Marv Gaye's 'What's Gog On?' turns 50 | CNN

Contents:

• MARV GAYE’S ‘WHAT’S GOG ON’ GETS 50TH ANNIVERSARY DIGAL REISSUE
• MARV GAYE
• WHAT’S GOG ON AT 50: MARV GAYE’S MASTERPIECE IS STILL SO TE TO LIFE
• ROLLG STONE PLAC MARV GAYE AT THE TOP OF S NEW, LS ROCK HEAVY LIST OF THE BT ALBUMS EVER
• MARV GAYE’S LOST ‘WHAT’S GOG ON’ FOLLOW UP, ‘YOU’RE THE MAN,’ SET FOR RELEASE
• 50 YEARS AFTER MARV GAYE ASKED, ‘WHAT’S GOG ON?’ AMERI STILL SEARCHG FOR AN ANSWER
• ‘WHAT’S GOG ON’: WHEN MARV GAYE UNVEILED A MASTERPIECE
• A PAFUL LISTEN TO MARV GAYE’S NEWLY RELEASED POSTHUMO ALBUM
• HOW MARV GAYE’S ‘WHAT’S GOG ON’ CHANGED THE SOUND OF R&B FOREVER
• SERI OF VIRTUAL EVENTS KICKG OFF TONIGHT WILL CELEBRATE 50TH ANNIVERSARY OF MARV GAYE’S INIC ALBUM, ‘WHAT’S GOG ON’
• MARV GAYE’S ‘WHAT’S GOG ON’ TURNS 50 — SECRETS BEHD THE H ALBUM
• MARV GAYE LIVE! (EXPAND EDN)
• IN SPIKE LEE’S FUR NEW FILM, MARV GAYE’S ‘WHAT’S GOG ON’ IS STILL FIGHTG THE POWER
• 500 GREATT ALBUMS PODST: HOW MARV GAYE’S ‘WHAT’S GOG ON’ CHRONICLED A NATN TURMOIL

MARV GAYE’S ‘WHAT’S GOG ON’ GETS 50TH ANNIVERSARY DIGAL REISSUE

Motown/UMe has marked the 50th anniversary of Marv Gaye’s sgle release for “What’s Gog On” — the tle track om Rollg Stone’s Greatt Album of All Time — wh an all-enpassg digal reissue of the 1971 LP out now on streamg servic.

To honor the sgle’s 50th birthday, Motown/UMe grouped together all that bon mic for the digal release dubbed What’s Gog On: Deluxe Edn/50th Anniversary, which ntas the origal album pl 12 bon tracks cludg sgle versns, mos and more, the “Detro Mix” of the album and the llectn of “Funky Natn” stmentals om Gaye’s post-What’s Gog On rerdg ssns. “The Detro Mix” of What’s Gog On, Gaye’s origal versn of the album before ncelg and reworkg Los Angel, prevly featured on the 30th anniversary reissue of the album 2001.

“Through the regnn of What’s Gog On Day, we hope to brg awarens to Marv Gaye’s profound words as his timels mic remas our hearts and mds and ntu spirg generatns to e. “He uld have wrten What’s Gog On yterday, ” poet Nikki Gvanni noted an terview last tumn, explag that the ver portra of her 2020 llectn, Make Me Ra, pays homage to Gaye’s album ver, picturg Gvanni a raat, her llar upturned. The rerd’s endurance – most movgly displayed by Nelson Manla, who, shortly after his release om prison 1990, reced l om the album at Tiger Stadium Detro – has practilly bee a one is wrong, of urse, to say that Gaye’s album cuts as eply today as did 1971.

MARV GAYE

A dively spired work driven by social rage – one that braid doo-wop harmoni, jazz and the hymns Gaye had loved as a child – What’s Gog On was also Gaye’s claratn of creative pennce om Berry Gordy’s Motown mache. ”What’s Gog On remas val, above all, for how turns away om that “Ameri” and stead addrs the tle qutn to a closer-kn group – those people gathered at the hoe party Gaye stag the album’s openg moments; the “mother, mother” and “father father” he lls out to (and that the party settg might emboln him to ndidly addrs).

WHAT’S GOG ON AT 50: MARV GAYE’S MASTERPIECE IS STILL SO TE TO LIFE

” the speaker asks What’s Happeng Brother?, checkg the claims of those power agast the thory of everyday Black is one thg to celebrate Gaye’s endurg and prcient mo of creatn; another to appld the ntued ronance of his album’s ncerns.

We should not be sangue, for stance, that Gaye’s unrstated blu crique of “trigger-happy policg” has stayed so relevant; or that anti-Black vlence has so persisted over the last 50 years that remas necsary for Black artists and everyday people to approach the task of survivg and thrivg Ameri wh the energy, elegance and grace that Gaye molled this landmark work. Maybe he was tired – was the last song of a long set – but the 40-year-old Gaye, his illed whe shirt and sequned red su jacket, appears to not jt work the crowd but panr to wh some ntempt: “This was our very first No 1 rerd ever the world, ladi and gentlemen.

ROLLG STONE PLAC MARV GAYE AT THE TOP OF S NEW, LS ROCK HEAVY LIST OF THE BT ALBUMS EVER

Photograph: US Army/Getty ImagThis is precisely the kd of galvanisg work that Gaye was dog wh What’s Gog On, for his own people his own time – a historil pot that is often obscured when we fixate on the rerd’s timelsns.

”Vcent se Gaye’s actns as “the drivg force” behd Stevie Wonr’s polil turn at Motown, as well as the rigoro funk of Sly and the Fay Stone and the righteo soul of Aretha Frankl’s 1972 album Young, Gifted and Black. The stars, along wh untls ssn micians, were “dog their bt work ever at this ccial moment time” – settg the standard, the se of Gaye and his llaborator David Van De Pte’s meticulo strg, nga, bass and vol arrangements – for what Vcent lls “soul mic as high art” be sure, What’s Gog On is an impecbly posed sue. Listen to how Gaye cranks the volume back up jt as the tle track starts to fa out – a sign of rilience as well as a petty refal to let a track that Gordy hated end whout a fight.

MARV GAYE’S LOST ‘WHAT’S GOG ON’ FOLLOW UP, ‘YOU’RE THE MAN,’ SET FOR RELEASE

Photograph: Jim Brt/Getty ImagWhat I listen for now are moments like the, which, spe repeated plays, ver versns and sampl of Gaye’s songs, still sound disrdant and unrolved. In this portn of the rerd, timg and melody e unmoored, as Gaye mak room for hard, even spairg qutns: is possible to “save a world that is sted to die”? If at first Gaye seems ncerned wh parsg good om bad actors, “those of who simply like to socialise” v “those of who tend the sick and heed the people’s cri, ” he also gathers them all to an affirmative, right-on roll ll that mellows out to an oblique paean to sex: “And my darlg, one more thg / If you let me, I will take you to live where love is kg.

50 YEARS AFTER MARV GAYE ASKED, ‘WHAT’S GOG ON?’ AMERI STILL SEARCHG FOR AN ANSWER

The squawkg tenor saxophone solo wh which Wild Bill Moore tears through Mercy Mercy Me might be the most dramatic performance of the “holler” Gaye sgs about Inner Cy Blu – but which Gaye himself livers, at the end of that song, as a stylised cry: “Owwww! What Gaye performs stead is the virtuosic, ant ntrol required, the midst of panic, of Black people Ameri, no ls than that other war elements are not easily absorbed or nscripted to narrativ about Gaye’s moment or our own; precisely bee they are the rerd’s jagged edg, they keep reachg out to grab listeners through time. Marv Gaye’s 1972 lost album, You’re the Man, will fally be released March 29th, jt days before what would’ve been the mician’s 80th birthday, April 2nd.

Gaye rerd the tracks for the would-be rerd Detro and Los Angel durg a particularly prolific perd, but none of them – save the tular sgle – were released at the time. Gaye origally rerd “My Last Chance” around 1972, and though was never released, the song was revised as “I Love You Secretly” for the Miracl’ 1973 album, Renaissance.

‘WHAT’S GOG ON’: WHEN MARV GAYE UNVEILED A MASTERPIECE

In the Neti, Motown issued a quiet storm-style mix of the track, which beme a mor posthumo h for Gaye, while 2001 the origal versn fally appeared on a bt-of pilatn.

A PAFUL LISTEN TO MARV GAYE’S NEWLY RELEASED POSTHUMO ALBUM

The physil versn of the rerd wh new ler not om Gaye bgrapher, David Rz, who exam “Gaye’s eply personal ternal nflict as a source of creative vigor and emotnal burn as he experienced What’s Gog On‘s massive succs and all that me wh . In a recent terview for a new CNN documentary about Gaye’s work, tled “What’s Gog On: Marv Gaye’s Anthem for the Ag, ” the Grammy-nomated artist and activist relled redisverg the album jt before headg to a prott Nashville last summer.

HOW MARV GAYE’S ‘WHAT’S GOG ON’ CHANGED THE SOUND OF R&B FOREVER

(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "AIN'T NO MOUNTAIN HIGH ENOUGH")MARVIN GAYE: (Sgg) Listen, baby, a't no mounta high, a't no valley low, a't no river wi enough, TERRELL: (Sgg) If you need me ll me, no matter where you are, no matter how (Sgg) Don't worry, Tammi Terrell's ath 1970 vastated Marv Gaye.

(SOUNDBITE OF MARVIN GAYE SONG, "MERCY MERCY ME")CERMAK: The song "Mercy Mercy Me" sort of stood out to me - oil wasted on the ocean and upon our seas, fish full of mercury. (SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "MERCY MERCY ME")GAYE: (Sgg) Oil wasted on the oceans and upon our seas, fish full of That one really h me bee I was an environmental science scholar studyg the world's oceans, lerally, and studyg the creatur the oceans and startg to learn that same bad news all over aga. (SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "MERCY MERCY ME")GAYE: (Sgg) Oh, mercy, mercy In the late 2000s, I found myself dog outreach tn wh high schoolers and teachg this environmental science g standardized textbooks and realizg that I wasn't really engagg the stunts - right?

SERI OF VIRTUAL EVENTS KICKG OFF TONIGHT WILL CELEBRATE 50TH ANNIVERSARY OF MARV GAYE’S INIC ALBUM, ‘WHAT’S GOG ON’

(SOUNDBITE OF MARVIN GAYE SONG, "MERCY MERCY ME")JEFFERSON PATERSON: The other song that actually guts me is the song - and I feel like I'm gog to choke up now talkg about , but 's the song "Inner Cy Blu.

(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "INNER CITY BLUES")GAYE: (Sgg) Oh, make me want to holler the way they do my life, yeah, make me want to holler the way they do my life. (SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "INNER CITY BLUES")GAYE: (Volizg) That was Eva Jefferson Paterson, a civil rights lawyer who -found the Equal Jtice Society and also sgs a Motown ver band Oakland, Calif.

MARV GAYE’S ‘WHAT’S GOG ON’ TURNS 50 — SECRETS BEHD THE H ALBUM

To unrstand the seismic shift the reer of Marv Gaye that was brought about by his bold new artistic directn on What’s Gog On, ’s worth steppg back to the Motown mastay’s prev LP release. The album, unveiled on May 21, 1971, was hailed by Billboard as “a cross between Curtis Mayfield and that old Motown spell, and outdo anythg Gaye’s ever done. Gaye, seemed, was settlg to a groove, albe one not pletely wele unr the Motown umbrella of factory-assembled hs about romantic love and happily ever after.

The 17-song llectn clus mic om the origal album as well as some of Gaye’s addnal work om that perd, cludg a rare extend take on “I Want to Come Home for Christmas.

In a betiful homage to his own gospel roots — mic troduced to him by his father, Marv Gay Sr., who would eventually kill his own son — “Piece of Clay” is a vivid examatn of society manipulatg s younger generatns to rryg the ss of their elrs. Wh Motown refg to further explore the impact and succs of Gaye’s socially nsc rerdgs, stead released Gaye’s soundtrack to the Ivan Dixon-directed Trouble Man.

MARV GAYE LIVE! (EXPAND EDN)

But even wh the chaos of his own life, lan by heartbreak that seemed to stalk him, Gaye still believed brighter tomorrows — when he wasn’t his own worst enemy. The song, built around an terpolatn of Marv Gaye's "I Want You, " is acpanied by a vio nsistg of a sgle shot of Lamar, g epfake technology to morph him to Black male celebri who have faced public scty — om O.

Marv Gaye, 'What's Gog On'“What’s Gog On, ” a poignant mil masterpiece crafted a season of unease, persists as a timely backdrop to another heated summer, half a century later, when the world feels upsi down.

Marv Gaye's 'What's Gog On'is still relevant and revealg, 50 years laterRacial tensns, police ntroversy, environmental anxieti, a globe on edge – they were the topics on the ont burner when Gaye rebooted his mil reer and took ntrol of his creative visn si Motown.

IN SPIKE LEE’S FUR NEW FILM, MARV GAYE’S ‘WHAT’S GOG ON’ IS STILL FIGHTG THE POWER

It would bee the first Top 10 LP for Gaye, a major rerdg artist who’d had many h sgl but hadn’t reached higher than number 33 on the Top 200 album chart. The album was unlike anythg prevly released by a Black superstar: Wrten and produced by Gaye (a first for any Motown artist not named Smokey Robson) and clockg at jt over 35 mut, secured his spot as one of mic’s leadg Black trs of the . He wasn’t the first Black artist to produce challengg mic after assumg plete creative ntrol — Jam Brown had done and so had former Imprsns lear Curtis Mayfield — but Gaye, who butted heads hard wh Motown orr to pursue a new artistic directn (he was signed to the Motown imprt Tamla), was the first to do wh such a thematilly and milly hive statement.

If he had wanted to, Gaye probably uld have spent years astg on the 1968 succs of “I Heard It Through the Grapeve, ” a chart-toppg smash that, at one pot, was Motown’s bt-sellg sgle of all time.

That probably would have helped Motown head Berry Gordy, who has said that he was “terrified” when Gaye first said he wanted to make a “prott album, ” sleep easier at night. But stead of vg to creative expectatns, Gaye cid to challenge himself and his dience by embarkg on a stunng mic reventn that rivaled what The Beatl had done a half- earlier wh “Rubber Soul.

500 GREATT ALBUMS PODST: HOW MARV GAYE’S ‘WHAT’S GOG ON’ CHRONICLED A NATN TURMOIL

” Gaye, who had once harbored aspiratns to be the Black Frank Satra, thoroughly transformed his sound and image, creatg a new chameleonic mil persona that would rry him through the ‘70s.

In addn to reposng and rebrandg Gaye s before “rebrandg” beme a thg, “What’s Gog On” blend the polil and the relig a way no sger had managed to do sce Sam Cooke’s “A Change Is Gonna Come” seven years earlier.