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Wednesday, October 08, 2008
WHEN THE LOVELIGHT STARTS SHINING THROUGH HIS EYES (ORIGINAL 45 MIX)
The Supremes
available on The Supremes Boxset
Motown : 2000 (original recording: 1963)
[Buy It]
BABY I NEED YOUR LOVING
The Four Tops
The Four Tops
Motown : 1964
[Buy It]
I CAN'T HELP MYSELF (SUGAR PIE, HONEY BUNCH)
The Four Tops
Four Tops Second Album
Motown : 1965
[Buy It]
"Battle Song" (Part 2 of 4)
By Sean Howe
Excerpted from Rock And Roll Cage Match: Music's Greatest Rivalries, Decided; edited by Sean Manning; Crown Books; 2008
[Buy It]
In October 1963, the month Bill Garrett is born, Smokey Robinson is asked to write a song for the Temptations; he comes up with "The Way You Do The Things You Do." At the time, the group consists of Otis Williams, Paul Williams, Melvin Franklin, Eddie Kendricks, and Al Bryant, but before the group gets around to recording it, baritone Bryant is gone. (The final straw had been the beer bottle that he'd broken on the face of second tenor Paul Williams.) Despite the last-minute lineup change, the harmonies on the record weave seamlessly. The parade of similes is clever, Marv Tarplin's guitar figures shimmer, and the rhythm demands that fingers snap along. The Temptations have their first hit.
Also in October 1963, the Four Tops - childhood friends Levi Stubbs, Duke Fakir, Obie Benson and Lawrence Payton - appear as backup singers on the Supremes' "When The Lovelight Starts Shining Through His Eyes." It's the first Supremes 45 from the songwriting/producing team of Brian Holland, Lamont Dozier, and Eddie Holland. The Tops had been playing gigs and recording (mostly Drifters-style R&B) for half a decade before singing to Motown for $400. They've just finished recording Breaking Through, an album of upbeat vocal jazz, for the label.
"When The Lovelight Starts Shining Through His Eyes" becomes the Supremes' first hit. The Tops, however, remain backup singers; Breaking Through is shelved.
Seven months later, after midnight on May 7, 1964, at a club in Detroit, Brian Holland approaches the members of the Four Tops and tells them he has a song for them. They are in the studio by three a.m., laying down the vocals for for "Baby I Need Your Loving." (The instrumental track had been recorded a few weeks prior, the first of many times Holland/Dozier/Holland would work with the Detroit Symphony Orchestra. It was so tightly packed in the studio that Motown founder Berry Gordy had a wall torn down afterward.) The record is as sweeping as anything that's been attempted by Phil Spector. In fact, after Cynthia Weil and Barry Mann hear it, they hole up in the Chateau Marmont and write "You've Lost That Loving Feeling" for Spector and the Righteous Brothers, which will go on to become the best-selling song of 1965.
David Ruffin, the singer who replaced Al Bryant in the Temptations, eventually gets a chance to sing lead on another Smokey Robinson song, this one called "My Girl." His voice, at once fluid and sandpaper-rough, transforms the song from wistful to exuberant with the bridge ("I don't need money, fortune or fame.") You listen to the song now and you realize you know every note - not just the guitar intro and all the words. You can sing along with the violin arrangement and the ad-libs on the fadeout. The Temptations can handle the dance-party stuff, but here they tug your heartstrings.
"My Girl," the Temptations' first number one song, appears on The Temptations Sing Smokey in April 1965. Also that month, the Four Tops release their first number one song, "I Can't Help Myself (Sugar Pie, Honey Bunch)." And Bill Garrett turns eighteen months old.
* * *
It's "I Can't Help Myself" that plays quietly just after the lunch rush at Charter's, a family restaurant overlooking the lake. The place is nearly empty, so Andrea (six) and Phillip (four) run for a seat by the picture windows. They sit down and look out at the choppy waters and dark skies before the kids realize that the paper menus have word hunts and pictogram puzzles. The sounds of tables being cleared are louder than the sounds of Levi Stubbs singing "sugar pie, honey bunch, you know that I love you." Lost in his thoughts, Bill realizes that Andrea is saying, "Daddy!" He looks down to see Phillip knocking over water and dropping parts of his sandwich on the ground and throwing curly fries. The waitress glares from a distance. Bill starts to pick up the mess, wishes Liz were here, and finally notices the song on the oldies channel because Andrea starts singing it to Phillip. This is a surprise. I guess kids just absorb some songs from the air, he thinks. Or else it's in a commercial for detergent, or in that movie where Robin Williams dresses up as a nanny. The kids love that one. Bill watches them singing. Andrea knows all the words. "In and out my life, you come and you go, leaving just your picture behind, and I've kissed it a thousand times." Bill had never realized until now, a couple hours after he and Liz explained the separation to the kids, that it was a sad song.
This concludes part 2. Stay tuned for part 3 of Sean Howe's "Battle Song" tomorrow!Labels: four tops, motown, sean howe, smokey robinson, supremes
posted by Brian
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