NORMAN WHITFIELD OWES ME THREE HOURS

I kind of knew this would happen. After mentioning the psychedelic soul-era Temptations yesterday, I figured it was time to give them some spins again. First the few below from old posts, then a couple hours in the living room in front of the stereo, digging my own rabbit hole. And then while prepping this post, an unrelated post from a couple years ago about Blaxploitation soundtracks popped up in the Boss Ten (left column on a desktop). Here we go. Shit never ends.

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Listen:
The Temptations - Can't Get Next to You mp3 at Box.net (?)
The Temptations - Cloud Nine mp3 at Box.net (?)
The Temptations - Ball of Confusion mp3 at Snuthing Anything
The Temptations - Psychedelic Shack mp3 at AM Then FM With spoken intro
The Temptations - Papa Was a Rolling Stone (7 minute version) mp3 at Lots of Fish

WAH-WAH, ECHO AND THE BEAT.

Dennis Edwards passed away a few days ago. He was the lead singer of the Temptations from 1968 onward (if the Temptations can be said to have had a lead singer). Edwards joined the group right about when Norman Whitfield started producing them moving them into psychedelic soul territory. It was a marked difference from their earlier years. As brilliant as Whitfield's productions were, the singers complained that their voices were getting lost in the mix, which was true to a degree. It wasn't "My Girl" and "Ain't to Proud to Beg" days anymore. But they weren't necessarily being drowned out, they just weren't as prominent. The instrumentation was big and drawn out, more so than their earlier work, and to Whitfield's credit, it made for a much bigger package. To wit, the LP version of "Papa Was a Rolling Stone" was a whopping twelve minutes long, with an intro that lasted over three minutes before the vocals came in. By the time Edwards laid down the opening lines, he had done over ten takes and was pissed.

Dennis Edwards

"Papa Was a Rolling Stone" is an interesting case study for how Whitfield worked. On more than one occasion, he would produce a song for one group and if it didn't hit the charts, he'd record the song in an entirely different version with another group. He produced the Temptations' version of "War" and when that didn't stick, he did it again with Edwin Starr and that version was a huge hit. Another Temptations song that failed to hit big was "Smiling Faces Sometimes", which Whitfield fine tuned into a hit for the Undisputed Truth. Lest you think that the Temptations got the short end of every stick, the original version of "Papa Was a Rolling Stone" was recorded by, you guessed it, the Undisputed Truth, which went nowhere. Whitfield brought it to the Temps and you know what happened there.

Here's a mixed bag. First up is a pre-Temptations 45 by Edwards, followed by a few of the Whitfield produced Temptations songs with Edwards sharing lead vocals, including three different versions of "Papa Was a Rolling Stone", the "short" version (seven minutes), the LP version, the 45 B-side instrumental version (take that Jamaica!). Finally, the original version by the Undisputed Truth.

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Listen:
Dennis Edwards - I Didn't Have Too But I Did (streaming) at YouTube
The Temptations - Can't Get Next to You mp3 at Box.net (?)
The Temptations - Cloud Nine mp3 at Box.net (?)
The Temptations - Ball of Confusion mp3 at Snuthing Anything
The Temptations - Psychedelic Shack mp3 at AM Then FM With spoken intro
The Temptations - Papa Was a Rolling Stone (7 minute version) mp3 at Data Vibe (?)
The Temptations - Papa Was a Rolling Stone (12 minute version) (streaming) YouTube
The Temptations - Papa Was a Rolling Stone (instrumental version) (streaming) at YouTube
The Undisputed Truth - Papa Was a Rolling Stone (original) (streaming) at YouTube

SAY IT AGAIN

I saw something posted on a social media page today that said "America has been at war 222 out of 239 years since 1776. Let that sink in for a moment..." Whoa. After I let that sink in for a moment as suggested, I found myself reciting the opening lines to the song "War" in my head. You know 'em. You may have just thought about the same song. In what could be seen as a case of misplaced priorities, instead of looking for more data on the subject, it had me on the hunt for the original version of the song by the Temptations, the one that Edwin Starr turned into the a massive hit. After hearing the original, it was on to more of that psychedelic soul era Temptations stuff. "Cloud Nine" was the first song working with producer Norman Whitfield, and the first Motown record to win a Grammy. The suits were gone, a string of similarly sounding psych-soul records in their place. All of these are tight, trust me. There's a whole lot of stuff going on in them, begging for repeated listenings. That Whitfield was a genius.

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Listen:
The Temptations - War mp3 at Soul Boogie Alex (?)
The Temptations - Cloud Nine mp3 at Boogie Woogie Flu
The Temptations - Ball of Confusion mp3 at LZ Center
The Temptations - Papa Was a Rolling Stone mp3 at Lots of Fish (?)

ARE WE EARLY? OR LATE?

Well this certainly adds to the late sixties psychedelic soul clusterfuck. Fuji, whose real name was Ellington Jordan, was the guy who wrote "I'd Rather Go Blind", a hit for Etta James (right after being released from jail, so the story goes). He was pals with the Temptations' Eddie Kendricks, who introduced him to a band called Black Merda. Together, Fuji and Black Merda recorded an album that wasn't heavily promoted, and went nowhere. Everyone who writes about it online seems to revere like it's some sort of psychedelic soul godhead. I've only heard a portion of it, and a handful of Black Merda's things without Fugi, so I'm not going to sit here and tell you that it's overrated, or that a lack of promotion didn't sink it. But, I'll tell you what, it made me want to lose myself in some psychedelic soul stuff from the A-listers. The Temptations cuts below were produced by Norman Whitfield, with guitar by Dennis Coffey. That's a killer combination right there. Hard to beat. Chess/Cadet, the label that released the Fugi LP, were probably throwing up there hands. "Aw fuck. We can't compete with that."

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Listen:
Fugi - Mary, Don’t You Take Me On No Bad Trip mp3 at Brobots
Black Merda - Ashamed mp3 at ATumblr (?)
Black Merda - Long Burn the Fire mp3 at Hard Raw Deep Funk
The Tempations - Ball of Confusion mp3 at LZ Center
The Temptations - Papa Was a Rolling Stone mp3 at Radio George
Dennis Coffey - Scorpio mp3 at EricMGrant.EJFlavors 
Full LPs:
Black Merda - Three full albums (via Diveshare) at Hard Raw Deep Funk
The Temptations - Cloud Nine (streaming) at YouTube Put this one on, turn it up, and go about your business for 35 minutes. It's perfect for that.

LEST WE NEED REMINDING

How bad were the eighties? Just listen to these two versions of "Ball of Confusion". The original by the Tempations is quintessential Norman Whitfield. (Whitfield produced much of the psychedelic soul era Motown stuff, that much you should know.) When the Temptations made the leap from matching suits to flashy paisley, Whitfield was the guy who crafted their sound. Listen to all of the stuff going on. Man, oh man, it's thick. "How about some fuzz over that bass?" "Let's get a little crazy with the percussion", and so forth. Now listen to the version that Tina Turner did with BEF in the eighties. Even with a certain amount of wiggle room for just going with the synth wave that permeated the decade, and with all due respect to Turner's prior output, it pretty much blows. Jeez, did the eighties suck.

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Listen:
The Tempations - Ball of Confusion mp3 at LZ Center
Tina Turner - Ball of Confusion mp3 at AM Then FM
Another good one produced by Whitfield:
The Temptations - Papa Was a Rolling Stone mp3 at Radio George.
Visit:
Norman Whitfield at Wikipedia

NORMAN WHITFIELD 1942 - 2008

Norman Whitfield died last week. He wrote (or co-wrote) many of the definitive late 60's/early 70's songs for Motown, so his name should be recognizable to anyone record-geek enough to actually peruse songwriting credits. Among them, "War" (which has to be the most powerful anti-war song to ever chart; #1 in 1971), "Ain't to Proud to Beg", "I Heard It Through the Grapevine", "Ball of Confusion", "Cloud Nine", "I know I'm Losing You" and roughly 300+ other songs (see the massive listing at the Songwriters Hall of Fame).

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As with any good song, the proof is in the pudding: how do the cover versions stack up? For "I Heard It Through the Grapevine" I'm including a link to the Slits decidely sparse version, and for "Papa Was a Rolling Stone" I had to include a link to the Pioneers version, my favorite, over even the Temps original. I tried to find D.O.A.'s cover of War (the only version that comes close to updating the intensity of the Edwin Starr original) to no avail (but turn up Starr's version and see if it doesn't still hit you in the gut). "Paint the White House Black" is a 1993 post-Motown song, co-written by Whitfield, George Clinton and about a half dozen others.

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This is just a sampling. For more Whitfield songs, check out the sites hosting these MP3s. And you should really read his bio/obit at the Guardian, to throw everything into context. (Thanks to Ted for the suggestion. I owe you again Snail!)

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War -Edwin Starr MP3 + Cloud Nine - Temptations + 3 other Whitfield/Strong songs at Bag of Songs
I Heard it Through the Grapevine - the Slits MP3 + 3 other Whitfield/Strong songs at Moistworks
Papa Was a Rolling Stone - the Pioneers MP3 + Temptations original version at Funky 16 Corners

Paint the White House Black - George Clinton MP3 @ Snuhthing/Anything (w/Ice Cube, Dr. Dre, Public Enemy & Shabba Ranks)
Norman Whitfield: Death of a Soul Icon obituary/bio at Guardian.co.uk
Norman Whitfield at the Songwriters Hall of Fame