Tuesday, January 20, 2009

Crate Digging: The Supremes Sing Holland-Dozier-Holland


I picked this up over the weekend at Dusty Groove, the consummate soul, R&B, funk, hip-hop and jazz record super store. I luckily live a stone's throw from the Chicago locale, which is like how all the addicts on Vh1's Sober House live up the hill from all their dealers in Hollywood.

Released in 1967, this album is superb. Now, I am not crazy about Diana Ross or her thin, reedy vocals, but I am crazy about Holland-Dozier-Holland and this was a truly golden find. Side one alone is home to two of my all time favorite songs: "You Keep Me Hangin' On" (best driving guitar line ever, Lamont Dozier was inspired by a news-flash radio signal and decided to use the Morse code like sound in the song) and "Love is Here and Now You're Gone." Side two kicks off with "It's the Same Old Song" and ends with "Love is Like a Heat Wave," but the lesser known gems are what truly round out this record. The somber and beautiful "You're Gone (But Always in My Heart)" and the lovely and twinkling "I Guess I'll Always Love You" are wonderful. But really, every song on this album is fantastic and some of the greatest pop song writing and studio instrumentation of all time is exhibited here.

1 comment:

Jan said...

I OWN THIS. Weird. Got it at a trunk sale in the south end.