performance at a concert like this, the niceties of voice, phrasing, pitch and all that, is fairly immaterial,” wrote the critic from the San Francisco Chronicle. “All were fine but that’s not the name of the song. Marvin Gaye’s return was not a concert, it was an event; a gathering of black pride…”.
It soon became apparent that this Oakland gig was a test run for a fully-fledged tour. As it was so lucratively successful, the promoters expected Marvin to bite their hands off. Not so. He didn’t want to commit himself to anything at this time as Jan was expecting their second child. All he wanted was to return to his sanctuary in Topanga Canyon. However, a series of odd incidents unhinged him, one of which was when someone slit the throats of his Great Danes: “It scared the shit out of me.” He also said he knew there were bad people gunning for him, and living where he did was dangerous: “It was time to come down from my mountain.”
While he was concentrating on pleasing himself, Motown were desperate to release an album of his recent performance. A straight forward process, one thought. Well, it would have been if the final decision to make the tapes available to the record company hadn’t rested with Marvin. He spent weeks listening, editing and mixing them until he was satisfied with the result. At long last, a relieved Motown paved the way for the release of “Marvin Gaye Live” although they were unsure of its reception. Hah, they need not have worried. The pulling power of the mighty Mr Gaye ensured the album shot to the pole position in the R&B chart, peaked in the top ten on the pop chart, sold over one million copies, and earned him his fifth Grammy Award nomination for Best Male R&B Vocal Performance at the 17th Annual Awards ceremony. He lost out to.. ….Stevie Wonder!
There’s no point in my listing the tracks as I’m sure you know them already, but I will say the track listing was broken down into sections, “The Beginning”, “Fossil Medley” and “Now”. Also, Motown/EMI originally scheduled it in the STML listing (the numbering system used for single jacketed albums) but decided on a July release under STMA, the company’s deluxe listing which carried a higher selling price.
Mentioning Stevie Wonder leads me to the second significant album release this month in 1974, namely “Fulfillingness’ First Finale” written and produced by him, with the exception of “They Won’t Go When I Go” co-penned with Syreeta. In preparation for his recording sessions in Los Angeles and New York, Stevie dug deep into his hoard of songs for suitable material. Rejecting most, he decided to write new music which he felt reflected his then-current mindset irrespective of what his fans expected.
With a bolshy attitude he told journalists, “I know everyone was expecting another ‘Innervisions’ but I hate categorisation, and people must get used to change.” Also, Stevie had intended it as a double album but had to abandon the idea when Motown insisted he stick to their planned worldwide release date of July ’74. As you know, Mr Wonder’s ability to deliver music on time was not high on his agenda, so he promised that Volume Two of “Fulfillingness’ First Finale” (the title came to him in a dream, he said) would follow.
The blissfully relaxing “Smile Please”, introduced the album which transported listeners on a journey through Stevie’s feelings on love, current politics and spiritual leanings. With “Heaven Is 10 Zillion Light Years Away”, Stevie-the-preacher-man demonstrated his beliefs in God, with lashings of keyboards and Moog bass, allowing a gospel-swaying chorus of Syreeta, Shirley Brewer and Paul Anka to build into a crescendo. The basic track was written in 1972 and intended for “Talking Book”. It wasn’t ready in time. The mood of the touching love song “Too Shy To Say” was broken with the funky, hard-grooved “Boogie On Reggae Woman” which, when released as a single in its edited version, peaked in the US top three and the UK top twelve. Stevie had worked on this song at the same time as “Jesus Children Of America” in 1973, with both tracks originally destined for “Innervisions”. Only one made it. The spontaneous melody of “Creepin'”, made memorable with Minnie Riperton’s assistance, gave way to the rock-inspired, Jackson 5-backed “You Haven’t Done Nothin'” which resonated with Stevie’s political views. Lifted as the first single, it returned him to the top of the US chart – his first number one since “You Are The Sunshine Of My Life” eighteen months earlier, and to the UK top thirty.
His love affair continued with “It Ain’t No Use”, while the synthesiser was used to its fullest on “They Won’t Go When I Go”, leaving the mysteries of nature to be explored with “Bird Of Beauty”. The closing track, “Please Don’t Go”, a lover’s plea, was highlighted by The Persuasions’ vocal support. OK, so this wasn’t a patch on “Innervisions” and, I think, for this reason it took me a long time to get into where Stevie was coming from this time. Then two years later we salivated over “Songs In The Key Of Life”.
Anyway, before drawing a line under this, the gatefold packaging was busy. It was a montage effect of the singer’s life from Little Stevie and Motown’s touring bus, his awards, influential people in his life, his musical instruments, his tiny bull (denoting his birth sign and the name of his production company), all fused into a soft cameo of reds and browns, reminiscent of an African carpet. Although I couldn’t come across any quotes from Marvin Gaye about losing out to Stevie at the 1975 Grammy Awards ceremony, I bet he really was miffed when Stevie walked away with a handful: Album of the Year – Artist and Producer; Best Pop Vocalist – Male; Best R&B Vocal Performance – Male, for “Boogie On Reggae Woman”, and Best R&B Song for “Living For The City”. So, to celebrate his runaway success, the happy star embarked upon a two-month US tour dubbed “Stevie Wonder’s Fall Festival Tour – Wonder Loves You”, his first since he shared billing with The Rolling Stones.
Moving over to the groups now with the first album release by the Commodores titled “Machine Gun”. Their cheeky lead singer named Lionel once said that when they joined Motown, they were number fifty-eight on its roster: “In front of us you had The Temptations, Supremes, Gladys Knight and the Pips. When we got ready to do our recording session, we were bumped because The Temptations had priority over us. Gradually, acts started leaving Motown one by one. The joke at Motown got to be ‘OK, Commodores, we’ve reached the end of the roster, now it’s your turn.'”
Their first single “The Zoo (The Human Zoo)”, written by Pam Sawyer and Gloria Jones, was aimed at the new funk market, but it was the instrumental “Machine Gun” – originally titled “The Ram” – that took off big time across America. Motown moved quickly to capitalise on this unexpected good fortune by releasing an album of the same name, by throwing together tracks resurrected from various recording sessions, to release a pot pourie of music. The ploy worked as “Machine Gun”, the album, became a huge seller, except in the UK where it died a death. The clavinet-led instrumental title track kicked off the album that included eight Commodores compositions, including two by Lionel Richie (“Superman” and “There’s A Song In My Heart”). “Rapid Fire” similarly slanted towards the title track, was outpaced by “Young Girls Are My Weakness” while “The Bump” boasted a main riff that could easily have been swiped from “Flashlight” by the Parliaments.
With its chunky funk and Milan Williams breaking through on the keyboards, Clyde Orange held the beat with his compulsive drumming. So, taken as a whole, the album was considered to be energetic, vital and, in spite of the musical variance, and commanded attention. Sadly, not many people in the western world did listen; however, it passed gold status in Japan and Nigeria, where, following the national anthem “Machine Gun” was played as the ‘close down’ track on the country’s radio and television networks. The group hastily cashed in on this rather peculiar success, by touring the Far East for the first time, performing in Japan and playing to 40,000 people in The Philippines in Manila alone.
A further album track, “I Feel Sanctified” followed “Machine Gun” as a single. Unfortunately, it failed by miles to repeat the instrumental’s success. Nonetheless, from little acorns oak trees grow, because this was the start of an incredible career for one of Motown’s first self-contained groups, and which would, in a few years, launch Lionel Richie as a world star – singer, performer and composer.
Other albums released in July included two in the “Anthology” series from Jr Walker and the All Stars, and the Four Tops; and “Down To Earth” from The Undisputed Truth. Original members Billie Rae Calvin and Brenda Joyce Evans had left the group, so Norman Whitfield expanded the membership by adding Virginia “V” McDonald, Tyrone “Big Ty” Douglas, Tyrone “Lil Ty” Barkeley and Calvin Stephenson, who joined Joe Harris, founding member and lead singer. I remember this album well because it contained three mind-blowing tracks – “Law Of the Land”, “Help Yourself” and “I’m A Fool For You”. Great listening! Erm…I play them regularly on my Hitsville radio show on Sundays at 1pm on Radio Illumini. So, just check out www.radio-illumini.com Tut, tut, such blatant advertising….
Finally, better known to UK television viewers as Dominique Devereaux in the US soap Dynasty, Diahann Carroll released her eponymous debut LP. Many, including myself, thought this a rather strange signing but, when queried, Diahann’s successful breakthrough into television was what Berry Gordy intended for Diana Ross, so he hoped the industry would recognise Motown as a complete entertainment outlet, rather than just a record company. With tracks that included “I Can’t Give Back The Love I Feel For You”, “I’ve Been There Before” and “Easy To Love”, the album disappeared into obscurity.
As I’m going on holiday, this month’s page was written before the extremely sad – and to be fair, unexpected – news of The Four Tops’ Duke Fakir’s passing. However, he will certainly not be forgotten by this gal because next month perhaps you would join me on my journey being a Four Top’s fan through the decades.
Sharon Davis
STEVIE WONDER: FULFILLINGNESS’ FIRST FINALE CD