Mellowing Motown Out

MOOD MUSIC FOR A NEW GENERATION

Norman Whitfield might have been intrigued by it. Mary Wells might have found it difficult to listen to. And for a moment, Smokey Robinson might not even recognise his own voice.

      Such are the challenges and contradictions of LoTown Vol. 2.

      This is the latest assembly of Motown classics to have been given the lo-fi remix treatment. The nine tracks were released last month through digital streaming services by way of Universal Music’s uChill channel. For those of you familiar with LoTown Vol. 1, which arrived last September, the vibe is similar and the result is, once again, not your father’s Motown – nor yours, if you’re of a certain age.

      To quote respected British broadcaster, DJ and soul aficionado Richard Searling: “It’s one of the strangest things I’ve ever heard.” He adds, “It’s a bit like a nightmare for those of us who relate to the warmth of Motown. It’s got a certain charm, though, and may well resonate with a younger audience.”

      And that’s primarily the point: to have these LoTown remixes connect with a younger crowd of music listeners, and to help keep the Motown legacy current and interesting.

      But let’s return to Whitfield, Wells and Robinson for a moment. Mondo Loops’ lo-fi treatment of the Temptations’ “Papa Was A Rolling Stone” takes down the temperature and the tempo (not to mention the running time) and turns Dennis Edwards’ vocal into a lower, slower cameo appearance. Miles Medina’s reshaping of “My Guy” locks Mary into a cupboard, to judge by the sound of her voice, and renders the singer vulnerable rather than blessed. “The Tracks Of My Tears” – another Mondo Loops remix – sends Robinson’s normally-recognisable tones down several keys, and, by submerging them below an icy piano, makes the song more melancholy than tragic.

      “It was a challenge mellowing these out to fit the lo-fi style,” Mondo Loops (a/k/a music producer Antonio Vianello) told me, “but my approach was mostly to craft a chord progression around the vocals – then start chopping them up and finding sections I could sample into the beat. So in the case of ‘Papa Was A Rolling Stone,’ I came up with the piano to loosely fit the pitched-down vocals, and, from there, added vocal chops in.”

THE ORIGINS OF LO-FI

      In several respects, lo-fi is ambient music, wherein tone and atmosphere are as important as structure or melody. Lo-fi (for “low fidelity”) has been around since the 1950s, but it has really flourished over the past ten years on platforms such as YouTube, Spotify and Soundcloud. Millions are drawn to it as background music – to help students concentrate, for example. “By listening to Lo-fi music,” wrote one such student, Brenden Lutes, “you are helping the brain to focus. The brain picks out the differences in sound and in turn helps it get into a mindset of focus.” To a world working from home, that can be useful.

Lou Bartolini: manipulating but maintaining

      The LoTown project originated with former Spotify exec Tammas Wilner, now a senior member of Universal Music’s digital team in Los Angeles, and Jamie Ells, part of its commercial projects division in London. Wilner was tracking the so-called “lean-back” music genres, the diversity of sampling and how classic melodies kept reappearing in different forms. “So about a year ago,” he says, “I started thinking about trying to create a richer dialogue around these types of music, and bring classic catalogue into the mix. Motown was the obvious place to start.” A few seasonal tracks from Hitsville were initially used by uChill in a Christmas playlist.

      For LoTown, Wilner credits two of Universal Music’s California catalogue crew, A&R vice president Harry Weinger and A&R manager Rachael Simpson, with bringing the project to life. “I went to them with the original concept, and they went deep into the archives to source the best and brightest of Motown. They really wanted to give our producer on volume one, Lou Bartolini, a wide range of options. Obviously not all music works for this type of downtempo music, so it was not just about finding ten tracks, but about finding ten that really felt fundamentally they could have been the basis of li-fi – something that’s evolved over 40 or 50 years.”

      Bartolini (alias LOUALLDAY) began loading up the stems of the potential choices, and – as he explained last year – “then searched for those special moments in each song that I wanted to bring forward and highlight. For example, I thought that the background vocals and string arrangements of ‘Baby, I’m For Real’ by the Originals were incredible. Since I was able to isolate those aspects of the song, it allowed me to manipulate them while still maintaining the core elements of the original recording. We wanted to make sure the listener would be able to recognise the songs to some extent.”

‘HUMBLED’ BY THE PAST

      That’s easier with some than others. The Originals’ hit is obvious from the get-go, as is the Marvelettes’ “Please Mr. Postman,” but “Baby I Need Your Loving” bears little resemblance to the Four Tops’ original – which is not to say it’s unappealing. The lo-fi repetition of beats can be engaging on tracks like the Isley Brothers’ “This Old Heart Of Mine (Is Weak For You),” although the genre’s retuning of vocals can sometimes be infuriating, as in “Come See About Me,” where the Supremes sound like, well, the Chipmunks (a dated reference if ever there was one).

      “With the older songs,” said Bartolini, “it was surprising to me how much detail they were able to capture with only three tracks, especially when you get to see them broken out. The players just had to commit to the performances and balance of the mix, which is so much different than how we create music today. We have so much ability to edit and improve music after it’s recorded now, so it humbled me pretty damn hard to hear how good they were able to nail things without those post-production capabilities.”

      As Bartolini progressed, the adventure gained its LoTown identity. “That was a Harry Weinger special,” recalls Wilner. “Everyone who worked on this project genuinely smiles every single time we say the name. It’s funny, because it’s kind of like, ‘Oh, yeah, of course that’s what it’d be called.’ Simple, but elegant.”

      For the second volume, Bartolini was joined by other remixers, including Mondo Loops and Miles Medina. “Rachael [Simpson] and I worked together on finding the right producers,” Wilner says, “and then they had the opportunity to select the tracks they wanted to work on.” Mondo Loops adds, “Working on these old recordings isn’t always easy, as they drift timing-wise and have been isolated retrospectively, so aren’t perfect quality. But it’s great to reimagine these classics and there are so many more Motown and soul tracks I’d love to see sampled more.”

      That seems likely. LoTown Vol. 1 has racked up 6.2 million streams to date across all the digital platforms, and the second set is following in its footsteps. This Motown metamorphosis will be difficult for many of those who grew up with the classic Detroit sound, but to others, it evidently appeals. Now if we could just find out what, say, Smokey or Paul Riser thinks…