Category: Motown
TAMLA MOTOWN IS DISTRIBUTING HARVEY LABEL . . . OCTOBER 20, 1962
From the MCRFB news archive: 1962
Motown Expanding Operations Includes Adding New Labels
NEW YORK — Berry Gordy, Jr., and his Tamla-Motown label are expanding their operations to include a new subsidy label and a distribution of an outside line.
The line being handled by the Tamla-Motown firm is is the Harvey label. Harvey, which is a subsidiary of Tri-Phi, currently has an item getting some action around the country in “Cleo’s Mood,” by Junior Walker and the All-Stars and this is the first outside disk to be handled by Motown. The label will also distribute all past and future material on the Harvey label. The new distributor arrangement was concluded between Harvey Fuqua of Harvey Records and Barney Ales of Tamla-Motown.
The Detroit-based Tamla-Motown firm has also debuted a new subsidiary in the Me-lo-dy banner. This makes four labels in the company’s camp: Tamla. Motown. Gordy and the new Ensign.
Berry Gordy, Jr., also reports that the firm is currently at work on jazz and spiritual material. The jazz albums will debut on another label, Workshop Jazz. A set by Earl Washington is currently in distribution, while another by Paula Greer, a Chicago-based songstress, is in the making. The label is searching out native Detroit talent for the line, and will seek newcomers and established stars in other areas of the country as well. END
(Information and news source: Billboard; October 20, 1962).
DICK CLARK SEE ROAD SUCCESS WITH TOUR ACTS . . . DECEMBER 14, 1963
From the MCRFB news files: 1963
DETROIT’S MOTOWN ACTS ROLLING
NEW YORK — Big touring pop record acts appear to be in for a sustained period of success, according to all current indications. At the time of peak interest in rock and roll in the late 1950s, such packages as Irvin Feld’s ‘Biggest Show Of Stars were terrific grossers.
Later, as the character of the pop scene begin to undergo several refinements, the pop tour seemed to suffer. The grosses dwindled as too many tried their hand in booking the shows, thus overcrowding the field, with poor promotion behind most of them. The payola inquiry at various governmental levels also played its role in de-popularizing the rock and roll package at the time.
Now, however, three big touring troupes have just been completed or are about to complete lengthy sessions on the road in all cases. Bigger plans are in the making for next year, and in at least one case, the troupe will undertake a similar type of tour in the European Continent.
Captain Clark
Deejay Dick Clark has been at the helm of two highly successful tours this fall under the banner “Caravan Of Stars,” a joint project of Clark and the William Morris Office of Music department, which is headed up by Rosalind Ross.
The current 31-day Clark tour embarked early in November and concluded Sunday night, December 8 in Norfolk, Virginia. The Clark package grossed over $35,000 in its first three dates on the most recent swing and featured Bobby Vee, Brian Hyland, Jimmy Clanton, Linda Scott, The Essex, The Jaynettes, The Ronettes, Little Eva, The Dixie Belles, Dale and Grace, Joe Perkins, Donald Jenkins and the Delighters, The Dovells, Paul and Paula, The Tymes and Jeff Condon.
Clark took a similar entourage out last July and in 19 dates the package grossed nearly $500,000. Plans have already been set in motion for a third Clark package tour to hit the road for a month starting next March 28 for the Easter season.
Feld himself remains a kingpin in the rock tour picture, just as he was some years back, having closed one of his most successful big-money tours of all. His “Biggest Show Of Stars,” fall edition, has just closed a 28-day run playing big auditoriums in numerous major markets, featuring James Brown and the Famous Flames, as the leading headliner. The all-Negro package, which included such acts as Marvin Gaye, Martha and the Vandellas, Doris Troy and the Drifters, among others, played major showcases like the Muninciple Auditorium, Norfolk; The Mosque Theater, Richmond; Kiel Opera House, St. Louis, and the Sam Houston Coliseum, Houston. The show “did very well,” according to Feld.
At the New Civic Center, a 13,000-seater in Baltimore, the show sold out at a ticket scale of $1.75 to $3.75, with, in Feld’s words, “several thousands were turned away.” Feld has already blueprinted a spring edition to hit the road for the Easter season next April and may for 45 days. Again headlining the indomitable James Brown and the Famous Flames. Brown’s “James Brown Show” album on King Records has been a best-seller on the album charts for a number of months.
Motown Rolling
Meanwhile, Motown – Tamla Records in Detroit, has just closed a highly lucrative tour for its Motor Town Revue, headlining a flock of stars on the two labels. The six-week tour played to capacity houses on close to half its dates. According to Esther Edwards of Motown, the tour concluded November 16 and 17 at the Fox Theater in Detroit, with standing room only audiences for eight shows over the two days. The total $42,000 gross represented the largest box office gross for two days in the past five years for the theater. The package featured The Miracles, Mary Wells, The Marvelettes, Kim Weston, The Contours, the Temptations, and on some dates, Little Stevie Wonder and Martha and the Vandellas, and included on stage Choker Campbell and his Orchestra Band. “We plan to send a tour out at least once a year,” Miss Edwards said.
In addition, Motown Records will send out a similar tour package of its own acts to Europe next spring, probably during April and May, 1964. END.
(Information and news source, Billboard; December 14, 1963).
MOTOWN: THE HOLLAND BROTHERS SPEAK OUT . . . FEBRUARY 26, 1983
From the MCRFB news archive: 1983
Holland Brothers Extend Rare Interview
Brian and Eddie Holland don’t talk a great deal. In more than 20 years as producers and writers, the can remember doing “maybe three or four interviews” — remarkable, considering the influence these gentleman have had on popular music.
Together with Lamont Dozier, they helped define the musical “Motown Sound.” What was an inspired hit-making formula for the Supremes, the Four Tops and many others has become a permanent part of our musical vocabulary. Daryl Hall and John Oates’ “Maneater,” for example, approximates the Holland/Dozier/Holland arrangement of the Supremes’ “You Can’t Hurry Love,” while Phil Collins has gone directly to the source for his current hit. Both these records have been top 10 pop hits this year, demonstrating the durability of a musical vision first forged in 1964.
Yet the Holland brothers are reluctant to dwell on the past. They’d rather talk about 8th Day, a five-member vocal group they have produced and signed to A&M Records. The original version of 8th Day recorded for the Hollands’ Invictus Records in the early 1970s.
“We don’t talk to the press often, because we’re basically background people,” says Eddie Holland. “But we’re genuinely excited about the group and this album.” Brian’s description of 8th Day‘s talent recall the Temptations. “We have five voices, each with its own particular style, which gives us an opportunity to use a lot of different vocal coloring and combinations.” When asked if 8th Day compared favorably to the Temptations, Eddie refused to be glib. “No, I couldn’t say that. The Temptations to me had, and still have, something quit special that I’ve never heard any other vocal group match. The quality of the voices and the way they could be played off each other made them especially interesting to work with.”
The Holland brothers and Dozier left Motown in the late 1960s in a flurry of lawsuits and acrimony. Today, Eddie says, “That was so long ago we can even remember what started it. It must have been a bunch of little things that just built up that were never quite taken care of at the time. Egos got in the way at some point, and it never was worked out. Our relationship with Motown now is fine.
“We use their Hitsville Studio in Los Angeles. We’re extremely happy with Jobete. They keep our music out there, and our income from our publishing just keeps increasing. We make more money from it today than we did 10 or 15 years ago. Jobete worked with us to do a co-publishing project with our Gold Forever Music on our old music as well as songs we’ve written more recently.”
About Berry Gordy, the Hollands have nothing but praise. “When we started, we were 17 or 18 years old, just kids really,” say Eddie. “Being a creative person himself, Berry could understand creative people and — this is important — could recognize talent in the raw. Some of the people at Motown had great talent and only needed a chance to grow. Others were just marginal talents that he stuck with.
According to legend, Motown’s music was ground out with a machine-like regularity of an assembly line. The Hollands agree that they were disciplined and worked quickly, but they say Motown meant “total freedom” to them. “It was a totally relaxed, creative environment and yes, very much like a family. We’d cut any time of the day or night. But we’d also sit down at Hitsville and play poker all night long.”
The famous trebley sound of Motown’s ’60s recordings was, according to Brian, more a matter of equipment than taste. “We’d listen to all those Stax records and other records of that period and try to get that same fat drum and bass sound,” he recalls. “When we’d hear our records through the speakers in the original Hitsville studio in Detroit, they’d have that same sound, too. But they wouldn’t record like that, though we’d hear them with a fatter sound through those particular speakers. But we didn’t complain. People seemed to like them.” END.
— NELSON GEORGE
(Information and news source: Billboard; February 26, 1983).
DETROIT’S TEMPTATIONS LIVE ON CKLW-TV CH. 9 1965!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ltRwmgYEUr8
MOTOWN CREW OFF TO EUROPE FOR BIG PUSH . . . MARCH 2, 1963
From the MCRFB news archives: 1963
MOTOWN INTENDS TO BROADEN BASE OVERSEAS ACROSS EUROPEAN HORIZON
DETROIT — Tamla-Motown Records is going after the overseas market with serious intent. The hot singles label is sending three representatives to Europe to establish and expand agreements with distribution outlets on the Continent. President Berry Gordy, Vice-President Barney Ales and Mrs. Esther Edwards (Gordy’s sister) will leave for London March 1.
The trio will make headquarters for the first week in the Carlton Towers. They expect to be in Europe four to six weeks. According to Ales, they will be cementing relations and affiliations not only for the label but also for the affiliated Jobete publishing and an associated management firm.
Ales also stated that this first trip to the Continent is exploratory in nature. He said he and Gordy were interested primarily in talking with as many companies as possible about distribution and representation.
The only firm from the Tamla-Motown labels have a solid agreement with at the present time is the Oriole label in England. This, Ales said, is due to run out in June. Most other agreement for distribution of records on the company’s labels are with companies on a one-shot basis with a 30-day cancellation clause.
The Detroit-based record executives will be touring Belgium, Germany, Holland and other European countries and wish to distribution and representation with many firms in those countries.
Ales stressed the importance of talks about the Jobete publishing and management firms because of the growing importance of both artists and tunes associated with the operation here. Ales noted that the Contours were going to appear in England in March and that three Jobete tunes have done very well in Europe: “Please Mr. Postman,” “Do You Love Me” and “Mashed Potatoes,” Dee Sharp had the hit on the last-named but Jobete had the copyright. END.
(Information and news source: Billboard; March 2, 1963).
MOTOR TOWN REVUE SHOW AT THE DETROIT FOX 1966!
MOTOWN RECORDS SALES GOING THE CONVENTION WAY . . . SEPTEMBER 9, 1967
From the MCRFB NEWS archive: 1967
Hitsville U.S.A Catalogs Record LP Release, Record Billings
DETROIT — The Motown Record Corporation’s single largest record release, 15 packages for fall, was introduced at the company’s first sales convention, held at the Hotel Ponchartrain, Friday to Monday, August 25 to 28. The Motown convention theme was “Showcase ’68.”
Barney Ales, vice-president in charge of sales for Motown, reported a record $4 million in billings for the 15 albums were received at the convention party.
“This party has been a success,” Ales told Billboard. “The acceptance of the product itself has been unbelievable and the album release is our best to date.”
Pointing to the tremendous growth rate to the record industry and the growth of rhythm and blues-oriented companies, Ales told the distributors, “We feel that here in Motown, we have indeed created new dimensions in the world of R&B, because we have worked for world-wide acceptance. While many of our competitors were busy merchandising their old sounds, Motown writers, producers and artists were busy creating a new sound and we take great pride in its having become ‘the sound of young America.’ ”
Fall Package
The new fall release features packages by Chris Clark, the Original Spinners, the Isley Brothers, San Remo Golden Strings, Gladys Knight and the Pips, Marvin Gaye and Tammy Terrell, Smokey Robinson and the Miracles, Jr. Walker and the All Stars, Martha and the Vandellas, Stevie Wonder, the Temptations, the Four Tops and Diana Ross and the Supremes (deluxe-double album package with pictures included).
Four new singles slated for release in the fall were “I’ll Come Running,” by the Four Tops; “From Head To Toe,” by Chris Clark; “Wondering,” by Stevie Wonder; and “Window Shopping,” by the Messengers.
A display and browser box for the new product were also shown during the Motown all-star studded extravaganza four-day event held in downtown Detroit.
Highlight
The convention highlight was the special Motown Showcase show presented Sunday night, August 27, at the Roostertail Supper Club. About 500 people, including the distributors plus local dealers, radio personalities and members of the press saw the two-hour show featuring Earl Van Dyke and his Orchestra, the Spinners, Gladys Knight and the Pips, Willie Tyler and Lester, Chris Clark, and Diana Ross and the Supremes.
Berry Gordy, Jr., Motown president, spoke before the show. He credited Smokey Robinson, a company vice-president as well as artist, for urging him to establish a national company with the release of the Miracles’ “Way Over There.” He also remembered his late sister Lucy Wakefield as a creative force in the company.
Gordy pointed out that Motown demonstrated that “people of all races not only can but do work together to achieve heights previously limited by lack of understanding.”
Education Key
He also stated that the racial gap can be bridged by education. “I mean complete education,” Gordy continued. “Educating the black about the black, Educating the white about the white. Educating the black about the white and educating the white about the black.”
The entire convention proceeded smoothly. On Friday night, Hal B. Cook, publisher of Billboard, gave the opening speech of the meetings. END
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(Information and news source: Billboard; September 9, 1967)
TEMPTATIONS’ MOTOWN ACT ENTHRALLS COPA CROWD. . . APRIL 19, 1969
From the MCRFB NEWS archive: 1969
Temptations a Polished Music-Making Machine
NEW YORK — The pleasure, pride and drama of steamrolling into the Copacabana last Thursday, April 10, with their million-sellers yielding to their million-sellers and hit albums crowding the current chart tops now belongs to Detroit’s own Motown Temptations, that relentless soul-to-gold hit machine, whose polish can be witnessed in person or can be researched in sneakers anytime on their fine album, “The Temptations Live At The Copa.”
Flashing their synchronized soul bursts, the quintet collaged their greatest hits into a picture of perpetual motions, striking the heights of excitement with “I Could Never Love Another,” “I’m Gonna Make You Love Me” and “I’m Losing You.” The crunching soul snarl of Dennis Edwards, melting into the sensitive notes and high cries of Eddie Kendricks, fluently eased into the chords given off by Paul Williams with his rendition of “For Once In My Life.”
The electrifying acts’ finality became even more crowd enthralled when Mel Franklin took the microphone by complimenting the staged event with his moving bass reading of “Old Man River.” The song had been previously entwined in the group’s indelible trademark ever since Motown released the Tempts Detroit Roostertail “live” performance LP in 1967.
The versatility and timeless popularity of the Temps has made them music makers as big as the music they have shaped themselves, a brand of music which is without question, still on top pulsating the rhythmic heartbeat of a nation dancing to Detroit’s Motown soul today. END
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(Information and news source: Billboard; April 19, 1969)
DETROIT MOTOWN SOUND CAPTURES WINDY CITY . . . MAY 4, 1963
From the MCRFB news archives:
Chicago Motown Stay Proves Huge Success For Berry Gordy’s Detroit Hit Makers
CHICAGO — These days mention personal appearance tours in the Windy City and the name of the Tamla-Motortown Review is sure to crop up. The 10-act bill opened in Chicago’s Regal Theater last week for the first of a series of appearances that will last into June. It’s been strictly SRO (standing room only) all week, so much so, if fact, that the Regal changed from a three to four-show-per-day policy. Tamla-Motown has so much success during the past year with its tour that in September the review will be broken into three separate shows, each featuring several of the tour’s top stars plus some new Tamla-Motown talent.
Meanwhile in other current Motown news, Martha Reeves and the Vandellas will break with their first album this week. It includes their big single hit, “Come And Get These Memories,” while the Miracles celebrate their fifth year together with an anniversary album that includes some of their early hits, many of which are nigh impossible to get: “Bad Girl,” “Get A Job” and “I Need Some Money,” they are three of the best.
May is birthday month at Tamla-Motown. Sandra Brown is first up on the third, Billie Jean Brown follows on the 12th. Mary Wells and Barney Ales, Tamla-Motown vice-president, both share the 13th., and Gladys Horton, lead singer of the Marvelettes, will wind up the month with one on the 30th.
Most of the Tamla-Motown group were in Chicago to catch the Regal opening. Berry Gordy, Jr., made it back just in time from his European tour which ended last month. . . . Billie Jean Brown and Sandra Edwards, together with Billie Jean’s mother, Mrs. Angie M. Brown, tours the city’s sights, stopping in for a fast hello and luncheon with a Billboard magazine reporter. Incidentally, Billie Jean and Sandra are the two girls who did “Camelwalk” by the Beljeans on Gordy last September. END.
(Information and news source: Billboard; May 4, 1963).
