Time out from the end of the world

I've been thinking about Levi Stubbs since last night. Levi Stubbs, the man, I mean. Before that, I confess, I never had at all. Part of the problem, I think, is that those Motown ensembles were sold as trademarked brands and there were so many crowding for shelf space.

Stubbs was 72 when he died in Detroit. He no longer had a booking agent or a manager.  Friends and family were impossible to find. The Wayne County medical examiner confirmed they had taken a report. The cause? He was sick for a long time. Beyond that, no one seems to know.

His cousin was Jackie Wilson. His brother fronted a band. And from the time the early 1950s until the mid-1990s, he toured and sang with the same three friends from high school: a decade of low-paying nightclub gigs, overnight, wild success in the mid-1960s and then a long retrospective wind-down through community centers and casinos. Beyond that, I don't know.

You think you know his voice from the Four Tops out in front of a string of hits tuned for AM radio and packaged by the Motown machine. (This is known as the "Rumours" fallacy.)

But here's a serious plea: listen again. I'm not saying drop what you're doing and listen again. But listen again to the great, sad voice of Levi Stubbs as I've been doing this morning. Because all you need to know is there.

Start, say, with "Baby, I Need Your Loving," the first collaboration with Holland-Dozier-Holland in 1964. 

Digression based on something I just learned: Johnny "Secret Agent Man" Rivers, a white singer, covered this in 1967 and felt comfortable enough to drop the final "g" --- as in "Lovin." A lot had apparently changed in just three years, because Motown, in 1964, gives white America the full, fresh, minty gerund.

In the end, there's no need, because there's not going to be any hanky-panky. This is not really a love song when Stubbs gets done with it; it's not even a failed plea. He's never getting the girl. The chorus flattens and simplifies to a chugging pulse: "I need you and I want you. I need you and I love you." 

And that builds to this line for Stubbs: "This loneliness inside, makes me feel half-alive." Clearly that's written to suggest an American Everyman out alone in his car desperate to get right with his girl. Or maybe he's with his girl and singing along off key, just trying to be charming enough to get some. Let's acknowledge that without music like this I would not be here. And I am not alone.

But here's the thing. When I'm listening to Stubbs sing it just now, it sounds more like he's holding onto his loneliness hard. It sounds like being half alive is better than the alternative, which qualifies as creepy in a pop song. Before you know what's happening he's subverted the lyric. Baby's gone. Baby's never coming back.

Or take the song popularly known as "Sugar Pie Honey Bunch" and wrapped up in that instantly addictive melody and swaddled in strings and horns. The full title starts "I Can't Help Myself..." and that's the message of Stubbs' voice. He's not gleeful or winking either. "No, no..." He's almost shouting. Forget the sweet talk, this man can't help himself.

Last one: "Reach Out, I'll Be There" (1966). 

Four Tops signature song, biggest hit, impossibly catchy bass line. You've heard it countless times. But for a song about a man offering consolation and support, it's Stubbs who sounds inconsolable and desperate. Who can he be talking to? Is he drunk dialing? Whoever she is, I'm sure she's ready to dismiss this sweaty offer before it's even made. Call me in the morning.

And for a song where everything seems programmed and sonically scrubbed, there's one moment that comes alive. Stubbs, just before he obliges with the soaring chorus, lets go with this crazy, guttural, karate-chop HA! 

Just like that, out of nowhere: HA! And it comes back around again.

I hope that was his contribution to the song as they sat around in that smoky garage. I like to think it was.

Reach out baby. C'mon girl. Reach out to me......HA. 

 

 

SeeqPod - Playable Search