Hitsville USA The Motown Singles Collection 1959-1971
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Free Music Notes for Hitsville USA The Motown Singles Collection 1959-1971
Free Music Review: A Genius Named Gordy
Hit: 5 Stars
I'm a die-hard vinyl man and still consider myself so in my heart. However, November 1992 rolled around and I caught a review of this set in the Washington Post (how we learned things before the Internet, children) by Richard Harrington on Nov. 8, 1992.With this, I finally had to capitulate, and start dropping the pointed hints that I wanted a CD player that coming Christmas. What cinched things was the information that this set comprised all original MONO single versions of 104 Motown titles. It was the only thing that made it worth it to now deal with music that slid into a drawer, and you couldn't 'watch' playing. I've not regretted it.
Is it perfect? No -despite my five stars. What's here is fantastic. There's a clear purpose in the selections to include many lesser-known hits (Elgins, Monitors, Shorty Long, Carolyn Crawford). But there's the equally clear drive to rein-in the set from becoming top heavy with Supremes. The first effort is sincerely laudable, the second lamentable.
"Where Did Our Love Go," is the June 1964 release that made the Supremes a household word, and put the group and the company on the map. If necessary, even "Come See About Me" should have been dropped for "Where" its as essential as "My Girl," "Heat Wave," "Shop Around" or "Please Mr. Postman."
But it's only the beginning where missing Supremes are concerned - number 1's like "Back In My Arms Again," "I Hear A Symphony," You Keep Me Hangin' On," and even their signature "Stop! In The Name Of Love" are not included here.
The 104 songs that are, are flawlessly presented and sound as wonderful as the first time you placed the virgin 45 of any of them on a turntable. So the entire set is indeed recommended without hesitation - it just should have gone to about six discs instead of four.
The finest description I've read of Berry Gordy's ultimate contribution to American art is "the building of a musical Mt. Rushmore in Detroit." And the awe he struck in the hearts and souls (not to mention ears) of baby-boomers on up, has failed to dim. I understand Mr. Gordy is over 70 today, and copes with high blood pressure. Now, who do we lobby to see that he's among the group of honorees at the next Kennedy Center Honors?
Free Music Review: Fascinating look at sixties Motown
Hit: 5 Stars
This boxed set of Motown's early years leaves out a lot of obvious songs, which leaves room for a lot of wonderful songs that you don't normally hear, but which are well worth a listen. My favorite of the four CD's here is the first, containing many of the early classics that were huge hits in America but not in Britain, where Motown was slow to catch on. Only My guy, Dancing in the street and Baby love, near the end of this CD, were major hits in the UK for the original Motown artists, though other songs became UK hits via cover versions. This CD is particularly notable for several classic songs by the Marvelettes, Martha and the Vandellas, the Miracles and Mary Wells, though Stevie Wonder, the Four Tops, the Temptations and Marvin Gaye are also represented here by early examples of their greatness.
The second and third CD's show Motown at the peak of their power with many classic songs included, although Diana Ross and the Supremes are poorly represented and plenty of other classics are also omitted. However, the absence of these songs leaves room to include songs by Chris Clark, Kim Weston, Brenda Holloway, the Contours, the Monitors, the Elgins, Shorty Long, Rita Wright (better known as Syreeta) and Bobby Taylor.
The final CD contains more high quality music but it was around this time that Motown started to slip as some of their stars departed to other labels and the replacements were not always of the same standard. So the final CD is great, but the first three are even better.
A companion boxed set covering the years from 1972 is also available. There are great songs on there too but not as many as can be found here.
This box is well presented with a superb booklet, but if you want a sixties hits collection, there are many other collections that will suit you better. For the ultimate Motown sixties hits collection, I recommend the British triple CD, Motown gold, which contains over eighty songs digitally re-mastered, almost all of them classics, though a few were hits in Britain but not America.
Free Music Review: A great cornerstone to any classic pop/rock collection
Hit: 5 Stars
When this box set was originally released, it was something of a godsend. Each CD is packed with over 74 minutes of great Motown tracks, digitally remastered from the original master tapes used for the original mono single mixes (just as they came out of the radio back then). I don't really need to tell you how great this music is; everyone who isn't cut off from American music has enjoyed this stuff through some form of the media. What's especially nice about this set is the number of minor, obscure hits presented, which is just as good as the classic material.This is a great place to start a classic pop/rock collection, and I stress that this set is a great PRIMER. There are plenty of essential Motown classics that were left out due to space constraints, particularly hits by the Miracles, Marvin Gaye, The Temptations, and the Supremes ("Where Did Our Love Go," "Stop! In The Name Of Love," and "Back In My Arms Again" are missing among many others). Luckily, these songs are widely available in various single CD, double CD, and box set anthologies, and any of these, depending on your tastes, will fill the gaps just fine.
At the time of its release, this box set sounded better than every previous Motown CD, but in recent years, Motown has reissued much of this material in anthologies that feature clearer sounding stereo mixes as well as slightly better sounding mono mixes. Audiophiles may prefer the definition and higher fidelity of the stereo mixes, but there's something about the punchiness of these mixes that make them preferable to me, particularly on the percussion sound.
Free Music Review: Great Motown Collection for Great Price
Hit: 5 Stars
JULY 2008 REVIEW: I purchased this particular box set a little over a month ago, and I must say: it does NOT disappoint. You really can't complain; although the box set was released several years ago, and therefore the early 1990's CD mastering here isn't necessarily as strong and powerful sounding as a 2008 mastering might be, the tracks presented here are bright and clear. Approximately 100 tracks fill out this 4-CD box set, and most of the songs are winners. And they are presented here in their original mono sound mixes as originally released (an apparent problem for some reviewers here, but I had no issue with it; the songs sound the same as they always have). I was certainly surprised upon listening, track after track, that I was familiar with almost every song on the set. And this many songs for the price!?! Right now, you really can't beat it.
I am very aware of the new MOTOWN box sets chronicling every "single" released over the years ("The Complete Singles Collection-1967" for example), but at roughly 100 bucks each, those exhaustive sets are very pricey and really only for hardcore Motown fans (and I for one would love to collect all of those sets one day, but purchasing the entire 1960's collection would run over one thousand dollars!!).
With this box set, of course everything cannot be represented, but a 100+ song collection for (as of now) 35 bucks is a real bargain for a casual fan looking for a basic overall Motown song experience.
Free Music Review: Greatest box set EVER
Hit: 5 Stars
Motown doesn't get the respect that, say Atlantic or Stax/Volt got in the 60s; "not black enough", whatever that's supposed to mean, is the usual criticism from Rock Snobs. They just miss the point.
This box has the greatest dance music ever made, thanks to the immortal rhythm section of Benny Benjamin and James Jamerson. If the songs don't make you get up, then you must be dead.
Oh, the songs... well you know most of them by heart. You do, don't you? "Money", "Shop Around", "Baby Love"... heck I knew over 80 out of the 104 songs before I bought this. Holland/Dozier/Holland and Smokey Robinson wrote the bulk of them, cranking out hit after hit like Detroit used to crank out Thunderbirds.
As for the artists, it's still amazing that ONE LABEL had the Supremes, Temptations, Four Tops, Martha & the Vandellas, Stevie Wonder, Marvin Gaye. And even they didn't get all the best songs. Jimmy Ruffin's "What Becomes of the Brokenhearted" is THE saddest song in the world and one of the greatest.
Now I'm sure some of you out there are holding back because every song's in mono. Well that's how records were made back then, for AM radio. All you have to do is crank up the volume and be prepared to be blown away by some of the most propulsive music ever captured for the ages.