Their good looks, charisma, complex choreography and vocal arraignments made The Temptations, particularly in the 1960s and 1970s, a male super-group who were arguably unmatched. The group’s impact on Motown, the Detroit record label that made them rich and famous, is well-documented: The Temptations, along with The Supremes, helped the company crossover into mainstream America, trading in their seemingly exclusive relationship the Chitlin’ Circuit, a network of theaters that were safe for Black entertainers to perform in during segregation, for the glitz and glamour of the Copacabana and ‘The Ed Sullivan Show,’ television’s longest running variety program.
The Temptations – the group, still making appearances, to this day remains led by Mr. Otis Williams, though all other original members are dead – are remembered for their suave and sex appeal, yet are forgotten for their social-consciousness. It was The Temptations, not Mr. Marvin Gaye, that led Motown into the era of message music, but history tells another story, which results in one of the world’s most beloved singing groups being unsung.
‘Motown the Musical,’ the Broadway production which is currently staged on Philadelphia’s Avenue of the Arts, further propagates the myth that it was Mr. Gaye who served as the catalyst for shifting the company – which rejected the idea that their music was just for Blacks and largely avoided debating the issues of the day in song – from apolitical to overtly political.
For example, ‘Motown the Musical,’ which runs at the Academy of Music until June 11th, is more music than storyline, though one story given some time to play out is an encounter between a socially-conscious Mr. Gaye, who, frustrated by the headlines he’s reading, wants to release ‘What’s Going On,’ and Mr. Berry Gordy, the record company’s founder, who, when it came to politics, aimed to err on the side of caution to the degree in which it could be mistaken for indifference.
As legend has it, Mr. Gaye, who had been wanting to release the record for some time, threatened to leave Motown if the song wasn’t made public. The tale frames the dynamic as Mr. Gordy not wanting to dive deep into hot topics, but Motown’s timeline is at odds with that narrative. In other words, ‘What’s Going On’ was preceded by ‘War,’ ‘War’ was preceded by ‘Ball of Confusion (That’s What the World is Today,’ and the aforementioned tune, which released in 1970, was preceded by 1969’s ‘Message from a Black Man,’ whose opening sentence is “Yes, my skin is black, but that’s no reason to hold me back.”
The Temptations performed both ‘Ball of Confusion (That’s What the World is Today)’ and ‘Message from a Black Man.’
‘Ball of Confusion (That’s What the World is Today)’ rivaled ‘What’s Going On’ in terms of social observations – the song’s opening verse is: “People moving out. People moving in. Why? Because of the color of their skin” – but it was ‘Message from a Black Man,’ which appeared on the album Puzzle People, that marked the beginning of what would become a rich, albeit brief, catalog of socially-conscious tunes by The Temptations that never penetrated popular culture the way Mr. Gaye’s songs did. But, just because The Temptations’ socially-conscious music didn’t go mainstream doesn’t mean it didn’t exist, and, furthermore, that it didn’t push the envelope.
For example, appearing on the same album as ‘Papa Was a Rolling Stone,’ which is the song that opens ‘Motown the Musical,’ is a track entitled ‘Run Charlie Run,’ a song about white flight from an American city whose chorus is: “Run, Charlie, run. Look the niggers are coming.”
The first two verses of the songs are as follows:
“I watch you go to church on Sunday. But you forget all you learned on Monday. You see your smiling face can’t hide, how you hate your brother inside. You built this great, big, beautiful city. But you ran away and left it to die, what a pity. You could have made friends with your neighbor, but you are too prejudiced to try, tell me why.”
‘Run Charlie Run’ was released in 1972, the same year as the album Solid Rock, which was the first LP without two founding members – Mr. Eddie Kendricks and Mr. Paul Williams – and which featured the tune ‘Stop the War Now,’ a song written to protest the Vietnam War.
As proven by history not hype, The Temptations were socially-conscious, and showing the world that, before Mr. Gaye became Motown’s poster-boy for the movement. It was The Temptations that set the stage for Mr. Gaye to flourish as the voice of the resistance. For whatever reason, Mr. Gaye’s brand of socially-conscious music was more popular than The Temptations, and because of such, it was maybe the only moment when The Temptations, at their peak, were overshadowed and unsung.
Thanks for reading! Until next time, I’m Flood the Drummer® and I’m Drumming for Justice!™
