What’s Going On Entry

Prior to the recording of What’s Going On, Marvin Gaye was considered a sex symbol and an American R&B sensation. His work was mainly consisted of strong passionate love ballads with heart-felt lyrics. Now in 1970 a close friend of Marvin’s, Tammi Terrell died as a result of a brain tumor which was an extremely emotional time for him where he insisted that he would no longer record duets with any other female performer nor was he going to perform on stage again since the incident. However June 1^st 1970 he returned to Hitsville to record the song “What’s Going On”, which was inspired by Marvin’s brother and his experiences in the Vietnam War. Co-writer Renaldo “Obie” Benson of the Four Tops also played a major role in the input of the song with his own experiences of police brutality against anti-war protesters in San Francisco. However Motown CEO Berry Gordy was not as enthusiastic about releasing the song, afraid that it could interfere with Marvin’s image as a sex symbol, and after many meetings and even some very heated debates between Motown and Marvin, Berry Gordy eventually gave in certain that it would flop. Now one of the main differences between this album and other R&B albums at this time would be its socially standing in society and the viewpoints that were hit on from the lyrics of the album. It was a very risky call for Marvin to make due to the fact that he did not have much support from his label and was pretty much taking a shot out on his own. It was amongst the first soul albums to touch on such social concerns such as environmentalism, political corruption, drug abuse and the war, and was known as the first soul concept album due to the structure of the songs leading into the next. This album left me with an impression that even though socially driven music may not appear popular, its really exactly what people want to hear because it’s the issues that they deal with on a day to day basis and to hear someone else touch and relate on those topics is a sure way to generate a large mass of people behind the cause and that is what this album was for people at that time.