The 100 Greatest Motown Songs

Smokey Robinson and the Miracles, “Ooo Baby Baby” (1965)

The sublimely mournful ballad “Ooh Baby Baby” came out of a moment of a live improvisation during the medley of contemporary hits the Miracles performed on tour. “At the end of it, rather than ending it, I just started to say, ‘Ooh, baby, baby.’ And the guys, who were so in tune with me, they heard me and they just started to harmonize with that,” Smokey Robinson recalled. “The crowd went crazy.” Its stark vulnerability touched a nerve, inspiring artists from John Lennon, who referenced the song on “I Am the Walrus,” to Linda Ronstandt, who covered it on her hit album Living in the USA and performed it with Robinson at the Motown 25 concert. —J.D. 

Willie Hutch, “I Choose You” (1973)

After working with Fifth Dimension and recording for RCA, Hutch joined the Motown machine as a writer — he helped pen “I’ll Be There,” which became a Number One hit for the Jackson Five. Hutch’s gifts as a singer-producer-arranger are evident on albums like The Mack and Foxy Brown, both of which soundtracked Seventies Blaxploitation movies. “I Choose You” is one of his richest works, a grateful love song built around a horn line that has the strength and architectural integrity of a suspension bridge. The brass is so sturdy that it’s been lifted wholesale by numerous hip-hop tracks, including the UGK and Outkast tour-de-force “Int’l Players Anthem.” —E.L. 

The Supremes, “Stop! In the Name of Love” (1965)

By the time the Supremes released “Stop! In the Name of Love,” they were already on a hot streak. They started the Sixties struggling to crack the charts, but after Diana Ross was placed as the group leader, the trio became pop sensations and the biggest act on Motown. “Stop!” was one of five consecutive Number One hits for the group, and has Ross begging a lover to rethink the decision to step out on their relationship. In 1983, the Hollies would have a hit with their cover of the track. —B.S.

Stevie Wonder, “You Are the Sunshine of My Life” (1972)

After the hard-hitting funk of “Superstition” became a Number One hit, Wonder emphasized the sweeter side of his genius with the next single from his landmark statement of independence, 1972’s Talking Book. “You Are the Sunshine of My Life” is his lighter-than-air love letter to his new wife Syreeta Wright, who was a secretary at Motown before going on to have her own music career, which included writing with Wonder, who also produced her 1972 album, Syreeta. Their marriage was short-lived, but few songs have captured the first flush of romantic rapture with such gentle grace and warmth. —J.D. 

Smokey Robinson and the Miracles, “Choosey Beggar” (1965)

“Choosey Beggar” is the kind of deep cut that hardcore Smokey devotees prize: just a B side, but proof that this guy’s B sides could top anyone else’s hits. (The hit was on the other side: “Going to a Go-Go.”) In this ballad, Smokey’s the ultimate supplicant, waiting for the woman of his dreams to notice him. “Beggars can’t be choosey, I know,” he begins, but he’ll go on waiting because “your love is the only love to make this beggar rich.” Even in the fade out, he’s still crafting ingenious wordplay, rhyming “I need someone beside me” with “How happy I’d be.” —R.S. 

The Commodores, “Still” (1979)

Lionel Richie was a one-man ballad factory in the late 1970s, writing blockbusters like “Easy,” “Three Times a Lady,” and the awesomely weird country pastiche “Sail On.” But “Still” was a real breakthrough — it marked Richie’s ascendance as the great Motown crooner of his generation. This song established him as the Black Sinatra that Berry Gordy always wanted Marvin Gaye to be — except Gaye was destined to become something even greater. “Still” remains an epic tearjerker, especially when Richie whispers that forlorn “I do love you … still” at the end. —R.S. 

Gladys Knight and the Pips, “If I Were Your Woman” (1970)

In 1961, Gladys Knight and her Pips were stranded in New York City, flat broke, when they got an offer from Motown. The catch was they had to get to Detroit — on their own dime. “We pawned everything that we owned,” Bubba Knight told Rolling Stone in 1973. “I had a guitar, man, I was teaching myself how to play guitar, and I pawned that.” They hocked it all for four bus tickets. But the move paid off with Motown success, peaking with the shattering soul agony of “If I Were Your Woman.” They had even bigger hits after leaving the label, like “Midnight Train to Georgia.” But this song would be enough to make their legend. —R.S. 

The Contours, “Do You Love Me” (1962)

In the 1980s, there may as well have been a law that every Hollywood movie had to use at least one Motown song. But only one of those classics returned to the charts as a result: This 1962 Number One R&B dance hit, brought back into circulation in 1988 by Dirty Dancing. Emerging from the raw days of early Motown, this Berry Gordy track pulls out all the tricks: a spoken word intro, a false ending, a mention of just about every dance craze at the moment. And if the Temptations had been where Gordy could find them, the hit could have been theirs. —K.H. 

The Jackson 5, “I’ll Be There” (1970)

Comforting ballads like “Let It Be” and “Bridge Over Troubled Water” were a pop radio staple at the dawn of the Seventies, and the Jacksons’ contribution made for a gorgeous addition to that hypersensitive canon. “I’ll Be There” remains one of Motown’s most universal ballads, and the Jacksons’ definitive rendition — which alternates Michael’s tender vocal with brother Jermaine’s husky, reassuring one — took it to an even deeper emotional level. “I’ll Be There” was also the first Jackson record to demonstrate that there was more to the band (and Michael) than rubbery bubble-funk hits. —D.B.

DeBarge, “Time Will Reveal” (1983)

DeBarge was a family act in the Motown tradition — sadly, with a history of tragedy that’s also part of the tradition. But nothing on Eighties radio sounded anything like El DeBarge’s voice. “Time Will Reveal” was his ultimate showcase — a tender melody full of breathy asides, falsetto swoops, the most vulnerable sighs and coos. Many singers have tried to redo “Time Will Reveal,” but not even Janelle Monáe could duplicate his style. El’s still got it — at the 2017 BET Awards, he did a great tribute to the late George Michael, with Kamasi Washington playing the “Careless Whisper” sax solo. —R.S. 

The Temptations, “Since I Lost My Baby” (1965)

Smokey Robinson loved writing for David Ruffin’s voice — the Temptations’ singer had a gruff baritone tenor suited to vulnerable confessions. And “Since I Lost My Baby” goes way beyond vulnerable. Ruffin sings a tale of lost love that leaves him in a world where “the sun is cold and the new day seems old.” The bridge is both Smokey and the Temptations at their best, with a string of rhymes that builds up the tension — “Next time I’ll be kinder,” “Someone please remind her,” “Every day I’m more inclined to find her.” Only Smokey could write a song so dazzlingly clever, yet so devastatingly sad. —R.S. 

Stevie Wonder, “Higher Ground” (1973)

Using a Moog synth and an envelope filter to give the groove a state-of-the-art funkiness, Wonder created this elevating anthem to spiritual transcendence and reincarnation. The song took on a special significance for Wonder when he was involved in a serious car crash shortly after it was recorded, which left him in a coma for several days. “I wrote ‘Higher Ground’ before the accident,” he told The New York Times. “Something must have been telling me that something was going to happen to make me aware of a lot of things and to get myself together.” —J.D. 

Mary Wells, “Two Lovers” (1963)

The opening lyrics of “Two Lovers,” the first big hit by the First Lady of Motown, sound scandalous: “I’ve got two lovers, and I ain’t ashamed/Two lovers, and I love them both the same.” One of her paramours is sweet and kind, the other treats her bad and makes her cry, “but I love him,” she sings, “I really, really love him.” Thanks to a smart twist at the end — an early demonstration of songwriter and producer Smokey Robinson’s genius — the horror melts away and Wells’ upbeat bragging in the chorus makes sense. The song was a Top 10 hit, solidified her stardom (the Beatles asked her to open for them), and it later became a staple of fan Marvin Gaye’s set lists toward the end of his life. —K.G. 

The Isley Brothers, “This Old Heart of Mine (Is Weak for You)” (1966)

While Motown was a career-long home for many of its artists, the label was just one stop on the Isleys’ long path through the music industry. They were already known for “Shout” and “Twist and Shout” and had broken in a young hotshot guitarist (some flashy kid named Hendrix) before their arrival at Motown; they left in 1969 to start their own label and stretch their music in a new direction. This 1966 Holland-Dozier-Holland song was their sole hit in Detroit, but it’s a stunner, the definitive match of Ronald Isley’s sexy rasp and Motown’s pop precision. —K.H. 

Marvin Gaye, “Let’s Get It On” (1973)

Prince’s output being the exception, no other song in music history conjures the phrase “U up?” quicker or more overtly than the title song to Gaye’s 1973 ode to carnal pleasures. Marvin had already conquered his socioeconomic, political and spiritual sides on past albums and originally recorded the song with more politically conscious lyrics. But love and sex prevailed, and any previous foreplay teases of his ladies’ man persona was now a full-throated come-on. Wrecking Crew guitarist Don Peake came up with Motown’s most recognizable guitar intro, but when Gaye croons, “There’s … nothing wrong … with me … loving you,” all thoughts turn toward one thing. —J.N.

The Temptations, “Get Ready” (1966)

This 1966 classic lost Smokey Robinson a gig. A the go-to songwriter-producer for the Temptations, Smokey thought he had a pop smash here: a groove suited to one of the year’s biggest dance crazes, the duck, and a seductively demanding falsetto vocal from Eddie Kendricks. But though it topped the R&B charts, it stalled at Number 29 on the pop chart. So when Norman Whitfield’s “Ain’t Too Proud to Beg” charted higher, an impatient Berry Gordy made him the Temptations’ new main producer. Many years later, weirdly, “Get Ready” was a hit for Motown — and for its white rock group Rare Earth. —K.H.

Jimmy Ruffin, “What Becomes of the Brokenhearted” (1966)

Jimmy Ruffin’s early-Sixties singles were each overshadowed by the success of his younger brother, David, who’d joined the Temptations in 1964. So it’s possible he didn’t have to try too hard to find the right amount of motivation to sing about broken dreams, illusionary happiness, and growing heartache on “What Becomes of the Brokenhearted.” Luckily for him, the way his need to find peace of mind blended with the song’s swaying chorus made it the perfect plea for love and redemption. —K.G.

The Commodores, “Nightshift” (1985)

After Lionel Richie went off to fiesta forever as a solo megastar, the Commodores could have given up. Instead, they rebounded with a move nobody expected: “Nightshift,” one of their biggest and best ever. It’s a tribute to the fallen R&B pioneers Marvin Gaye and Jackie Wilson, who both died in 1984. But there’s nothing mawkish about “Nightshift” — the Commodores trade off vocals, toasting the memory of their old friends, listening to those sweet sounds coming down on the nightshift. This song is proof that true soul legends never die, which is why “Nightshift” has never left the radio, keeping Marvin and Jackie’s names alive. —R.S.

Smokey Robinson and the Miracles, “You’ve Really Got a Hold on Me” (1962)

It’s impossible to imagine American pop music without this 1962 ballad from Smokey Robinson, which has since been covered by the Beatles, Percy Sledge, Eddie Money, Rod Stewart, and the Jackson Five. Robinson, who ended up recording the song with the Miracles, wrote the tune by himself in a New York City hotel room while on a Motown business trip after hearing Sam Cooke’s “Bring It on Home to me. “I was in my hotel room with nothing to do,” he once said of writing the song, “so that’s what I did.” —J.A.B. 

The Supremes, “Baby Love” (1964)

After shaking the in-house moniker the “no-hit Supremes” with 1964’s “Where Did Our Love Go,” the girl group’s follow-up single, “Baby Love,” was made to sound just like it — and, naturally, it found a month-long home at the top of the Hot 100. The song’s saccharine longing was less sugary in the version first presented to Berry Gordy, who dismissed it as having “no life” and “no gimmick.” Motown’s premier production team Holland-Dozier-Holland then spiced up “Baby Love” with foot stomps and verve, cloaking lyricist Dozier’s first-love-lost blues with the pulse of hope. —M.C.

Marvin Gaye, “Mercy Mercy Me (The Ecology)” (1971)

Much of Marvin Gaye’s 1971 masterpiece What’s Going On focused on a country racked by war, poverty, and social unrest, but on “Mercy Mercy Me (The Ecology)” — the lone track on the record that the singer wrote entirely himself — Gaye widened the frame, addressing the dire state of the environment. Over a gentle Funk Brothers groove, Gaye laments “oil wasted on the ocean and upon our seas” and “fish full of mercury,” and asks, “What about this overcrowded land?/How much more abuse from man can she stand?” A roaring tenor solo from Wild Bill Moore adds bite to his sentiment while the choral backing vocals from the Andantes give the song an elegiac gospel feel. For Gaye, the song was really about the perils of a faithless world. “When we don’t follow [Jesus’] example and turn to exploitation and greed, we destroy ourselves,” he told biographer David Ritz. “That’s what ‘Mercy Mercy Me’ is about.” —H.S.  

Smokey Robinson, “Cruisin'” (1979)

“Cruisin'” is one of Robinson’s last transcendent hits and one of his stealthiest. It starts gently, with a curious, open-ended figure on a guitar and a melody that seems to double back on itself like switchbacks leading up the side of a mountain. But “Cruisin'” gradually swells — adding a second guitar, strings, flutes, and a formidable cadre of backup singers — until it seems like Robinson is leading an army of cuddled lovers in ecstatic rounds of call-and-response. He initially hit on “Cruisin'” while listening to a tape of ideas from longtime guitarist Marv Taplin. “The music that Marvin had given me, just him playing his guitar, I used to listen to it every night,” Robinson said. “I’d have it playing in my house as I was walking around because it was so sensual.” But it took him five years to pen lyrics that completed the track. —E.L. 

Stevie Wonder, “Don’t You Worry ‘Bout a Thing” (1973)

Nobody did cultural appropriation like Stevie Wonder — in his music, he could flash from Brazil to Jamaica to London back to Detroit. “Don’t You Worry ‘Bout a Thing” is where he goes Cuban with a son montuno piano groove straight from Havana. He even kicks it off with the self-mocking boast, “I speak very, very fluent Spanish!” But he turns it into an uplifting benediction, full of cowbell and guiro, that only Stevie Wonder could write — a highlight of his 1973 classic Innervisions. It inspired fond remakes from Latin musical legends Tito Puente and Arturo Sandoval. —R.S.

Marvin Gaye and Tammi Terrell, “You’re All I Need to Get By” (1968)

Motown had many duet teams, but nobody could take you to the mountaintop like Marvin and Tammi. They made “You’re All I Need to Get By” a three-minute emotional roller coaster. Tragically, Terrell died of brain cancer, only 24, after collapsing in Gaye’s arms onstage. “You’re All I Need” was the first duet they recorded after her surgery, and you can hear that pure stronger-than-death conviction in their voices. In the final months of her life, she came to see Marvin at the Apollo, in her wheelchair. When he spotted her from the stage, he came down to sing this with her one last time. “You’re All I Need to Get By” was the song played at her funeral, while Marvin gave a tearful eulogy. —R.S. 

Diana Ross, “Upside Down” (1980)

The First Lady of Motown got a futuristic makeover with “Upside Down,” teaming up with Chic’s Nile Rodgers and Bernard Edwards. She told them she wanted to make a fresh start, after moving to New York as an independent woman. “This is a major time of change in my life,” she said. “And everything is going to be 180 degrees different from now on.” Her words inspired them to write her a new theme song: “Upside Down,” a brash disco anthem. Motown hated it — Berry Gordy insisted, “‘Upside Down’ is not a Diana Ross record.” But it zoomed straight to Number One and became her definitive solo hit. —R.S. 

Martha and the Vandellas, “Nowhere to Run” (1965)

Amid the backdrop of race riots in Detroit and the Vietnam War in the mid-1960s, famed Motown songwriter Lamont Dozier sat at his piano one day playing with a new groove. “It came out sounding kind of military because I was looking out my window and there were tanks coming down the street,” he told Rolling Stone in 2012. He summoned Martha Reeves and the Vandellas to the studio to record what would become the ominous yet poppy “Nowhere to Run,” their signature song and highest-charting track of their career. Reeves was still getting over a nasty case of the flu when she recorded the song, a kiss-off to the man who doesn’t love her back. “The minute I heard that, something inside me said, ‘You’ve got to sing this — this is exactly how you feel. You’ve got nowhere to run, nowhere to hide, so you better sing, however bad you feel,'” she recalled. —J.N.

Rick James, “Super Freak” (1981)

Rick James became the king of “punk funk” with “Super Freak,” the monster hit from his 1981 opus Street Songs. It’s an ode to very kinky girls, the kind of girls you read about in New Wave magazines, and how much Rick yearns to taste them. But he also made “Super Freak” his link to the Motown tradition, bringing in the Temptations to sing harmony. And to make sure nobody missed them, he cued them by yelling, “Temptations, sing!” It’s old school, it’s new school, and yes, it’s also Hammer Time. But kinky girls have been rocking out to “Super Freak” ever since. —R.S. 

Edwin Starr, “War” (1970)

“War” might be the toughest protest song to hit Number One in the Vietnam era — or any era. At a time when even the edgiest rock stars got too intimidated to take on the Nixon regime, it was a shock to hear “War” blast out of AM radio, with Edwin Starr leading the chant: “War! Good God, y’all! What is it good for? Absolutely nothing! Say it again!” Norman Whitfield and Barrett Strong originally wrote it for the Temptations, but Starr had the righteous rage in his voice to take it to Number One. “War” became a hit all over again in the nuke-crazed Reagan years — perhaps the only Motown tune covered by both Bruce Springsteen and Frankie Goes to Hollywood. —R.S.

Marvin Gaye, “Got to Give It Up” (1977)

Few were more reluctant to wade into the disco waters than Marvin Gaye, whose label requested he get into the craze in 1977. Ironically, the result was one of the greatest disco songs of all time, with the full version clocking in at nearly 12 minutes of dance-floor bliss. Written and produced by Art Stewart, the track was originally titled “Dancing Lady,” inspired by Johnnie Taylor’s “Disco Lady.” “I love the way Johnnie sings, and I thought it was a fabulous song,” Gaye told his biographer David Ritz. “As good as disco ever got. I appreciated the picture of the super-sexy woman on the dance floor, though in my version, I tried to give it a little twist.” —A.M. 

The Four Tops, “I Can’t Help Myself (Sugar Pie, Honey Bunch)” (1965)

The Four Tops had been together for more than a decade when they finally started having hits for Motown, and that experience helped add depth and strength to their vocal performances. On  “I Can’t Help Myself,” their first Number One single, Levi Stubbs’ pleas of desire blur between elation and agony, as the music soars and glides around him. In writing the song, Lamont Dozier drew on memories of his grandfather, who used phrases like “sugar pie” and “honey bunch” while flirting with the women who’d come into Dozier’s grandmother’s beauty shop to get their hair done. As he later recalled, “I hear him saying, ‘Good morning, sugar pie.’ ‘How you doin’, honey bunch?’ That’s what started it.” —J.D. 

The Temptations, “Ain’t Too Proud to Beg” (1966)

When Norman Whitfield submitted this Temptations classic to Berry Gordy, the up-and-coming songwriter and producer was making a play to become the group’s main producer. Smokey Robinson had the title up to that point, having been behind hits like “My Girl.” Gordy wasn’t immediately sold on Whitfield’s hitmaking prowess, but Whitfield was not afraid to put up a fight. The song was turned down more than once at Motown’s quality-control meetings until the producer asked singer David Ruffin to sing above his register, making for a passionately strained, inspired performance, perfect for a song about fighting for the one you love. “Ain’t Too Proud to Beg” was released right after the Robinson-helmed “Get Ready,” and the track ended up being an immediate runaway success. —B.S.

The Marvelettes, “Please Mr. Postman” (1961)

The Marvelettes’ first single for Motown also happened to be the storied label’s first single to hit Number One. It remains a wonder, a lightning bolt of longing — conveyed with throaty urgency by lead singer Gladys Horton — that grabs you by the throat with that opening command (“WAIT!”) and refuses to let go for the next two and a half minutes. The drummer is ready to create an extra racket at a moment’s notice, playing crackling fills at seemingly every opportunity. Whenever Horton isn’t singing, and plenty of times when she is, the rest of the Marvelettes are thundering out high backing vocals behind her. For the last 45 seconds, in case the whole thing wasn’t ferocious enough already, the producers throw in an extra layer of hand claps, and Horton’s voice gains a raspy charge as she tears through the line “Check and see, one more time for me.” “Deliver the letter,” she adds. “The sooner, the better.” —E.L.

Stevie Wonder, “Living for the City” (1973)

“A boy is born in Hard Times, Mississippi,” Stevie Wonder begins his story: a hard-hitting seven-minute tale of black America’s bleak realities. The boy grows up in the South, trapped by racism and poverty. He can’t find a job (“Where he lives, they don’t use colored people”), so he hops a bus to New York. But he gets set up for a drug bust, goes to prison, and ends up back on the streets, full of bitter rage. Richard Pryor used to climax his 1970s stand-up set with his imitation of a black preacher turning his text to “The Book of Wonder,” then preaching the lyrics of “Living for the City.” [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Vymu584WGs] It always got laughs — but it also hurt. —R.S. 

The Supremes, “You Can’t Hurry Love” (1966)

In July 1966, angry that the past two Supremes singles had only gone Top 10, Berry Gordy issued a decree: Henceforth, the group would only release Number One singles. So Holland-Dozier-Holland combined the Supremes’ previous hit, “Come See About Me,” with the Fifties gospel number “You Can’t Hurry God” (by Dorothy Love Coates of the Original Gospel Harmonettes), tossed a traditional Motown “advice from mama” motif into the lyrics, and produced a Number One song to order. You may have to wait for love, but at Motown, at least, you can hurry a pop hit. —K.G. 

The Four Tops, “Reach Out I’ll Be There” (1966)

After the haunting flute line fades away at the start of “Reach Out,” the Four Tops join together in one big growl — that’s how strong their passion is. Then singer Levi Stubbs takes the lead, offering a hand to his girl as her world crumbles, promising that no matter what happens, he’ll always be there. “I wanted the song to explore the kinds of things women were going through and for Levi to come off as understanding and supportive,” Lamont Dozier, one of the song’s co-writers, remembered in The Wall Street Journal. “I also wanted the lyrics to be phrased in a special way — as though they were being thrown down.” Ultimately, the song was as sweet as it was intense. —K.G. 

The Jackson 5, “ABC” (1970)

For its second Jackson 5 single, after “I Want You Back,” Motown played it safe: Co-writer and co-producer Freddie Perren admitted later that he  and his collaborators simply took the chorus of “I Want You Back” and  made it the foundation for a new song. Similarities to its predecessor aside, “ABC” more than held its own. What could have been a mere novelty song with a love-as-education motif was elevated by the Funk Brothers’ kinetic musicianship and young Michael’s typically ecstatic lead vocal (especially in the breakout “I think I love you!” section). —D.B.

The Supremes, “Where Did Our Love Go” (1964)

The first Supremes song to top the charts, and the first of five consecutive Number One hits for the group, almost never got recorded. Lamont Dozier originally wrote the song with the Marvelettes in mind, but their singer Gladys Horton rejected it, as did the Supremes’ Mary Wilson. Dozier finally convinced Florence Ballard and Diana Ross to give it a shot, and after Dozier’s lush original arrangement was stripped down into something more urgent and direct, the brass at Motown quickly realized the song’s potential. “We put it out the next week, and it shot up the charts,” Dozier recently told Rolling Stone. ”It was shocking how fast it did that around the world. That made the Supremes a household name.” —J.D. 

Stevie Wonder, “Signed, Sealed, Delivered I’m Yours” (1970)

“Signed, Sealed, Delivered I’m Yours” is a love song of total commitment, delivered with total exuberance. It’s the first track that Wonder, not yet 20 during the sessions, produced on his own, though he got some help from a key source in its writing. Wonder says his mother, Lula Mae Hardaway, came up with the title phrase after hearing her son experiment with the song’s melody at the piano in their home on Greenlawn Street in Detroit. (She got co-writing credit, along with Syreeta Wright, who’d become Wonder’s first wife, Lee Garrett, a DJ and friend of Wonder’s, and Wonder himself.) Wonder’s vocal performance is one of his greatest. “Nobody can sing like he does,”  Elton John told Rolling Stone in 2010. “I know: I actually recorded a version of ‘Signed, Sealed, Delivered’ when I was young, and I really had to squeeze my balls to get those high notes.” —C.H.

Smokey Robinson and the Miracles, “I Second That Emotion” (1968)

Smokey Robinson got the idea for “I Second That Emotion” while Christmas shopping with co-writer Al Cleveland. When a store clerk said something nice to Cleveland, Cleveland misspoke, and instead of saying “I second that motion,” his words tumbled out as “I second that emotion.” “The girl and him and me laughed,” Robinson told Rolling Stone, “and then we were walking out of the store, and I said, ‘Hey, man, that’s a hell of an idea for a song.'” Robinson made it even more clever by composing it as an upbeat tune about a guy rejecting a one-night stand because he prefers “a lifetime of devotion,” a very mature outlook for a three-minute pop song. —K.G. 

Marvin Gaye, “I Heard It Through the Grapevine” (1968)

This Norman Whitfield/Barrett Strong song was clearly going to be a hit. The question was, whose? The Miracles cut their version first, then Marvin Gaye gave it a go. Gladys Knight and the Pips’ straightforwardly aggrieved funk raver got the nod. And it was a hit. But though Gaye’s take was relegated to an album track, DJs and fans heard something snakily menacing in its groove, something haunting and tortured in how he (reluctantly, at Whitfield’s insistence) stretched out of his regular vocal range to capture a pain the lyric only suggested. —K.H. 

Smokey Robinson and the Miracles, “The Tears of a Clown” (1967)

One year, at Motown’s annual Christmas party, Stevie Wonder approached Smokey Robinson and told him about a track he’d just finished recording but hadn’t written words for. Robinson took it home and the song’s bright, swirling melody immediately made him think of a circus. As Robinson later recalled, he wondered, “What can I write about the circus that’s going to touch people’s hearts? Can’t write about the animals. People love animals, but what’s that got to do with touching people’s hearts, unless I write something tragic about an animal.” He eventually landed on the idea of a sad clown; “Tears of a Clown” appeared on the Miracles’ 1967 album Make It Happen, but wasn’t released as a single until 1970, when it went to the top of the charts in the U.S. and U.K. —J.D.

Martha and the Vandellas, “Dancing in the Street” (1965)

Martha Reeves calls out around the world with a question: “Are you ready for a brand new beat?” The world has been moving to “Dancing in the Street” ever since. Martha and the Vandellas make it a utopian celebration of one nation under a groove, shouting out to Philly, Chicago, New Orleans, D.C., and can’t forget the Motor City. But it was also a complex challenge to an America still reluctant to share those streets with black bodies. When Detroit went up in flames in the summer of 1967, rising up against trigger-happy cops, “Dancing in the Street” took on a new meaning as a call to arms. The Rolling Stones turned it into “Street Fighting Man,” Bruce Springsteen turned it into “Racing in the Street,” and David Bowie and Mick Jagger turned it into one of the Eighties’ freakiest videos. —R.S.

The Jackson 5, “I Want You Back” (1969)

The Jackson 5’s rocket-launch of a debut single was originally demoed for Gladys Knight and the Pips and titled “I Wanna Be Free.” Motown head Berry Gordy Jr. repurposed it for a new vocal group of five brothers he’d just signed. With a piano intro that grabbed you by the lapel and wouldn’t let go, and the charisma-bomb vocals of 11-year-old Michael leading the charge, “I Want You Back” was bubblegum funk pop at its most exuberant, introducing America to the Jacksons and establishing a rock-solid relationship between the group and the Corporation, a team of writers (including Gordy) who wrote many early J5 hits. Almost overnight, the family band from Gary, Indiana, went from school kids to superstars, touring the world and being chased through airports by crazed fans. “In school, we’d been learning about the Eiffel Tower, Buckingham Palace, the Statue of Liberty, and so on.,” Tito Jackson later recalled. “Then suddenly we were going back to class with pictures of us in all these places.” —J.D. 

The Supremes, “You Keep Me Hangin’ On” (1967)

By 1966, Supremes singles had already reached the top of the pop chart seven times, but songwriters Holland-Dozier-Holland decided the time had come for a change; the trio needed an injection of rock & roll edge to keep up with the times. Starting with its Morse code-inspired guitar intro, “You Keep Me Hangin’ On” was their answer, and mission accomplished. Ditching the flirty buoyance of the early Supremes hits, the magnificent “You Keep Me Hangin’ On” was three minutes of relentless, haunted desperation, pushed along by a beat that never let up. According to Lamont Dozier, Diana Ross’ brief spoken interjection — “And there ain’t nothing I can do about it” — was improvised in the studio. “We wanted to make it believable, add some everyday talk, like the girl was really going through this predicament,” he said. “When you get to a certain point with a situation, you realize, ‘Hey, there ain’t nothing I can do about it.’” —D.B. 

The Temptations, “My Girl” (1964)

“The Temptations inspired ‘My Girl’,” Smokey Robinson told Rolling Stone’s Brian Hiatt in a 2020 episode of the Rolling Stone Music Now podcast. “If not for the Temptations I probably never even would’ve even written ‘My Girl.’” Amid Motown’s hothouse creative environment, Robinson was looking for a different kind of song to offer the label’s preeminent male vocal group and came up with the somewhat contrary notion of writing a sweet romantic tune and having David Ruffin, the group’s gruffest-sounding singer and a new member at the time, take the lead vocal. The result was the group’s first Number One single, Motown’s first Number One by a male group, and easily one of the most perfect distillations of romantic fulfillment ever recorded. Over the years, many people have assumed Robinson wrote the song for his own group, the Miracles, but as he told Hiatt, “I was just trying to write a sweet song for David Ruffin to sing for the girls.” —J.D.

Stevie Wonder, “Superstition” (1972)

On “Superstition,” Stevie Wonder’s inspiration arrived in the form of a loose drum line played, improbably, by guitar virtuoso Jeff Beck. “Stevie came kinda boogieing into the studio: ‘Don’t stop,'” the guitarist remembered. “‘Ah, c’mon, Stevie, I can’t play the drums.’ Then the lick came out: ‘Superstition.'” Wonder played the funky line on a Clavinet and ended up layering his own Moog bass and drums, while guest musicians played the horn line. Wonder then finished it off with lyrics about falling ladders, broken mirrors, and believing “in things that you don’t understand.” Wonder told Beck he could have the song as a thank you for playing on his Talking Book LP, but it ended up being bad luck for the guitarist, since Motown’s Berry Gordy liked it so much he rushed out Wonder’s recording first — and it went to Number One. —K.G. 

Martha and the Vandellas, “Heat Wave” (1963)

“Heat Wave” is a Motown masterwork before Martha and the Vandellas even open their mouths to sing. It’s an all-time peak for the Motown house band, the Funk Brothers, especially the drums — the legendary Pistol Allen on the run of his life, with the beat even Keith Moon tried and failed to copy. (You might say Moon was just one of the many drummers who spent a lifetime chasing “Heat Wave.”) The double-team attack of Allen and bassist James Jamerson kicks off “Heat Wave” at full blast — but then Martha Reeves takes over, a former Motown secretary flexing one of the Sixties’ toughest voices, testifying to a love that burns. It all explodes in the apocalyptic final minute, as Reeves belts “Yeah yeah, yeah yeah,” and the Vandellas cheer her on (“Go ahead, girl!”). “Heat Wave” was more than a hit — it was a manifesto, from a team of black kids making sure the world would never, ever be able to ignore them again. —R.S.

Marvin Gaye, “What’s Going On” (1971)

Marvin Gaye spent most of the Sixties as the Prince of Motown, belting out timeless love songs both on his own and with duet partners such as Tammi Terrell. But by the end of the decade, following Terrell’s onstage collapse and his brother Frankie’s harrowing tour in Vietnam, his world had started to unravel, mirroring the troubled state of the nation. So when Four Tops member Renaldo “Obie” Benson brought the singer a song he’d been working on, inspired by seeing police attacking protesters in Berkeley’s People’s Park, Gaye knew he’d found the perfect vehicle to express his growing concern. The resulting track brought together sumptuous strings courtesy of the Detroit Symphony Orchestra with the supple bounce of Motown’s legendary Funk Brothers, framing Gaye’s own yearning multitracked vocals and pointed social commentary (“Picket lines/Picket signs/Don’t punish me/With brutality”). Berry Gordy initially thought Gaye was making a huge mistake by speaking his mind in song, but “What’s Going On” turned out to be one of the most iconic, and perennially relevant, tracks in the Motown catalog. Benson, who brought the song to the Four Tops before Gaye, later reflected on how his bandmates and many others misread the message of “What’s Going On.” “My partners told me it was a protest song,” he recalled to writer Ben Edmonds. “I said, ‘No, man, it’s a love song, about love and understanding. I’m not protesting. I want to know what’s going on.'” —H.S.

The Temptations, “Papa Was a Rollin’ Stone” (1972)

Motown’s golden era culminated in its most visionary classic, “Papa Was a Rollin’ Stone.” The Temptations, with producers-songwriters Norman Whitfield and Barrett Strong, made this a seven-minute epic, as ambitious and radical as Hitsville U.S.A. ever got. But it was also a Number One hit — and that combo is the ultimate Motown ideal. “Papa Was a Rollin’ Stone” remains as shocking now as it was then — a tour of America as a land of broken promises and shattered dreams.

“Papa” self-consciously takes in all of black music — it starts with In a Silent Way-era Miles Davis, then fierce blues guitar, jazz trumpet, cinematic strings. Yet it all comes down to that heartbeat bass — as Greil Marcus called it in Rolling Stone, “the most dramatic bass line in all of rock & roll.” It’s steeped in African American rage, with that blues sense of being born into a country that’s already rejected you. Its shattering punch line? “When he died, all he left us was alone.”

At seven minutes, “Papa” was supposed to be too long for radio — but like “American Pie” or “Bohemian Rhapsody,” it raised the stakes and changed how people heard pop music forever. “Papa” still sounds like the whole Motown story in one song — and maybe also the story of this country. —R.S.

Smokey Robinson and the Miracles, “The Tracks of My Tears” (1965)

The genius of Smokey Robinson, perfectly captured in three minutes. Only one songwriter could craft a heartbreak ballad as anguished as “The Tracks of My Tears,” and only one singer could wring so much emotion out of those high notes. And they were the same person. Every songwriter alive wanted to be Smokey in 1965, and songs like this are why. 

Smokey was the foundation of the whole Motown empire. He cranked out hits for the label’s artists, as well as the Miracles. When Berry Gordy founded Motown, he put his motto right on the label: “The Sound of Young America.” But Smokey wrote the tunes that made that vision come true. As he told Rolling Stone in 1968 (in a profile calling him “the reigning genius of Top 40”), “It has to be something that really means something, not just a bunch of words on music.” He was worshipped by peers like the Beatles, who always said they were just trying to “do a Smokey,” or Bob Dylan, who basically made a Smokey tribute album with Blonde on Blonde. 

“The Tracks of My Tears,” like so many of his classics, is a pained confession. As he told Rolling Stone’s David Browne, “One day I was looking in the mirror and said, ‘What if a person would cry so much that you see tracks of their tears in their face?’” His co-writer Marv Tarplin plays that delicate guitar intro, the Miracles come in with sweet doo-wop harmonies, and then Smokey sighs, “People say I’m the life of the party/‘Cause I tell a joke or two.” This song is Smokey at his best, which means it’s also Motown at its best. And one thing never changes — even after all these years, nobody can sing Smokey like Smokey. A national treasure, then and now and forever. —R.S.