Review: The Marvelettes - The Marvelettes Sing (1962)

Tracks: 1) Mashed Potato Time; 2) Love Letters; 3) The One Who Really Loves You; 4) Twistin’ The Night Away; 5) Hey Baby; 6) Twistin’ Postman; 7) Good Luck Charm; 8) Slow Twist; 9) Lover Please; 10) Dream Baby.

REVIEW

Contrary to the general belief, not everybody every time is a fan of happy endings. Case in point: ‘Twistin’ Postman’, the exaggeratedly joyful sequel to ‘Please Mr. Postman’ that was supposed to kill two birds with one stone — provide a satis­fying conclusion to the saga of the broken-hearted girl, the faraway lover boy, and the loyal UPS agent, AND capitalize on the ongoing twist craze — only managed to rise to #34 on the charts, as opposed to the #1 position of its predecessor. Somewhat surprisingly, it was not because the song, as it often happens, was a simplistic re-write of the original: on the contrary, it is a completely different number, probably put together from bits and pieces of Chubby Checker’s performances to put up a lively dancing atmosphere. Alas, that’s pretty much all it does: you can dance to it, like you could to a million other songs back in 1961–62, but if there is any sort of emotional or moral message to the song, my only idea is — "all you have to do to ensure a constant flow of positive vibes from your mailbox is to teach your local postman to twist". Simple and innocent solutions for simple and innocent times.

In all honesty, though, the relative failure of the song lies not so much in the ridiculousness of its concept (something that could have easily been overlooked by audiences back in the day) as it does in the fact that Gladys Horton does not feel fully confident and believable in this «twisting», or, more accurately, «soft-rock-’n’-rolling» mode. Her somewhat limited vocal range does not allow for a whole lot of dynamics, and she certainly ain’t no Tina Turner or Etta James when it comes to ad-libbing and throwing all sorts of extra vocal fuel on the fire. For conveying a worried, pleading attitude that voice was quite adequate; but it does not properly understand how to convey exhilarating joy — in fact, I’d say the drummer does a much better job at keeping us exhilarated, particularly during the instrumental break, than the lead or backup singers. Overall, this is an embarrassment on many different levels, all the way up to the picture on the single cover, featuring an actual twisting postman with letters scattering all over out of his mail sack — as if to acknowledge the profound social inefficacy of such an idealistic concept.

Even if the world failed to recognize the artistic boldness of Berry Gordy’s decision, he was still determined to exploit the elevated status of the Marvelettes — having them record and release a second LP of «new» material just a few months after the dubious success of the second chapter in the Mr. Postman saga. The original title was Smash Hits Of ’62, though it was quickly retired because (a) 1962 was over quicker than one might expect it, and (b) although the record did contain quite a few smash hits from 1962, they weren’t exactly smash hits for the Marvelettes — they were smash hits for other artists, which could get a bit confusing. So, before you knew it, the LP became known simply as The Marvelettes Sing, which was at least as factually true as «the cows moo», «the kittens meow», and «the record industry is run by con men and idiots». This did not, however, change the fact that there were even fewer songs on the album than before, and that not a single one of them was written specially for the record — or, for that matter, for the Marvelettes in general.

Instead, what we have here is a mish-mash of contemporary pop hits by other artists (from Sam Cooke to Roy Orbison to Elvis), as well as a couple additional Motown tunes originally recorded by other Motown artists (‘The One Who Really Loves You’ = Mary Wells). The only one of these that might be worth a special mention is the opening number, ‘Mashed Potato Time’, a hit for short-lived R&B star and teen idol Dee Dee Sharp in early 1962; the irony here is that Dee Dee’s producers, Kal Mann and Bernie Lowe (the key figures at Philadelphia’s Cameo-Parkway Records and official curators of Chubby Checker’s career), wrote the song to the exact melody of ‘Please Mr. Postman’ — even openly admitting to that in the song’s lyrics ("Then they discovered it's the most, man / The day they did it to Please Mr. Postman").

Thus, in this weird game of stylistic confusion, ‘Mashed Potato Time’ is a better proposition than ‘Twistin’ Postman’, since it uses the catchiness and the atmosphere of ‘Please Mr. Postman’ for the express purpose of showcasing a cool dance move, rather than using just the plotline of ‘Please Mr. Postman’ for the express purpose of showcasing a slightly less cool dance move. But when it comes to getting you up on your feet, Dee Dee Sharp’s voice rings out louder and brighter than Gladys Horton’s, so even if one couldn’t really blame the Marvelettes for basically taking back what rightfully belonged to them, there’s still nothing in this restitution other than empty-feeling social justice.

As for everything else, well, I can understand a band like The Ventures standing around monitoring the charts for contem­porary smash hits so that they can produce their sophisticated instrumental takes on them; but the idea of a severely limited girl group like the Marvelettes doing the same thing is, at best, treasurable through its sheer ridiculousness, as in, it can be a nice distraction to place bets on which of these songs they will butcher and which one is going to be slightly more passable. To the former category certainly belongs the cover of Elvis Presley’s ‘Good Luck Charm’ — a great pop song, for sure, but Wanda Young, who takes lead vocals on this one, shows not the tiniest bit of sly sexy subtlety that Elvis injected into his performance, instead, for some reason, making more emphasis on nastiness and confidence, thus ruining the very purpose of the song. Later on, poor Wanda makes a similar mistake with Roy Orbison’s ‘Dream Baby’, depriving the song of any whiffs of actual «dreaminess» — leaving nothing but the empty catchy carcass for the listener to latch on to.

On the more positive side, ‘The One Who Really Loves You’ sounds nearly identical to the Mary Wells cover — in fact, listening to them back-to-back I’m almost positive they use the exact same backing track, or at least alternate takes / mixes from the exact same session, except the Marvelettes also lay their own female backing vocals on top of the male backing harmonies. After that, it’s really your pick of whether you prefer the more «feminine», softer take by Mary or the slightly tougher, sultrier take by Gladys — I think both singing styles suit the song just fine; it’s a decent, not too outstanding pop song whose point is to prove that the lead singer, unlike everybody else mentioned in the song, has soul, and sure enough, both Mary and Gladys got it. If we’re really going to be picky, though, the lyrics here are «girly» enough to make Mary seem like a more believable choice — clearly Smokey intended this to be for Mary, not Gladys, when he wrote it, and the public eagerly confirmed his decision through sales.

A quick run through the rest: ‘Love Letters’ — the piano melody is still great (remember how John Lennon would pilfer it for his own ‘God’ years later?), but the deep mysticism of Ketty Lester’s classic vocal performance is predictably unmatched. ‘Twistin’ The Night Away’ — always fun, but in between Sam Cooke and Rod Stewart, these vocals feel wimpy, and it’s kind of a guy song, too. Come to think of it, Bruce Channel’s ‘Hey Baby’ is even more of a guy song, and gender reversal feels artificial here as well, particularly because the Marvelettes cannot muster enough swagger (I’m pretty sure Tina Turner could, but apparently she never recorded this). ‘Slow Twist’ is the Marvelettes finally daring to tackle Chubby Checker head-on — don’t much care for Chubby, care even less for second-hand Chubby. Finally, Clyde McPhatter’s ‘Lover Please’ — actually, tougher and sassier than the original, but the song is a whiny plea, so it doesn’t really require toughness and sass, to be honest.

On the other hand, most of these numbers are really good songs, and most of these performances do not end in the girls ruining them, so no need to complain too much. At least they did not choke the Marvelettes with string-saturated covers of pre-war oldies from the Songbook — by focusing on contemporary hits, even with such a throwaway record Motown still indicates that it is looking forward, not backward as it did with, for instance, the first Marvin Gaye LP (and even then, admittedly, it was all Marvin’s personal fault, not that of his bosses). 25 minutes of light fun, every bit as pointless as the appearance of The Twistin’ Postman on the horizon, but with a slight chance of as bizarrely lingering in the back of your mind for a while as the figure of The Twistin’ Postman eventually dissolving away in the sunset.

• Only Solitaire reviews: The Marvelettes