602 Marvin Gaye - Midnight Love (1982)

 602 Marvin Gaye - Midnight Love (1982)

Studio Album - Soul


About the Act:

Marvin Gaye was the son of a rather unpleasant Pentecostal minister, also called Marvin, who beat him, and had him sing in church from an early age. He obviously had singing talent and his mother encouraged him into a musical career. He started in 1957 in a vocal quartet called the Marquees, who then became Harvey and the New Moonglows, who worked as session singers until 1960. Marvin then worked as a session musician for a while, mostly on drums, it would seem. After Gaye had performed at the house of Berry Gordy, president of Motown, Berry bought Gaye's contract from Tri-Phi records and signed him to subsidiary Tamla. In a couple of years he started to have success as a singer.

He recorded 17 solo albums, and a further 6 collaborate albums with singers Mary Wells, Kim Weston, Tammi Terell and Diana Ross, in turn. He married Berry Gordi's older sister Anna in 1963. In 1966 Denise Gordy, Anna's niece, gave birth to Marvin's son, Marvin III, whom Anna soon adopted. Anna and Marvin separated in 1973 and divorced in 1977. He married Janis Hunter in 1977, but they were separated in 1979 and divorced in 1981. 

Marvin was killed, one day before his 45th birthday, shot by his father during an argument.

He has been hugely successful and is regarded as one of the foundational acts of Motown Soul.

About the Album:

This was Marvin's seventeenth and last studio album. It was recoded significantly using a synthesizer and a drum machine, but with the addition of several "real" instruments, including significantly brass. It was recorded at a time when Marvin had just split with Motown, over frustration over the way they edited his previous album, and at a time when he was struggling with drug addiction.

My History with this Album:

None.

Review:

Synthesisers and drum machines are tools, and in fact musical instruments. Like any musical instrument, they take skill to be used well. This album has a distinctive sound because it is drenched in synth (a Jupiter 8) and drum machine (the legendary Roland TR-808). These sounds were making significant inroads in pop in general, and soul in particular. Funk, disco, Kraftwerk, The Human League, Gary Numan, there was an explosion of synth technology and music using it. It was really easy to make something basic, and much of it sounds dated now. This album somehow blends these sounds with more traditional "real" instruments and makes the whole thing sound.. well, alive. 

I lived through the synth revolution, as an avid music listener in my teens, and much of what I listened to was Rock. I remember Queen proudly proclaiming on their album sleeves "no synthesizers" (this was before "Hot Space"), and I remember the general attitude of dismissing things as "synth rubbish". I also remember having conversations in which I would support the music of Jean Michel Jarre and Isao Tomita, and give the opinion that synths could be used well. I probably, at the time, would not have been that impressed with this album.

I am now. I'm not that impressed by the lyrics, it's mostly fairly pappy soul stuff. I know the well-known "sexual healing" is a classic, but I've always been a bit suspicious of it as a song, as I could see it being used to pressurise girls who are not ready. Turn on some music has an interesting idea behind it. There is a mixture here mostly of seductive and sexy soul with a bit of religion thrown in. 

The singing is excellent, soulful and effortless. Nicely done that man. The music is a mix of all sorts of things, most of which I think of as soul, but there are touches of reggae and funk in here too. The funk element will always win me over. The soul element is not soul-less, which is where soul was going in the early 80s - helped along, it seems to me, by the machines that make sounds. Somehow, and I think it's quite subtle, this album escapes that, by making good use of the technology. The overall sound is very produced, and slick, but there is a subtlety of feeling behind it, and a richness of sound, that I found quite attractive.

So I enjoyed it. This is far from my favourite kind of music, but I found it pleasant listening. If this was my home turf musically I could contemplate thinking it was a masterpiece, and grudgingly, I think that means that I do think that. It is well-crafted, that's the bottom line. Very well crafted. Musically. And vocally.

7.7/10


Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/album/3gPlX9Zs3tXZZKNCyoOkSm

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLWoDjyMxQPYhgkTTly2tS2wLIurVZmRIY

Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Midnight_Love



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