The Supremes

513. Phil Collins – You Can’t Hurry Love (1983)

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The Intro

You Can’t Hurry Love was one of The Supremes’ biggest hits in 1966. But it was Phil Collins who took it to number 1 in the UK, with a faithful rendition of the Motown smash. Collins had left Genesis and begun a solo career, and went on to become one of the world’s bestselling singers of all time. Seriously.

Before

Philip David Charles Collins was born 30 January 1951 at Putney Hospital in Wandsworth, South London. The youngest of three children, Collins and co moved twice before he had reached three, and they settled in Brentford and Chiswick, Middlesex. At the age of five, Collins received a toy drumkit for Christmas. He would play along to music on the television and radio, and developed a keen ear. Aged seven, he interrupted his own talent show performance of The Ballad of Davy Crockett to tell the accompanying orchestra they were in the wrong key. In his formative years, Collins loved The Beatles and the soul music of Motown and Stax Records. Although he received basic music tuition when he was 12, he never learned to read or write music notation.

Collins moved from Nelson Primary School in Twickenham, Middlesex to Chiswick County Grammar School in 1962. He formed his first band, The Real Thing (not the group that scored a number 1 with You to Me Are Everything in 1976), which featured his future wife Andrea Bertorelli on backing vocals.

In his mid-teens, Collins quit school to enrol at Barbara Speake Stage School. He was uncredited in his role as an audience member in The Beatles’ A Hard Day’s Night (1964) and later that year he had his first starring role as The Artful Dodger in Oliver!. Although he had two West End runs, his days in the role were numbered when his voice broke. Collins also nearly starred in Chitty Chitty Bang Bang (1968), but his role was cut.

While trying to make it big as an actor, Collins continued to love music, and frequented the Marquee Club so often that the management asked him to help out there. Eventually he decided to concentrate on music, and he auditioned unsuccessfully for Vinegar Joe and Manfred Mann Chapter Three. But The Cliff Charles Blues Band enlisted him, and he then jumped ship to a backing band known as The Gladiators. Incredibly, he had the chance to audition for Yes after he spoke to singer Jon Anderson, but he failed to turn up.

In 1969, Collins was part of John Walker’s (of The Walker Brothers) backing band during a live tour. When that ended, the band became Hickory, before settling on Flaming Youth. They recorded the concept album Ark 2. A year later, his path crossed the Fab Four’s once more, when he recorded a conga part for George Harrison’s Art of Dying.

The rock band Genesis, who had formed in 1967, signed to Charisma Records in 1970 and released their second LP, Trespass. Genesis were in a period of upheaval, having lost their guitarist, Anthony Phillips, and fired their third drummer, John Mayhew. Singer Peter Gabriel, a former drummer himself, was impressed by Collins, and he got the gig.

For the next five years, Collins played drums and percussion and sang backing vocals with Genesis. Over time, the band noticed the strength and synergy of Gabriel and Collins’ voices when put together. Then, in 1975, Gabriel decided to leaPve Genesis, and although Collins sang backing vocals for would-be applicants, they decided he would become their new lead singer for the album A Trick of the Tail. The decision was vindicated when the album became a hit in the UK and US.

In 1977, Genesis became a trio after the departure of guitarist Steve Hackett. The 1978 LP that followed – …And Then There Were Three… – was also a smash, and contained their first UK top 10 hit in Follow You, Follow Me. But Collins’ marriage was in trouble, and following their December tour, Genesis went on hiatus.

Collins failed to save his marriage and so returned to music, resuming his role in jazz fusion group Brand X, who he had helped since 1975. No stranger to cameos elsewhere, having collaborated with Brian Eno previously, he also helped out John Martyn. Genesis resumed in 1980 with their 10th album, Duke. Collins was becoming more involved as a songwriter, and it paid off, becoming their first UK number 1 album.

Soon after, Collins was working on demos for songs he considered too simple for Genesis. They also had a personal nature, often concerning his impending divorce. In January 1981 came his debut solo single, the haunting In the Air Tonight. Featuring one of the most famous drum breaks in pop, the song went to two in the charts. Quite the introduction to a solo career, but nothing else from that album, Face Value, matched it, with I Missed Again and If Leaving Me Is Easy reaching 14 and 17 respectively.

The early 80s were an extremely busy and successful time for Collins. In 1981, he also found time to be on Genesis’s next LP Abacab and produce Martyn’s album Glorious Fool. The following year, he produced and played on Anni-Frid Lyngstad of ABBA’s LP Something’s Going On and drummed on Robert Plant’s first solo album Pictures at Eleven.

He then set to work on his second solo album, Hello, I Must Be Going!. As with his last, much of the material focused on his divorce. However, the first single, Thru These Walls, didn’t bode well. A song about listening through walls to neighbours having sex, the song sounded like an inferior retread of In the Air Tonight. Released a month before the album, in October 1982, it didn’t even reach the top 40. Collins would have been better off releasing his cover of You Can’t Hurry Love first.

You Can’t Hurry Love had been one of The Supremes’ signature tunes. It was penned by prolific Motown hitmakers Lamont-Dozier-Holland and based on the gospel song You Can’t Hurry God by Dorothy Love Coates and the Gospel Harmonettes. The Supremes single was a pulsating, bright and breezy pop stomper with backing from the Funk Brothers, and it peaked at three in the UK in the late summer of 1966. Collins wanted to pay tribute to Motown (his latest album said ‘Motown, we salute you’ on the back) and worked with producer Hugh Padgham to attempt a remake, rather than interpretation, of the classic recording. He later admitted he didn’t succeed, dissing specifically the ‘naff strings’ on his version.

Nonetheless, Collins had recorded his vocal, drums and tambourine in May and June 1982, with help from Daryl Stuermer on guitar, John Giblin on bass and J Peter Robinson on piano, glockenspiel and vibraphone. Strings were provided by Martyn Ford and credited to The Mountain Fjord Orchestra.

Review

Collins’ standing in the music world is interesting. From drummer in one of the biggest prog rock bands of the 70s, to global superstar in the 80s. Capable of bangers like In the Air Tonight and Easy Lover, yet also guilty of the hypocritical Another Day in Paradise. A bland, uninteresting character, yet also blessed with an unassuming charisma. He was subject to ridicule for years, yet his stock has rightfully improved in recent years. He didn’t deserve such disdain, yet I can see why he was attacked.

Depending on my mood on the rare occasion I now hear it, his version of You Can’t Hurry Love is either unnecessary or not bad. It’s a serviceable attempt at covering a real classic, but why bother? If his aim really was to capture the 60s sound, while updating it a little for 80s audiences, he’s right that he didn’t really achieve it. Having said that, who could, especially in the early 80s, when production techniques were as far removed as Motown’s raw yet sugary pop could be?

The best part of this version is Collins’ voice. You’d never choose it over Diana Ross, Florence Ballard or Mary Wilson’s, but it does work surprisingly well here. Less surprising is that the other highlight is Collins’ drumming. It seems that unfortunately it may take his passing for people to realise he was an excellent drummer, not just an MOR pop star. You can feel his love for the sounds of his youth, and the enthusiasm somehow shines through this average but pleasant cover. There’s no wonder it became his first number 1, as it appealed to his many fans and the record buyers of the 60s, who by then will have loved this unthreatening new version of a tune from their teens.

They’ll have also enjoyed the novelty of the video, in which Collins performs the song under a spotlight, with two other versions of him on backing vocals – one wearing sunglasses. Collins as The Supremes. I will have been four when I first saw it, and I was fascinated to know how he was able to be in three places at once. Was he magic?

After

You Can’t Hurry Love became the first new number 1 of 1983, toppling the 1982 Christmas chart-topper Save Your Love. It also topped the charts in many countries and was a US hit. Collins was well on the way to becoming a global megastar.

The Outro

Lamont Dozier was impressed by Collins’ cover, and was happy to say yes when Collins asked him to co-write Two Hearts, a lovely Motown tribute that featured in his film Buster (1988).

The Info

Written by

Holland-Dozier-Holland

Producer

Phil Collins & Hugh Padgham

Weeks at number 1

2 (15-28 January)

Trivia

Births

21 January: Labour MP Wes Streeting
24 January: Scottish footballer Shaun Maloney
27 January: Scottish Conservative MP Douglas Ross

Deaths

18 January: Composer Cedric Thorpe Davie/Writer Colin Watson
22 January: Trade unionist Walter Citrine, 1st Baron Citrine
28 January: Singer-songwriter Billy Fury

Meanwhile…

17 January: Breakfast Time became the first British breakfast television programme when it launched on BBC One.

19 January: The two policemen who wounded the innocent Stephen Waldorf were charged with attempted murder and released on bail. They were suspended from duty pending further investigation.

23 January: The prohibition on non-British boats fishing in British waters was lifted when the European Economic Community’s Common Fisheries Policy came into effect. 

25 January: The Infrared Astronomical Satellite was launched, becoming the first-ever space-based observatory to perform a survey of the entire sky at infrared wavelengths.

26 January: Red rain fell in the UK, caused by sand from the Sahara Desert within the droplets. 

28 January: Escaped prisoner David Martin (who Stephen Waldorf had been mistaken for) was rearrested.

407. The Jacksons – Show You the Way to Go (1977)

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The Intro

An early glimpse of the biggest pop star of the 80s. But not early enough, in a way. The Jacksons, when known as The Jackson 5, were one of the most exciting and successful acts of the late 60s and early 70s. And yet despite their first four singles becoming number 1 in the US, it took until 1977 for them to reach the pinnacle of the charts here.

Before

The Jackson 5, like it or not, began with Joe Jackson in Gary, Indiana. The strict disciplinarian who allegedly put his family through years of physical and mental abuse, couldn’t make it as a professional boxer. He then failed to become a pop star after a stint in the 50s as a guitarist in the Falcons. And so he became a crane operator instead and raised a family with his wife Katherine. Rebbie came first and went on to become a singer in the 70s. Then came Jackie, Tito, Jermaine, LaToya, twins Marlon and Brandon (Brandon died shortly after birth), Michael and Randy.

Joe returned home one day in 1964 to discover Tito had been playing with his guitar without permission. Although initially furious, he wondered if his children could achieve what he couldn’t. He became the manager of The Jackson Brothers – Jackie, Tito and Jermaine, with childhood friends Reynaud Jones and Milford Hite playing keyboards and drums. Within a year Michael, then only eight, was added to the line-up on congas. Soon after Marlon joined on tambourine and Joe renamed them The Jackson Five Singing Group. In 1966 they won their first talent show. That same year Janet, the youngest of the family, entered the world.

Jones and Hite were replaced by Ronnie Rancifer and Johnny Jackson and the band performed at talent shows around the region, soon also performing paid gigs. Little Michael began to outshine Jermaine and replaced him on lead, wowing crowds with his dance moves, mimicking the likes of James Brown. He later said he paid for his talent because Joe focused his strict ways specifically on him, helping to turn his own son into a superstar but permanently damaging his own child in the process.

Allegedly a gig by the band at Harlem’s Apollo Theater earned them their first celebrity fan. Gladys Knight was impressed and sent a demo tape to Motown Records, which was rejected. As was a recording of Big Boy, which became their debut single when Joe signed them to Steeltown Records in 1968. That July they supported Bobby Taylor & the Vancouvers. Taylor was blown away my Michael and arranged a taped audition with Motown. Founder Berry Gordy Jr refused to sign any more ‘kid acts’ after Stevie Wonder, but he too couldn’t deny they had something special. They finally signed with Motown as The Jackson 5 in 1969.

It was decided that The Jackson 5 had a better chance to make a big first impression by claiming they were discovered by Diana Ross from The Supremes. Michael was billed as being eight, even though he was 10. Gordy had high hopes for his latest signing, even going so far as to assemble a crack team of songwriters specifically to create hits for The Jackson 5. He dubbed them The Corporation. And they certainly achieved their aim.

Their debut single, I Want You Back, was released that October. This effervescent funk and pop was one of the last great songs of the 60s, eventually topping the Billboard Hot 100 in January 1970. It peaked at two in the UK, which is criminal. Their debut LP, Diana Ross Presents The Jackson 5, didn’t need Ross’s name to sell it after all. Second album ABC‘s title track was another stone cold classic and another US number 1, as was The Love You Save and ballad I’ll Be There, which came from their imaginatively titled Third Album. No act had ever achieved four number 1s with their first four singles before. And before the year was out they released a fourth album, Jackson 5 Christmas Album, featuring their energetic take on Santa Claus Is Coming to Town.

Jacksonmania was everywhere, and they overtook The Supremes as Motown’s bestselling group. The label made the most of it, licensing all manner of merchandise, including stickers, posters, colouring books and even a Saturday morning animated series. Michael’s star appeal was too big to limit to just the group and so he also began a solo career in 1971, reaching the top in the US with his ode to a rat, Ben. To a lesser degree of success, Jermaine followed.

Unfortunately, this tied in with the start of The Jackson 5’s commercial decline. Never Can Say Goodbye and Sugar Daddy went top 10 in the US in 1971 but after that their singles hovered around the bottom reaches of the top 20 in the US. In the UK they had two singles reach nine in 1972 – Looking’ Through the Windows and Doctor My Eyes. The Corporation split in 1973, which hardly helped matters. The title track to Dancing Machine in 1974 marked their foray into the emerging disco scene, and earned them a number two in the US. But the slide continued afterwards.

In 1975 The Jackson 5 released their final LP on Motown – the ominously titled Moving Violation. Joe and his sons were tired of low royalty rates and wanted greater creative control. They announced their decision at a press conference to garner interest from other labels. It worked. In June 1975 they signed with Epic Records for a much greater royalty rate. Well, most of them did. Jermaine had married into the Gordy family so decided not to rock the boat and remained with Motown. Joe replaced him with Randy, the youngest of the Jackson boys. As they were under contract with Motown until 1976, Gordy threatened to sue over the use of their group name, so they became known as simply The Jacksons.

Their eponymous album came out in 1976, and it looked like they’d made a wise move. They were teamed up with expert hitmakers Gamble and Huff and signed to their subsidiary, Philadelphia International Records. First single Enjoy Yourself was their biggest hit in two years, and then came Show You the Way to Go. Written and produced by Gamble and Huff, it featured Michael on lead and he joined the others on backing vocals too. Tito played guitar, Randy played bass and the rest of the music came from their label’s house band of session musicians, MFSB (meaning Mother Father Sister Brother).

Review

How strange that of all those initial massive pop hits by The Jackson 5, it was this more subtle track that gave them their only UK number 1. On first listen, you’d be forgiven for thinking, this is an album filler at best. But Show You the Way to Go is, for me, fascinating. It’s a strong sign The Jacksons were growing up, and Michael in particular. No longer the squeaky voiced cute little boy, he was maturing into just as talented an adult star and the others were fading into the background. Michael makes tentative steps into his signature sound, with the yelps and improvising pointing the way. Showing the way he’d go, in fact.

But then the song has this weird structure, where it sounds as though it’s coming to a natural end, but carries on. It’s even in the single edit and it’s like nothing I’ve ever heard in a number 1 before. It should make for a total mess, but Michael saves it with his interjections. The yelping on the fade out is of note too. It surely can’t have been performed in one take, which means it must be studio trickery – so is it early sampling? It almost sounds like 90s techno. So yes, what on first listen is far from an obvious chart-topper, makes for an intriguing listen. The other Jacksons deserve mentioning too. Those backing vocals, warm and comforting, work so well with the tenderness of the tune.

After

In a curious reversal of fortunes, this period in the Jacksons saw greater chart success than in the US. Their 1978 classic Blame It On the Boogie was a number eight hit here, didn’t even crack the US top 50. By this point they had been given total creative control, and the parent album Destiny was a huge success. It also featured the excellent Shake Your Body (Down to the Ground), written by Michael and Randy. And soon after the former’s solo career really took off thanks to 1979’s Off the Wall album.

In 1980 The Jacksons’ album Triumph lived up to its name, especially thanks to the disco epic Can You Feel It (number six in the UK), written by Michael and Jackie. But there was no escaping the fact that Michael had become a superstar and the rest of the brothers couldn’t match his talent and magnetism. Not that there appeared to be any bad blood. In 1983 on the US TV special Motown 25: Yesterday, Today, Forever, The Jacksons reunited with Jermaine. It was the show on which Michael’s ‘Moonwalk’ to Billie Jean made headlines around the world.

In 1984, with Jermaine back on board, they recorded their bestselling album yet, Victory. However, it was essentially a collection of solo recordings. Their final UK top 20 single, State of Shock, was mainly a duet between Michael and Mick Jagger. Despite the success, this proved a tumultuous year for the group. Famously, while filming a Pepsi commercial with his brothers, Michael suffered burns to his scalp. Their tour was marred by Jackie suffering a leg injury, ticket issues and friction within the family.

Understandably, Michael felt it was time to concentrate purely on his own career. Marlon left soon after to go solo too, before quitting music entirely. One more album followed in 1989. The remaining four released 2300 Jackson Street and the title track featured Michael and Marlon as well. But it sold poorly and the brothers went on hiatus.

And that was it until September 2001, when all six reunited for two concerts filmed for TV, celebrating Michael’s 30th anniversary as a solo artist. Then in 2009, Jackie, Jermaine, Tito and Randy began filming a reality TV show centred around their plans to reform and record a new album to celebrate 40 years in showbiz. Everything changed a few days after filming in June when Michael died. It was turned into a series and named The Jacksons: A Family Dynasty. The surviving Jacksons recorded backing vocals for Michael’s previously unreleased This Is It, intended as the title track to his big comeback. Instead it became his epitaph.

There was talk of a reunion tribute tour and album from The Jacksons but it never transpired. Jermaine and Jackie released new music though. Then a tribute concert was in the running, to the extent Jackie, Tito and Marlon appeared alongside Katherine and LaToya for press conference. But Randy and Jermaine issued their own statement denouncing the idea as it was planned to coincide with the manslaughter trial of Michael’s doctor Conrad Murray. It went ahead anyway and in 2012 Jermaine joined the trio for the Unity Tour, which ended in 2013. In 2018, Joe died.

Although Michael had at times publicly spoken about the abuse suffered at his father’s hands, his brothers are always quick to jump to his defence. Whether this is a case of joint Stockholm syndrome, we’ll never know. At time of writing, Jermaine, Jackie, Tito and Marlon are publicising a political reworking of Can You Feel It.

The Outro

Obviously, there will be plenty more Michael Jackson to follow in due course, but I’ve decided to give The Jackson 5/The Jacksons and relevant solo careers a deeper listen. Forever overshadowed by Michael, for good and bad reasons, I feel it’s time the band’s career was reappraised away from the controversy of their most famous member’s life.

The Info

Written & produced by

Gamble and Huff

Weeks at number 1

1 (25 June-1 July)

Meanwhile…

26 June: Jayne McDonald is found battered and stabbed to death in Chapeltown, Leeds. Police suspect she is the fifth person to be murdered by the Yorkshire Ripper. McDonald was a 16-year-old shop assistant, not a prostitute, which brought a new level of revulsion to the Ripper’s crimes from the media.

1 July: Virginia Wade won the Women’s Singles title at Wimbledon. 

303. Diana Ross – I’m Still Waiting (1971)

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The Intro

How much power did Radio 1 DJ Tony Blackburn have in 1971? Quite a lot it seems, as it’s thanks to him that Chirpy Chirpy Cheep Cheep topped the charts, and only a few months later he persuaded EMI (who distributed for Motown in the UK) to release this album track by the former Supremes singer as a single. It went on to become Diana Ross’s first solo number 1.

Before

I covered The Supremes when I reviewed their 1964 number 1 Baby Love, but Ross’s life deserves a closer look. She was born in Detroit, Michigan on 26 March 1944. Her mother actually named her Diane, but a clerical error resulted in ‘Diana’ appearing on her birth certificate. She was billed as Diane Ross on early Supremes records. Growing up, Ross had Smokey Robinson and Aretha Frankin among her neighbours.

On the day she turned 14 in 1958, the Ross’s moved to the Brewster-Douglass Housing Projects. She had ambitions to be a fashion designer and took several classes, in addition to modelling and hairdressing for neighbours. A year later, she joined Florence Ballard, Mary Wilson and Betty McGlown in The Primettes, the sister group of The Primes.

Thanks to Robinson, The Primettes auditioned for Motown in 1960. Berry Gordy Jr recalled being blown away by Ross’s voice in his autobiography, but he felt they were too young. In these early years, Ross would be responsible for the group’s look, serving as hair stylist, costume design and make-up artist.

In 1961, with McGlown gone and Barbara Martin in, Gordy signed The Primettes on the condition they change their name. Ballard chose ‘The Supremes’, and Ross was worried it made them sound like a male group, but as we know, The Supremes they became, and from 1963 onwards, reduced to a trio without Martin, they became one of the most successful groups in history. They scored their sole UK number 1 with Baby Love, but had many more in the US.

From around 1966 and for the next few years Gordy began pushing for Ross to take centre stage. He had considered getting her to go solo, but deciding the timing was wrong he settled on renaming them Diana Ross & the Supremes instead. Ballard was fired and replaced with Cindy Birdsong, and Ross would often be the only Supreme to actually feature on recordings, backed by session singers like The Andantes. The pressure resulted in Ross developing anorexia, and she collapsed on stage during a 1967 performance, and had to be hospitalised for exhaustion.

Nevertheless, Gordy continued to shine the spotlight on Ross, having her perform solo in 1968 TV specials by The Supremes. The following year he decided the time was right, and it was announced she was leaving the group. Someday We’ll Be Together became Ross’s swansong, and the single was the final US number 1 of the 60s. She made her final appearance as a Supreme in January 1970.

It was only four months later that her eponymous debut solo LP was released, and it featured her cover of Ain’t No Mountain High Enough (originally recorded by Marvin Gaye & Tammi Terrell), which climbed to number six in the UK and was number 1 in the US.

November 1970 saw the rush-release of her second album, Everything Is Everything. Deke Richards was commissioned to make the LP more pop than her debut, and it featured two Beatles covers (Come Together and The Long and Winding Road), as well as a sad ballad by Richards himself – I’m Still Waiting. No singles were released from it, initially, with Motown choosing to mine her next album, Surrender, released in the summer of 1971. Unusually, both Remember Me and the title track performed better on these shores than America, both reaching the top 10.

Blackburn, then in charge of the Radio 1 breakfast show, was a huge fan of Ross, and he loved I’m Still Waiting. He promised Motown/EMI that if it was made a single, he would make it his ‘Record of the Week’ and play it every morning for five days. Both sides kept their end of the arrangement, and the hype saw it reach number 1. It was Motown’s biggest-selling single in the UK until Three Times a Lady by the Commodores in 1978.

Review

I’m baffled as to why this is the case. For me, I’m Still Waiting should have remained an album track. It’s dated, melodramatic and rather unmemorable.

Ross sings from the point of view of a woman who met the love of her life when she was five and he was 10. He would tease her, as boys do, but she loved him. Then he had to move away, and told her not to wait for him, but for love. But Ross couldn’t forget him, and nobody else compares.

Nice sentiment, but it could have been so much better. It has a slick production, but the tune is certainly not up there with the classics of The Supremes. Ross isn’t known for displaying too much emotion in her singing, which is probably a good thing in such a sentimental song, but I find it hard to believe in the performance. I much prefer her next number 1, Chain Reaction, which came 15 years later in 1986.

The Outro

An ill-advised dance remix of I’m Still Waiting by DJ Phil Chill reached 21 in 1990.

The Info

Written & produced by

Deke Richards

Weeks at number 1

4 (21 August-17 September)

Trivia

Births

26 August: Actress Gaynor Faye
29 August: Business executive Nicola Mendelsohn
31 August: TV presenter Kirstie Allsopp
1 September: Conservative MP Daniel Hannan
2 September: TV presenter Lisa Snowdon
13 September: Actress Louise Lombard/Fashion designer Stella McCartney
17 September: Labour MP Parmjit Dhanda

Deaths

18 August: Travel writer Peter Fleming

Meanwhile…

1 September: The end of an era, as the pre-decimal penny and three-pence ceased to be legal tender.

3 September: Qatar became independent from the UK.

7 September: Three years after the beginnings of The Troubles, the death toll reached 100 with the death of 14-year-old Annette McGavigan, who was fatally wounded by a gunshot in crossfire between British soldiers and the IRA. There would be many more deaths still to come.

9 September: British Ambassador Geoffrey Jackson was freed after being held captive for eight months by extreme left-wing guerrillas Tupamaros in Uruguay.