Line #60 Creator/Motown


1	[[quoteright:340:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/motown_50th.jpeg]]
2	[[caption-width-right:340:An image celebrating the label's golden anniversary in 2009.]]
3
4	->''"Once upon a time in a kingdom known as UsefulNotes/{{Detroit}}, there lived a young warrior named Berry … [who] took on the ways of the minstrel, and he began to write songs for others to sing. And a local celebrity, Sir Jackie of Wilson, heard some of the songs and put them on circular platters called “discs.” And the townspeople liked the sounds that emanated from the pressed discs, and turned them into something called “hits.” … So Berry went out on a great quest, and he found Miracles and [[Music/StevieWonder Wonders]] and Marvelettes. And he brought the discoveries to a secret place called Hitsville, and there he taught them wondrous things. There was young Smokey of Robinson, and Mary of Welles, and Martha of the Vandellas. [[Music/MarvinGaye Marvin of the Gaye]] and Tammi of Terrell. And there were Pips and [[Music/GladysKnight Knights named Gladys]]. And [[Music/TheTemptations Temptations]] and [[Music/FourTops Tops]], Contours and Spinners. And before anyone realized what was happening, it happened: Hitsville became like its name."''
5	-->-- '''Creator/RichardPryor''', ''[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KPTRVCuatvw Motown 25 Special]]''
6
7	After a successful stint writing for Jackie Wilson, UsefulNotes/{{Detroit}}-based songwriter Berry Gordy decided that there was more money to be made in the music business as a producer than as a songwriter. Taking out a loan, he founded the Tamla Records label and started signing local talent. Following up early successes with the creation of the Hitsville USA studio, Gordy started a second label to supplement Tamla. Its name was a portmanteau of the Detroit nickname, "Motor City" or "Motown". From there, Tamla Motown (along with such associated labels as Gordy, Soul, and V.I.P.) went out to conquer the world of pop.
8
9	This American record company had a huge impact on popular music in general and {{Soul}} in particular, so much so that it was revived in 2011 after operating under the Creator/RepublicRecords umbrella for six years; it's noted for a number of reasons. First and foremost is the "Motown sound", which was developed primarily by company session group the Funk Brothers; this was characterized by tambourine-accented percussion, melodic bass lines, gospel-influenced call and response singing and lush string arrangements. The Motown sound was highly influential on subsequent artists, especially those of UsefulNotes/TheBritishInvasion.
10
11	Second, Motown labels were noted for their factory-like production process. Berry Gordy was very keen to see black musicians getting into the upper reaches of the pop charts, so songs were tailored with crossover appeal in mind. Much of the production work was centered around staff songwriters and songwriting teams, the most famous of which was Holland-Dozier-Holland. New tunes were written during the week and then presented at Gordy's quality-control meetings on Fridays, where they were played in a sequence of the top five singles of that week. If Gordy felt that the song lacked promise, he wielded an executive veto. It could be overcome only by artists with enough clout and determination, mostly famously when Music/MarvinGaye butted heads with Gordy over the socially-conscious song "Music/WhatsGoingOn", which proved a critically hailed smash hit when Gaye got his way and had it published.
12
13	Finally, Motown was famous for the sheer number of hugely successful acts they signed. At one time or another, Music/MarvinGaye, Music/StevieWonder, [[Music/MichaelJackson Michael]] [[Music/TheJacksonFive Jackson]], Music/LionelRichie, Music/BoyzIIMen and Music/RickJames were artists signed to one of Gordy's Motown labels, while famous acts from the glory days of the label like Music/TheTemptations, the Music/FourTops, Music/TheSupremes, Smokey Robinson and the Miracles, and Martha Reeves and the Vandellas quickly became HouseholdNames.
14
15	The early years of the label, and the career of Music/TheSupremes in particular, were the inspiration for the musical and movie ''Theatre/{{Dreamgirls}}''. The long-overlooked contribution of The Funk Brothers is illustrated in the documentary/concert film, ''Standing In The Shadows Of Motown''.
16
17	!!Motown performers with Website/TVTropes pages:
18	[[index]]
19	* Music/The5thDimension
20	* Music/{{Akon}} +
21	* Music/{{B5}}
22	* Music/ErykahBadu
23	* Music/{{Babyface}}
24	* Creator/DrakeBell +
25	* Music/BlueOctober +
26	* Music/ToniBraxton
27	* Music/BustaRhymes +
28	* Music/BoyzIIMen
29	* Creator/BillCosby
30	* Music/DJKhaled +
31	* Music/{{Drake}} +
32	* Music/FourTops
33	* Music/MarvinGaye
34	* Creator/KevinHart (as Chocolate Droppa)
35	* Music/TheIsleyBrothers
36	* Music/MichaelJackson (switched to Creator/EpicRecords in 1979)
37	* Music/TheJacksonFive
38	* Music/RickJames
39	* Music/{{Jojo}} +
40	* Music/KidCudi +
41	* UsefulNotes/MartinLutherKingJr (Motown/Gordy released two albums of King's speeches, ''The Great March to Freedom'' in 1963 and the posthumous ''...Free at Last'' in 1968)
42	* Music/MeatLoaf
43	* Music/LilWayne +
44	* Creator/LindsayLohan +
45	* Music/GladysKnight and the Pips
46	* Music/NickiMinaj +
47	* Music/{{Nelly}} +
48	* Music/NeYo (appointed Motown's Senior VP of A&R in 2012)
49	* Music/LionelRichie
50	* Music/KellyRowland +
51	* Music/TheSupremes
52	* Music/TheTemptations
53	* Music/FrankieValliAndTheFourSeasons
54	* {{Creator/Vanity}}
55	* Creator/BruceWillis
56	* Music/StevieWonder
57	[[/index]]
58
59	[=+=] Signed with the now-defunct Universal Motown incarnation that existed from 2005 to 2011
60
61	!!Tropes:
62	* AlbumFiller: Motown was notorious for releasing albums which were essentially hit singles surrounded by cover songs. This policy prompted Music/MarvinGaye to record the ConceptAlbum ''Music/WhatsGoingOn''.
63	* BoyBand: The Four Tops, the Temptations, and the Jackson 5 are among the earliest examples.
64	* TheChessmaster: Berry Gordy.
65	* ChristmasSongs: Plenty of their artists released Christmas singles and albums over the years.
66	* ClassicallyTrainedExtra: That lush string sound? Provided by moonlighting members of the Detroit Symphony Orchestra.
67	* CoverVersion: Songs were often covered by different artists within the company. Marvin Gaye's version of "I Heard It Through the Grapevine", for example, wasn't even the first one recorded.
68	* EarlyBirdCameo: "Does Your Mama Know About Me?" by Bobby Taylor & The Vancouvers, produced by Berry Gordy himself, was a standard 1968 sweet Motown ballad. It was co-written by the band's guitarist, [[Creator/CheechAndChong Tommy Chong]].
69	* GirlGroup: Music/TheSupremes were the most successful, achieving nine number one hits and becoming arguably the second biggest pop group in the world next to Music/TheBeatles during the 1960s. Others included the Marvelettes and Martha Reeves and the Vandellas.
70	* GreatestHitsAlbum: Lots and lots of them. In fact, it's possible that they've released more of these than any other label.
71	* IdolSinger: [[TropeCodifier Codified the idea]] of this style of pop singer long before it reached Japan. Gordy recruited many singers from local bands, churches, and youth groups in the Detroit area, and sent them to finishing school in order to clean up their images for the public.
72	* LeadBassist:
73	** James Jamerson, routinely considered one of the best bass players in history whose highly complex and dynamic basslines typically carried the melody.
74	** Jamerson's essential replacement, Bob Babbitt, also fits this trope, as he was the go-to bassist for Motown producer Norman Whitfield.
75	** This even applied to cases where Motown outsourced their music. Most of the Jackson 5's hits were recorded in Los Angeles, but Wilton Felder's bass work was very much in line with what Jamerson and Babbitt had done.
76	* MusicIsPolitics: Taking into account Gordy's iron-handed control over the company, Motown was absolutely awash with this. For example, Diana Ross was never thought of as the best singer in the Supremes, but she ''was'' the most marketable as a leader, so she was brought to the front and given the big solo push when the group broke up.
77	** It was noted by Berry Gordy, while he worked at a local music store, [[SlobsVersusSnobs that jazz music sold far less than pop music]]. Gordy, keen to make an R&B/pop crossover style that appealed to whites and blacks, with a sophistication and elegance not usually found in R&B but not too sophisticated or uncommercial that it would alienate pop audiences ("[[ThreeChordsAndTheTruth Don't Bore Us, Get To The Chorus]]" was reputedly a popular motto of his when auditioning new songs), insisted that the Funk Brothers ''not'' play anything too jazzy. As the Funk Brothers were jazz musicians determined not to become too bored playing formulaic pop-R&B, and as Berry often kept the musicians interested by promising them they could make jazz music at some point and time, the musicians were limited by what they could play, but often did their best to sneak jazz into their accompaniment without Berry losing his patience with them. One might classify the "Motown Sound" as a compromise between the two worlds, to some degree. This, along with the sociopolitically charged/uncompromised lyrical content, might explain Gordy's hesitance to allow concept albums like ''[[Music/StevieWonder Music of My Mind]]'' and ''Music/WhatsGoingOn'' to be released. [[note]]Gordy did give jazz another try with the short-lived Workshop Jazz label, which was established in part to give the musicians a chance to decompress by playing their beloved jazz and releasing it under their own names. However, few of the core Funk Brothers got a chance to do so due to the label's shortlivedness; Gordy had once again found out the hard way that jazz didn't sell.[[/note]]
78	** Equally, though Gordy cultivated a strong, independent black image for the label, he established a grooming system for his artists which instructed them on how to "properly" look, act, walk, talk, dance, and conduct themselves, partly so as not to alienate the pre-Civil Rights movement white market and the older black market he hoped to entertain. He also tried to incorporate universal themes in the lyrics and images, and was reluctant to allow blatant racial or political statements in Motown music (or overtly, militantly black musical styles or imagery) for many years.
79	* NewMediaAreEvil: They were infamously slow to embrace [=CDs=] in TheEighties, figuring they wouldn't overtake vinyl. They were similarly dismissive of music videos as well in the same time frame.
80	* TheRival:
81	** Creator/StaxRecords qualified stylistically, because it specialized in tougher, harder-edged soul music in contrast to the more commercial pop sound produced by Motown. Ironically, although Stax specialized in music that sounded more "black" than what Motown offered, the label was actually owned by a white businessman, Jim Stewart, and featured several white musicians, including ace guitarist Steve Cropper and bassist Donald "Duck" Dunn, on its recordings (both featured in ''Film/TheBluesBrothers''), not to mention distributing Music/BigStar through its rock subsidiary, Ardent.
82	** Creator/AtlanticRecords, a New York-based jazz and blues label (and erstwhile Stax distributor) which eventually released other genres such as [[RockMusic rock]] and [[CountryMusic country]], is another commonly cited rival.
83	* SignatureStyle: The Motown sound was extremely distinctive, with minimal guitar (often solely textural), highly complex and melodic basslines that almost invariably took a lead role, a call-and-response vocal structure, lush string sections, and a steady backbeat with prominent tambourine accents. In general, the style focused much less on groove than the Stax and Atlantic artists, and was heavily driven by melody.
84	* SillyLoveSongs: They came to specialize in an eloquent, rhapsodic version of these, with [[Music/TheTemptations "My Girl"]] probably being the epitome.
85	* SpotlightStealingSquad: They inevitably overshadow all other R&B and soul music recorded in TheSixties. This was particularly true when it came to '60s-focused oldies radio stations. At least one station actually used "Motown, Soul, and Rock 'n' Roll" as a slogan.

Context Creator / Motown