Was This Early Motown's Raciest Release?

[Boogiedown]

By "early" Motown--- thru the sixties and up into the early seventies ....


I don't even know how this got radio play:




Whatever trick he's got hidden up his sleeve , it's spring loaded and she finds it most impressive!


Others that were racier??

[BigAl]

I always felt "Buttered Popcorn" was nothing but one long double entendre.
"Sticky and gooey and greasy and salty?"
You didn't have to be Fellini to figure that one out!

[TomatoTom123]

I'm not sure if this is one is "racy" in that sense but "First I Look At The Purse" is certainly non-PC... heehee

[midnightman]

I felt some of Mary Wells' material was a bit racy.

[rovereab]

Going Down For The Third Time

[sup_fan]

I Ain't Been Licked

[Circa 1824]

Touch Me Down There In The Morning

[sup_fan]

Once in the morning - Diana version, definitely means 1 thing

Once in the morning - Sup version, interesting to learn this is all about snorting coke!

Early morning love - hell, the singer isn't even awake yet and her guy is turning her over and mounting! now the question is did he turn her towards him before the mount or away!! is it early morning love in the front door or back! lolol

You are the heart of me - Mary's wimpy orgasmic gasps and moans. pedro must not have know what all to do!

[Ngroove]

Martha Reeves & the Vandellas - Motoring

[Ngroove]

Marvelettes - Forever

[Ngroove]

Shorty Long - Devil With The Blue Dress

[rovereab]

Stop Beating Around The Bush - Velvelettes

[TheMotownManiac]

I see the love on your face is glowing, I feel your lovin inside me growing, I know exactly just where you’re going – let me come with you!
https://youtu.be/HX8UWrSWgNI

[nevertoolate]

Love is like an Itching in My Heart--Supremes
Shoot your Shot --Jr Walker and the All Stars

Do you think we are reading too much into the old songs? Or did songs imply things in
those days due to censorship?

[marv2]

By "early" Motown--- thru the sixties and up into the early seventies ....


I don't even know how this got radio play:




Whatever trick he's got hidden up his sleeve , it's spring loaded and she finds it most impressive!


Others that were racier??

This is a bit strange to me. Never since my Mom brought this "new 45" home decades ago did I imagine it to be nasty or as you say racey. Amazing what other people hear. It was just a nice Soul record by the Marvelettes to me.

[marv2]

Love is like an Itching in My Heart--Supremes
Shoot your Shot --Jr Walker and the All Stars

Do you think we are reading too much into the old songs? Or did songs imply things in
those days due to censorship?

Yes I think you all are reading too much into these old songs. It's not like the wide open, suggestive music that came out with Disco in the 70s like "Push, Push In the Bush".

[DJMoch]

Or their even more overt song "Love Massage" from their second album "Musique II". Nothing even remotely subtle there.

[marv2]

Or their even more overt song "Love Massage" from their second album "Musique II". Nothing even remotely subtle there.

Exactly DJMoch, you know what I'm saying........

[nevertoolate]

However, come to think of it, some of the R&B songs in the mid-sixties were more
obvious like: Midnight Mover, A Man and a Half, In the Midnight Hour by Wilson Pickett.
I remember reading somewhere Berry Gordy told songwriters "Keep It Clean". I think
Motown aiming for a Pop Sound didn't want to make it too obvious.

[marv2]

However, come to think of it, some of the R&B songs in the mid-sixties were more
obvious like: Midnight Mover, A Man and a Half, In the Midnight Hour by Wilson Pickett.
I remember reading somewhere Berry Gordy told songwriters "Keep It Clean". I think
Motown aiming for a Pop Sound didn't want to make it too obvious.

Risque songs have always been a part of Rock and Roll since the 50s. Songs like "Sixty Minute Man", "Work With Me Henry" etc,etc. I just think we're really grasping to find a lot of that stuff in Motown songs.

[Boogiedown]

This is a bit strange to me. Never since my Mom brought this "new 45" home decades ago did I imagine it to be nasty or as you say racey. Amazing what other people hear. It was just a nice Soul record by the Marvelettes to me.

What magical trick do you imagine this male lover is producing for her that goes
"twang"???

[Boogiedown]

Love is like an Itching in My Heart--Supremes
Shoot your Shot --Jr Walker and the All Stars

Do you think we are reading too much into the old songs? Or did songs imply things in
those days due to censorship?

I would have said that the song offered above, "MOTORING", might have even meant a Sunday drive for a picnic were it not for the giveaway line ,

"now we gonna motor, all night long"

Thanks for providing that one Ngroove. That's exactly the kind of early example I was wondering about. I don't expect too many examples because of course Berry presented a nice, clean, and properly run ship as part of the Motown theme , it's one of the things I most admire about the label.

Martha Reeves & the Vandellas - Motoring

[marv2]

What magical trick do you imagine this male lover is producing for her that goes
"twang"???

Well since I was only 8 years old when this song came out and was played at my house and on the radio, I didn't have a clue. I didn't even know what the word "morale" meant at that age. I have not listen to some of these songs that much since in the days there current hits. From Melvin Franklin's deep, "You Are under my power"..... I just thought with as a catchy song. I gave it no more thought than I did about Barbara Eden playing "Jeanne" [[which was a popular TV show at the time) running around this guy's house in this skimpy outfit. I am sure if we examined and dissected many corny Pop songs from back in the day like "Sugar, Sugar" by the Archies, we'll be able to interpret a more adult theme or meaning than what was intended.

[Boogiedown]

Well since I was only 8 years old when this song came out and was played at my house and on the radio, I didn't have a clue. I didn't even know what the word "morale" meant at that age. I have not listen to some of these songs that much since in the days there current hits. From Melvin Franklin's deep, "You Are under my power"..... I just thought with as a catchy song. I gave it no more thought than I did about Barbara Eden playing "Jeanne" [[which was a popular TV show at the time) running around this guy's house in this skimpy outfit. I am sure if we examined and dissected many corny Pop songs from back in the day like "Sugar, Sugar" by the Archies, we'll be able to interpret a more adult theme or meaning than what was intended.

I think that's exactly right.

That's why I'm surprised you're surprised that some of those cute songs that can appeal even to an eight year old might hold a bit more meaning upon closer examination. [[without the confessions of the authors, we can only conjecture what was or wasn't "intended" )

[Ngroove]

I would have said that the song offered above, "MOTORING", might have even meant a Sunday drive for a picnic were it not for the giveaway line ,

"now we gonna motor, all night long"

Thanks for providing that one Ngroove. That's exactly the kind of early example I was wondering about. I don't expect too many examples because of course Berry presented a nice, clean, and properly run ship as part of the Motown theme , it's one of the things I most admire about the label.

I remember, when reading those extensive essays on those old "Ultimate Collections" booklets, that often told something of just about every one of their twenty-five tracks each, they used to mention how coded raunchy or "forbid girls would sing that one without getting in trouble!", which of course, would pique my interest over time, to have them join in with my listening airplays of "Heatwave" and "Don't Mess With Bill".

[Ngroove]

Okay, I know, this is supposed to be "early Motown", but noting this one, because, unlike Marvin's "Let's Get It On" and Diana's "Touch Me In The Morning", Smokey Robinson's bedroom ballads, Rick James, and the notability of Queen Latifah shouting "B****!" on the Motown 40 documentary, ect, this was a definite "WHOA!" from a former "good boy" of the Temptations, based on his previous style when he was with the Temptations. Eddie and Brian Holland brothers production too. Really, for the first few years I've given this one a listen, I've thought of this as simply a fun, pop-radio friendly, light disco-y confection, before further "research" and actually paying closer attention to the lyrics, cutting through the smoothness, towards what's it actually subliminally saying.

[Ngroove]

On a different kind of "risque":

[144man]

Okay, I know, this is supposed to be "early Motown", but noting this one, because, unlike Marvin's "Let's Get It On" and Diana's "Touch Me In The Morning", Smokey Robinson's bedroom ballads, Rick James, and the notability of Queen Latifah shouting "B****!" on the Motown 40 documentary, ect, this was a definite "WHOA!" from a former "good boy" of the Temptations, based on his previous style when he was with the Temptations. Really, for the first few years I've given this one a listen, I've thought of this as simply a fun, pop-radio friendly, light disco-y confection, before further "research" and actually paying closer attention to the lyrics, cutting through the smoothness, towards what's it actually subliminally saying.

Only the 1975 release date stopped me from posting this myself. I don't think this is subliminal at all; it's absolutely blatant.

[midnightman]

Love is like an Itching in My Heart--Supremes
Shoot your Shot --Jr Walker and the All Stars

Do you think we are reading too much into the old songs? Or did songs imply things in
those days due to censorship?

Yeah we're reading too much into MOST of them. Lol

Mary Wells' Two Lovers would've been racy had it not been for the twist at the end.

But I think of those early years, MR&TV's Motoring might've been the raciest of the early years of the label. Other than that, Motown's music was really SAFE especially compared to Stax and some stuff out of Phil Spector's Wall of Sound, Ike & Tina's stuff and the Brill Building.

[TomatoTom123]

If we're reading risquéness into these songs, then this one is absolutely FILTHY!!



Naughty Smokey!!!!!

[Boogiedown]

If we're reading risquéness into these songs, then this one is absolutely FILTHY!!

Naughty Smokey!!!!!

Ha!
"everybody gather 'round" .... would that be a --- oh never mind.

OK--- here's one that's indisputably blatant:

ODE TO A TEENAGE HOOCHIE MAMA:

[TomatoTom123]

Ha!
"everybody gather 'round" .... would that be a --- oh never mind.

Naughty Boogie!!!!!

[theboyfromxtown]

Stop Beating Around The Bush - Velvelettes

You are so naughty! lol

[woodward]

February 1967
Gordy 7058-B
Third Finger, Left Hand
Martha & the Vandellas

[sansradio]

February 1967
Gordy 7058-B
Third Finger, Left Hand
Martha & the Vandellas

You win the internet!!!!

[Ngroove]

Marvin Gaye, "She's Got To Be Real", B / side of "Ain't That Peculiar" - "Imagine the Mona Lisa, mixed with a girl from a Playboy book".

Yes, am aware, topical reference, back then the rag's gals were more semi-demure "girl next door", yet, the T and A was still there since the start. Not sure what the book's rep was then, might have been more publicly known as the lifestyle of the robed and spoiled for all I know, but I'm quite sure, it was still a book that had girlfriends caught their boyfriends ogling it, they'd slap em', the song briefly clearly not "reading it for the stories".

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z0rdJP0WGsk

[Boogiedown]

Okay, I know, this is supposed to be "early Motown", but noting this one, because, unlike Marvin's "Let's Get It On" and Diana's "Touch Me In The Morning", Smokey Robinson's bedroom ballads, Rick James, and the notability of Queen Latifah shouting "B****!" on the Motown 40 documentary, ect, this was a definite "WHOA!" from a former "good boy" of the Temptations, based on his previous style when he was with the Temptations. Eddie and Brian Holland brothers production too. Really, for the first few years I've given this one a listen, I've thought of this as simply a fun, pop-radio friendly, light disco-y confection, before further "research" and actually paying closer attention to the lyrics, cutting through the smoothness, towards what's it actually subliminally saying.

Yes I think the implied subject matter kept me from exploring this song any further at the time , too bad because I think there's a pretty good tune in there otherwise. The lyrics just left a bad taste in my mouth , if i can put it that way.