Quote Originally Posted by Philles/Motown Gary View Post
Tom, I just listened to "My Past Just Crossed My Future" There's a lot of pent-up energy going on in that song. .
Whew! I love colorful words and phrases and you really hit it by saying "There's a lot of pent-up energy going on..." That's what I was looking for. I love that song to pieces, and always thought there was something I couldn't quite peg about it-until I read your words. This is one of those songs, I could listen to a million times in a row and still never quite wrap my head around all the stuff going on in that song.

It was a few years before I even focused on the lyrics! The drums nearly steal the whole show. Why did Motown mix backing vocals so low on nearly everyone's music? Here we get to hear the Tops un-adorned harmonies and they're nearly buried in the mix. Actually, I stumbled onto a little trick where I can play a CD, tape or album through a pedal effects compressor and darn if it doesn't help to bring up backing vocals and other things in the mix just a bit louder and clearer. Doing that, I'm really appreciating how good the Tops [[and Andantes, when they were used) really were.