Originally Posted by
TheMotownManiac
I agree wholeheartedly with everything you said here except two things:
surrender was released in early July 1971. It had evaporated totally before I’m still waiting, to my surprise, was issued in October or early November. I don’t know the exact date but I was working on a killer haunted house at the time which would’ve been somewhere between October 10 and November 5. I do think that I’m still waiting, with TV exposure, could have hit big here. However, they needed to restore the original fade. The 45 version in the US is absurdly cropped and ruins the construction of the record.
I think there was room to include reach out I’ll be there on the Diana special, buy shortening the bill Cosby bit, that cornball Frank Sinatra thing with Michael and Diana, and get another minute shaving a bit here and there. The single version is only four minutes, I think it would’ve had a chance but I think it really needed to be re-edited. After the disappointing showing of remember me, I’m really surprised the follow-up single was not given more exposure. I know she was pregnant, but it’s not that far to go to a couple TV studios like she did for mahogany. And I know that she was working on Lady sings the blues, but they could have found time if they really cared. I don’t think surrender had a chance in the states.
i’ve often wondered why Motown didn’t take I’m more aggressive approach to gauging public interest for a single, much like networks do for TV pilots: they expose the material to a randomly selected audience, and gauge their feedback. If that had happened, touch and you got to have love in your heart would never have gone out as 45s.
I don’t believe that the success of a single has very much to do with the publics perception of the act that performs the single. If they hear a song on the radio and they really dig it they buy the 45. If they love it enough to buy the album, win otherwise they would not have bought the album, that shows actual interest in the act. Where did our love go took off like crazy and no one knew who the Supremes were. The same for I want you back, which didn’t exactly zoom to the top. Fight and Claude its way to the number one spot and is the quintessential example of what I consider to be a great single launched with a decent amount, but not a big amount of adds, but the response they were getting at the stations that were playing it, helped it go up the charts so other stations took a chance on it. That’s textbook how it’s supposed to happen. Surrender, reach out and touch, everybody’s got the right to love, i’ll start it off with much more support, or similar support in the case of surrender, with I want you back. But the public wasn’t responding, No matter how much Motown pushed or wanted it to, you can get a record played sometimes, but you can’t make the public go out and buy the song just because they’re hearing it on the radio. They have to like it. And I think a lot of these singles just did not get decent response. I know you like touch, but I think it is the worst choice of a single since Run, run, run.