marvelous marvin

"hey man! whats yo' name, smoke this!"
one of my favorite marvin songs is "whats going on". the time when music was sending messages of civil rights & world / human equality. power to the people, power for people! sorry kids. no more make out music or teenage prom songs for this early 70s motown record. in 1971 the "whats going on" lp was released. it was something that was not expected from marvin after the death of his good friend & recording duet gal-pal, tammi terrell. it was known to most that marvin fell into a deep depression & threatened to leave the music industry for good. one of my favorite stories told about marvin was that after tammi's death, marvin focused his career on his first love, football. that spring gaye tryout for the detroits lions, but didnt make the cut. what he did make was a group of new friends in the detriot lions football team. by helping lift his spirits and inspire him to return to the studio, marvin recorded one of the best albums of his career.

i have this thing with my ears where i can pick up the most indistinct sounds, so it is no surprise that i fell in love with "whats going on". all of the over layering of lyrics, dialogue and harmonies is brilliant. one can listen to that song repetitively and will find something different each time, like a 'wheres waldo' poster. the instrumental makes you wanna dance, the lyrics make you wanna change the world, but the background, it makes me laugh. it became my favorite part... all the commotion in the background. there are the sounds of the men talking & laughing & whooting. it is so faint and easily dismissed, but it drives me crazy. one day i was curious in finding out what the hell was actually "going on"! so i laid on the floor, pressed my ear to the speaker and listened closely. i jump up & turn to "the wife" & say , with a big smile on my face, did you hear that? someone just said "hey man whats yo' name, smoke this!" and then i hear the more familiar"everythang, is eveythang!" then "hey man toss me the football" "right on!" "its groovey" and my personal favorite, the inhaling of the whatever it is that they are smoking on with the subtle "whoo" that follows. heAH! come to find out that the men on the track were some of the cats from detroit lions and the vocals were recorded during a, you guessed it, a BBQ!! hot damn, too good! and since they participated on the grammy award winning song / album, they all received one as well. gotta love it! im gonna praise jah right now, for the detroit lions & BBQs, for without them, who knows if we would have ever heard from marvin again! love-joy.