important work in color
1961: Soulful Moods of Marvin Gaye. 1963: That Stubborn Kind of Fellow * Live on Stage. 1964: Together (with Mary Wells) * When I’m Alone, I Cry * Greatest Hits. 1965: How Sweet It Is * A Tribute to the Great Nat King Cole * Hello Broadway. 1966: Moods of Marvin Gaye * Take Two (with Kim Weston). 1967: United (with Tammi Terrel) * Greatest Hits, Vol. 2. 1968: In the Groove (later titled I Heard It Through the Grapevine) * You’re All I Need (with Tammi Terrel. 1969: MPG * Easy (with Tammi Terrel). 1970: That’s the Way Love Is * Superhits. 1971: What’s Goin’ On? 1972: Trouble Man. 1973: Diana and Marvin * Let’s Get It On. 1974: Live * Anthology. 1976: I Want You. 1977: Live at the London Palladium. 1978: Here, My Dear. 1979: Pops, We Love You. 1981: In Our Lifetime. 1982: Midnight Love. 1985: Dream of a Lifetime * Romantically Yours. 1986: Motown Remembers Marvin Gaye. 1990: The Marvin Gaye Collection (Box Set). 1991: The Last Concert Tour. 1997: Another Box Set.
Marvin Gaye’s early career seems lackadaisical compared to other Motown artists. Gaye didn’t follow up his 1961 debut album right away. Fancying himself a crooner, he released, in 1965, A Tribute to the Great Nat King Cole and Hello Broadway. The latter included versions of "My Way," "Hello Dolly," and "People." Subtract the six duet albums with Mary Wells, Tammi Terrel, Kim Weston and Diana Ross, in which the contributions of all the artists are obscured, rather than enhanced, by the format. Something is missing on almost all the albums Marvin Gaye made for Motown in the sixties. Arrangements and melodies are generally okay. Gaye often had a more stripped down sound than was usual for Motown. "Can I Get a Witness" and "Hitchhike" were raw enough to impress the Rolling Stones, who covered them early on. Although he didn’t have the beautiful tonality of Smokey Robinson, the husky elegance of Levi Stubbs, or the invigorating power of Martha Reeves, Gaye sang wonderfully. Emotional details were always present in his vocal performances. Sometimes Gaye’s voice slid towards blandness on soft ballads, or when he relied on his falsetto. Uptempo r&b left him reliant on a pleasurable, but redundant, bag of tricks, as he pushed the buzz in his throat and worked the rhythm. Gaye seemed restless, even distracted, as he wound his way through the Hit Parade. What he heard in his head may not have matched what came out of the speakers. Was it pride that made him dissatisfied with being just another Motown success? All indications are that he wanted to break out of the r&b pop song mold, but he seemed to await a revelation.
In 1969, Marvin Gaye was in the middle of a sturdy, but not overly exceptional, pop career. In the Groove (which contains, and was soon retitled, I Heard it Through the Grapevine) is a Motown classic, though it’s not on the same level of what we would soon come to think of as a Marvin Gaye album. Nick Ashford and Valerie Simpson weren’t as potent for their artist as were Holland-Dozier-Holland or Smokey Robinson for their artists, and the albums that followed In The Groove are uneven. Anthology does a good job of gathering the best from Gaye’s rambling impulses, ignoring most of the crooning tunes and the duets.
Marvin Gaye ws like a hippie stoner bohemian caught in a suit and tie desk job. The difference between In the Groove and What’s Going On is the difference between good business choices and personal expression. When What’s Goin’ On was released, Vince Aletti wrote, "There are very few performers who could carry a project like this off. I’ve always admired Marvin Gaye, but I didn’t expect that he would be one of them."
What’s Gon’ On was Marvin’s evolution and emancipation: Motown was rumored not to like it. Berry Gordy didn’t want to release it. Biographers have suggested that Gaye’s ego was as big as the dark side of the moon, and he must have relished pouring his voice and his words all over this record. A vocalist, who once seemed rather limited in range, suddenly opens up enough avenues of possibility to travel for a lifetime. His falsetto never sounded better, his crooning was warm and enticing, his pain more achingly real, his multi-tracked vocals were melodically inspired. It was like an explosion of the libido subsiding into an ocean of sensuousness. There’s an African meets European feeling present. Rhythm and punch aare colored and lightened with a lushcious wash of sound. Soundtrack ambiance, bachelor pad quirkiness, dance grooves and jazzy atmospherics are part of the texture. The three-dimensional quality that resulted was like a rhythm and blues version of grunge, with smeary strings in the background, longwinded horn melodies blowing quietly almost out of earshot - the brass playing sometimes with, sometimes against, the upfront vocal melodies - the whole arrangement wrapped with jagged vocal lines and jigsaw-puzzle harmonies. In interviews, Marvin was soon trying to claim all the credit, boasting of how he would soon be his sole arranger and writer (a boast which never materialized). What’s Goin’ On was a production coup for David Van DePitte – one of Motown’s factory workers. And, to Gaye’s credit, for once and forever after, Motown’s backing musicians were named in the album notes. For Gaye this was probably a necessity: the horns and flutes weave in and out, supplying much of the melodic dreaminess. Some of the best horn parts are those Gaye supplies with his own voice and it’s possible he took these from improvised horn partterns from early versions of the songs. As an immediate reaction to being a free man, Gaye seemed to have developed distaste for short tunes about love. There’s a wartime (Vietnam), state-of-the-nation message running throughout. There are the personal gospel underpinnings of "Wholy Holy" and "God is Love." The test reaches it’s zenith in "What’s Happening Brother," which is about an astonished Vietnam veteran returning to a changed world. "What’s Goin’ On," with it’s "things ain’t what they used to be" thrust, risks a banal pessimism, but the street-textured weariness and its connection to truly troubled times, makes it one of the best musical documents of that particular era: it takes its place alongside classic historical discs like Volunteers and Four Way Street.
Gaye’s own brand of love tunes, like the gospel tunes on What’s Goin’ On, were more personally sensual that Motown’s repressed product. Gaye threw down personal defenses. On Let’s Get It On, I Want You and Here My Dear, he’s unguarded when talking about sex, loss, betrayal and hope. Here My Dear may be too personal, an album that calls to mind the spite, confusion and pain of John Lennon’s Plastic Ono Band era. It’s fascinating, although the arrangements are undeveloped: the pitfalls of Gaye’s sprawling musical styling sometimes led to formless melodic structure. But this is Gaye’s style: when he attempted mainstream, hard-boned funk on In Our Lifetime and Midnight Love, the weaknesses present in his sixties work were again apparent – not to mention how bored he sounds with his one-tracked vocal. Gayes work was best when he spilled himself all over the music.
Gaye’s career is one of many that disprove the myth that pop artists execute an initial set of good work and then decline. It also represents a late flowering of talent that is rarely allowed to flourish in the competitive music world.
For our complete listings of bands, visit our
King of Pop Music Reviews Index
SF
Music Chronicle Home
Contact Us