Inspiring Music Row
JOBETE’S JEWELS JOURNEY FROM DETROIT TO NASHVILLE
Eric Church isn’t someone you’d normally expect to break into classic Motown, but then again, this was Detroit.
The country music rebel was appearing at the city’s Little Caesars Arena a couple of years ago when he pivoted from his autobiographical “Mistress Named Music” into a medley of Hitsville’s finest, including “Where Did Our Love Go,” “My Girl,” “Signed, Sealed, Delivered (I’m Yours), “I’ll Be There” and even “Nightshift.”
OK, so Motown has been running through the veins of popular music for more than six decades now, but Church – sometimes described as country music’s middle finger – seems like an unlikely disciple. But as “Mistress Named Music” advises us, he started right: “I still remember Miss Bessie/Black, wrinkled fingers on ivory keys/Just five years old, my church shoes a dangling.”
Smokey and Dolly, knowing each other by hand and heart (photo: Bob Sebree)
Other stars and would-be stars of Nashville have been visiting 2648 West Grand metaphorically for years. Among them are household names (Dolly Parton, Ronnie Milsap, Tammy Wynette) and the delightfully obscure (Stacey Rowe, DeDe Upchurch, Sherry Brané), plus others you really wouldn’t expect: the (Dixie) Chicks delivering “You Can’t Hurry Love,” for instance, or Reba McEntire rendering “You Keep Me Hanging On.”
Hell, there’s even pre-Motown. Narvel Felts took “Lonely Teardrops” into the Top 5 of the Billboard’s Hot Country Singles chart in 1976. Berry Gordy and Billy Davis must have been delighted (and double-checked their royalty statements, I’d wager). Another such example: “To Be Loved” by Ronnie McDowell in 1991.
So welcome, y’all, to a quick study of Motown’s past and present Music Row connections. And this is aside from the firm’s attempts to corral that market with the Mel-O-Dy imprint in the early 1960s, and with its younger label cousins, Melodyland, Hitsville and MC, in the ’70s. (You can read more about that adventure here.)
The Motown-made superstar with the most country music credentials is Lionel Richie. At the sun-up of his solo career, he worked with one of the genre’s biggest names, Kenny Rogers, writing and producing five – count ’em, five – consecutive Top 10 country hits for him. One of those, “Lady,” also ruled the Billboard Hot 100 in 1980, and Richie later performed the song in Nashville on the Country Music Association’s annual awards show. (On Rogers’ Share Your Love album, one Richie-created track, “Goin’ Back To Alabama,” included Michael Jackson on background vocals.)
Several of Richie’s songs with the Commodores were country flavoured, of course, so it was no surprise when covers of “Three Times A Lady” charted for Nate Harvel (1978) and Conway Twitty (1984). Others which did the same were Barry Kaye’s version of “Still,” and Tom Grant’s “Sail On.”
Tammy invited Smokey inside these ‘Walls’
The ultimate country music triumph for Richie came long after he quit Motown, however. His 2012 album, Tuskegee, was a million-selling barn-load of duets with Willie Nelson (“Easy”), Shania Twain, Little Big Town, Tim McGraw (“Sail On”), Rascal Flatts (“Dancing On The Ceiling”) and Kenny Chesney, among others. There was talk of a second volume, but nothing has materialised so far – and Richie’s closing on Stevie Wonder for the length of time between albums.
The country acts drawn to Jobete copyrights were most probably attracted by the strength of individual songs as well as their familiarity. The Holland/Dozier/Holland catalogue was inviting to the likes of the Dixie Chicks and Reba McEntire, cited above, as well as Helen Cornelius (“Where Did Our Love Go”), Gary Stewart (more on him in a moment), Trisha Lynn and Billy Hill (both charted with “I Can’t Help Myself”) and the Forester Sisters (“Back In My Arms Again”). Equally comfortable in the company of Nashville performers was the work of Smokey Robinson. “My Guy” was a Top 50 country hit for Margo Smith in 1980, while Mickey Gilley’s “You’ve Really Got A Hold On Me” rode to No. 2 on that chart in 1984. The previous decade, Tanya Tucker’s sister, La Costa, roped in “I Second That Emotion,” and the late Penny DeHaven wrapped her voice around “I’ll Be Doggone.” Savannah sang “My Girl,” as did the inimitable Dolly Parton, re-gendering it as “My Love” in 1977.
Ten years on, Parton and Robinson duetted on “I Know You By Heart” (not a song of his) for her album Rainbow, which also included a version of “Two Lovers.” Always partial to the ladies, Smokey recorded “I Second That Emotion” with another Nashville queen, Tammy Wynette, for her 1994 album, Without Walls.
Gary Stewart: singing ‘the living hell’ out of H/D/H (he used the name Mowtown on his union contract)
During the relatively short period that Motown had its own country music labels in Nashville, several of the acts polished Jobete jewels, including “I Can’t Help Myself” (T.G. Sheppard), “Yester-Me, Yester-You, Yesterday” (Pat Boone, Marty Mitchell), “You Are The Sunshine Of My Life” (Mitchell) and “Baby I Need Your Loving” (E.D. Wofford). Then, in 1985, the company opened its own Jobete Music subsidiary on Music Row, headed by vice president Roger Gordon.
“Gordon has supervised the creation of a new set of demos,” reported Billboard, “recutting old label hits to present them to country/pop users.” Some years earlier, music publishing executive Henry Hurt had conjured up a similar idea, and recruited Gary Stewart to record the remakes. Reputedly for a $30 fee, the honky-tonk singer cut “Baby I Need Your Loving,” “Yester-Me, Yester-You, Yesterday” and “I Can’t Help Myself.”
In 2018, Stewart’s long-lost takes on the first two of those tracks were released in the U.S. on Record Store Day by Nashville’s Delmore Recording, in tribute to the late singer. “This could have been just a generic male vocal in a country style demo,” Delmore founder Mark Linn told Rolling Stone, “but Gary sang the living hell out of these three songs.”
Whoever the singer, whenever the time, whatever the style, Motown’s songs can motivate in that manner. “Always, no matter what genre you’re in, diversity usually leads to some breakthrough things,” said Eric Church, the country music rebel who diversified into Motown on that Detroit stage. “That’s what you want. That’s what you’re trying to inspire.”
Music notes: it’s tough to lasso all the country covers of Motown originals, but the latest West Grand playlist makes a start (my thanks to Ken Barnes and Alan Warner for their help). It’s surprising that some major-label tracks don’t appear to be on streaming services, such as Conway Twitty’s “Three Times A Lady” or Helen Cornelius’ “Where Did Our Love Go.” Then again, nothing of Motown’s own Melodyland and Hitsville labels seems to be available on digital service providers, either, not even T.G. Sheppard’s original hits (you can locate re-recordings). And while there’s plenty of Nashville piano king Floyd Cramer to be found digitally, it doesn’t include his version of “You Are The Sunshine Of My Life.” Shame.