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Miracle MIR 9 (B), October 1961
B-side of Angel In Blue
(Written by Janie Bradford and Berry Gordy)
If the A-side Angel In Blue had been baffling, a spoken-word parable delivered by white radio DJ Joel Sebastian as some sort of ego-massaging favour, a throwaway offer (“come round some time, we’ll cut a record on you!”) which somehow got out of hand, then this B-side is even odder. Conceived as a downtempo ballad, Sebastian can’t decide whether he should be singing or just reading the lyrics, and the result is two excruciatingly painful minutes of ham and cheese.
Like the A-side, there’s the germ of a half-decent song buried in here. This one is musically reminiscent in places of the Marvelettes’ lovely Forever a couple of years later, although some of the rhymes and half-rhymes are a tad forced – using the word Cinderella at the end of a line really limits your options, though Bradford and Gordy give it their best shot (made harder when, at one point, Sebastian inexplicably substitutes “told her” for the presumably intended “tell her”, proving he had literally no idea what he was doing) – but in someone else’s hands, it might have been salvageable. While the song isn’t too bad, however, it’s “sung” – and I use that term in the loosest possible sense – so very poorly that it’s a terrible record.
Sebastian’s singing voice is just appalling, a sort of high bass but flat and tuneless beyond redemption, and so he keeps reverting to his “dramatic” hammy spoken-word comfort zone, only to decide that he wants to sing the next couple of lines, only to give up when it’s not working, and so on for the entire duration of the record. The result is a laughable up-and-down mess that makes Sebastian sound as though he’s doing an awful William Shatner impression.
In many ways, these two sides are the polar opposite to Pete Hartfield’s Love Me – there, an obviously talented singer gave a great vocal delivery in the service of some massively subpar material, whereas here, Sebastian is given better songs (or, well, if not “better” then more promising, or perhaps intriguing at the very least), but torpedoes them so completely they’re hopelessly ruined.
You can just imagine Berry Gordy sitting in the producer’s chair trying desperately not to wince as Sebastian mangled his song so horribly – “no, no, Joel, that was great, really great, it’s gonna be a big hit” – his face getting sore from holding that fake smile in place as he internally tried to calculate how much money he was about to lose on this farce.
Nobody in their right mind would ever want to listen to this more than once.
MOTOWN JUNKIES VERDICT
(I’ve had MY say, now it’s your turn. Agree? Disagree? Leave a comment, or click the thumbs at the bottom there. Dissent is encouraged!)
You’re reading Motown Junkies, an attempt to review every Motown A- and B-side ever released. Click on the “previous” and “next” buttons below to go back and forth through the catalogue, or visit the Master Index for a full list of reviews so far.
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| Joel Sebastian “Angel In Blue” |
Mary Wells “Strange Love” |
Motown Junkies 
I bought this record in 1962. I listened to both sides once. I still have the record (as I collect all Motown singles from 1959-1972). I’ve never listened to either side even a second time.
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Listening back to this (yes, yes, I know), it’s actually more Adam West (as Batman) than William Shatner.
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Excruciatingly bad! This ranks right up there (or should that be down there) with the best (or is that worst) of Dr. Demento. This song is on a par with Telly Savalas singing???? “If”. However, for me this song has one saving grace & this is that after all of these years of searching, I’ve finally found someone who sings worse than I do.
Yea for me!!!
But that’s STILL not enough to excuse how horrible this song is!
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It’s literally – literally – the worst singing I’ve ever heard. He makes Lee Marvin sound like Carreras.
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One upside: the girls on backgrounds (sounds like The Andantes) sound wonderful.
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What makes them sound any more like The Andantes than The Beljeans, Supremes, Vandellas or an ad-hoc trio of Motown female singers? There’s little individuality in their chorus parts.
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Actually, I have read many times that The Supremes sang backgrounds on both sides of this record (or was that the Don McKenzie?). I’m even losing long-term memories now. It’s no fun getting old, that is, until one is too old to realise that he is deteriorating quickly.
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I really fail to see how one can possibly dislike a tune where “Cinderella” rhymes with “fella”! I just heard this (more than once!) and it really struck a chord in me, I absolutely love it, I can’t stop replaying and, embarrassingly enough, singing it! The “Blue Angel” is fairly indifferent indeed, but this is another matter altogether. There is actually not as much narration here as the reviewer says, and what little there is ties perfectly with the singing. What the reviewer calls ” ‘dramatic’ and hammy” I would simply call dramatic in an admirably controlled way (and without the quotes). But then I am generally a sucker for the grand style, so… The overall manner reminded me of Oscar Brown Jr.’s “Brother Where Are You”, a record I cherish and esteem and just decided to listen to one more time! I would really love to know more about the completely unknown Mr. Sebastian and, contrary to what seems to be the prevailing sentiment here, I wholeheartedly applaud his claim to fame! Hurray, then, for “Blue Cinderella” and, of course, her fella!
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