Originally Posted by
Philles/Motown Gary
Keith -- and also to thisoldheart -- you both bring up a good point which I hadn't considered until now. Motown may have temporarily tried sticking an old, obsolete-sounding song on the B-side to prevent DJ's from flipping the record over and playing the B-side instead of the intended A-side, as Phil Spector did by pressing his Philles B-sides with Jazz instrumentals.
Personally, I wouldn't have minded Motown putting a track from an earlier album on the B-side if it had at least been a track containing "The Motown Sound". But to use those age-old cha-cha recordings before Motown developed its sound was annoying as all get-out -- especially when I was trying to impress fellow high-school classmates with the latest Motown releases, as I often did. Our Business class had one of those neat old 1960's Califone "classroom" record players [[which radiotvphononut is oftentimes restoring on his YouTube channel). Every time I bought a new Motown 45, I'd take it into Business class with me to play for the 9 or 10 classmates before the teacher showed up. Three or 4 of the students always loved what I brought in, but there was always one hard-rock fan who thought Motown was bubble-gum crap. One day, when I was playing The Tempts' "[[I Know) I'm Losing You", I tried to get away with not playing the B-side, "I Couldn't Cry If I Wanted To". As luck would have it, somebody requested that I play the B-side. I said, "No, it's time for Mr. K to arrive." They egged me on with, "Come on, just flip it over and play the B-side real quick. Out-numbered, I reluctantly honored their request. As expected, nobody liked it. And, what's worse, the hard rock-loving, Motown-hating creep said, "What the hell is that?" Embarrased that he of all people was there to hear it and criticize it, all I could say in embarrassment was, "I know. It sucks." In retrospect, Motown had tons of high-quality, previously-unreleased "Motown-Sound"-ing material they could have tapped to use as B-side filler for their 45 releases. Why they resorted to using that old, obsolete stuff is still beyond me.
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