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Tamla T 54053 (B), December 1961
B-side of What’s So Good About Good Bye
(Written by Smokey Robinson)
Fontana H 384 (B) – February 1962
B-side of What’s So Good About Good Bye
(Released in the UK under license through Fontana Records)
Like the A-side What’s So Good About Good Bye, this is another Miracles song which flatters to deceive; ultimately there’s rather less going on here than first meets the ear.
What first meets the ear is, like the A-side, quite pleasing; the band sound more proficient, the vocals are good, there’s a slight sheen of MOR cheese glistening on the surface which does it little credit but on the whole it sounds rather pretty.
What it doesn’t sound like is a hit record, not for the end of 1961. Indeed, I don’t think I’d be exaggerating to say that for me this is the most forgettable of all the Miracles sides that had appeared so far.
(And I mean that word in its dictionary sense, rather than a lazy synonym for “worst” – I mean I find myself hard-pressed to even remember what this sounds like even half an hour after listening to it, something which hasn’t really happened so far with any of the Miracles’ other records. Even the crap ones – I Love Your Baby might be rubbish, but I can definitely remember the thing.)
So, yeah. This is a slick, smooth, horn-heavy bit of late-period doo-wop/R&B, surprisingly straightforward in structure, repetitive in the extreme – there’s almost no chorus at all to speak of, the song consisting of an endless rotation of verses, occasionally punctuated by a high tenor/falsetto vocal mini-bridge from Smokey Robinson, but otherwise there’s just nothing at all happening here to hold the interest.
On further reflection, actually, it’s quite similar in many respects to the only other Miracles side so far that comes close in terms of lack of substance, The Only One I Love, another arpeggio-driven downtempo B-side which featured Smokey trilling at the top of his range to break up the verses.
So, it’s quite pretty, but utterly pedestrian. Which (once again) isn’t to say it’s dreadful, it’s just… there, which is really not good enough by the rarified standards set by Miracles records.
Once more I find myself feeling as though I’ve been harsh, as though I’ve been judging Smokey Robinson’s music on a different scale to that of, say, Mickey Woods, whose one half-competent B-side, (They Call Me) Cupid, appears to have got a better review than this record, even though by most objective measurements you’d care to apply, it’s vastly inferior. The point is that Smokey’s “off days” are better than a lot of people’s “on” days, but to me that means I’m entitled to expect more than this.
(Truth be told, if I were picking out the best pop music of Motown’s 1961 release schedule, confronted with both this and the aforementioned Mickey Woods B-side, I wouldn’t spend my time listening to either record, because neither of them really “does it” for me; but this is more disappointing than the Woods record, because I know the Miracles were capable of so much more whereas Woods never seems to have been. This, for readers coming to the site late, is where I first decided I should start doling out marks out of ten, to be clearer about this sort of thing (well, that and to provoke debate…) even though the marks aren’t really meant to be relative, more an indication of how I was feeling about the records at that particular time. But this is a digression.)
So. I’ve Been Good To You. Sounds nice, not dismal by any means, couldn’t possibly tell you what it’s about, couldn’t sing it back to you right now if you paid me. This single’s A-side helped revive the Miracles’ commercial fortunes by pushing them back up into the higher reaches of the charts, but taking both sides into consideration, it has to rank as the weakest of all their singles to date.
VERDICT
* * * * * * * * * *
5 / 10
(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!)
COVERWATCH
Motown Junkies has reviewed other Motown versions of this song:
- Brenda Holloway (February 1965)
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.
(Or maybe you’re only interested in Smokey Robinson & the Miracles? Click for more.)
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| The Miracles “What’s So Good About Goodbye” |
The Twistin’ Kings “Congo (Part 1)” |
Motown Junkies 
Once again I loved your review. It’s important to start out that way because my feelings about this track are quite distinct from yours.
Being the very end of 61, it’s a good time to sum up. At this point Smokey has put out nine singles, including the Ron & Bill thing, a total of eighteen tracks. For me the clear highlights are Bad To Me, Shop Around and…….. this track!!! Even more, this is my clear favorite over the other two!! I don’t argue with any of the particulars about the track you mentioned. Your description is quite accurate. I only differ in my response to the track when listening to it. Clearly Smokey himself thought it had possibilities (perhaps even regretting putting it on a flip side) since he produced at least three other artists re-recordings of it, perhaps as many as five, I really don’t recall. In any event, their versions simply point up the accuracy of everything you’ve said. When I listen to the other versions, if I even make it very far before quitting, it’s very clear that there is not much there. But I’m transfixed by Smokey’s original. Maybe what makes it so satisfying, so great for me is the one thing Smokey couldn’t offer the other artists he gave it to, namely Smokey himself. In spite of everything you’ve said, which, again, I agree with (!!!) this track is, for me, a 10 (?????) go figure (but then, I like Schoenberg too)
Let me hit your point about there being not much there, and it not being hit-worthy, or memorable, from a different vantage point. There’s no hook (!!). Not in the lyric, not in the tune, not in the arrangement, not in the vocals. No hook at all. Nothing to hold onto, nothing to remember, nothing to distinguish it from a hundred others.
So, again, the question is if I am not drawn in by some hook or other, what draws me in. And again, the answer is simple. It’s the pure intensity of the vocal. That being the case, the lack of a hook is for me a virtue, as it would only distract from one of my favorite Smokey performances ever. As for not being memorable, that’s fine with me, I don’t want an aftertaste when I eat fine chocolate either. 🙂
Once again thanks for a stellar review and for reminding me of one of my favorite forgotten tracks.
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re: the above
I hope readers realize that in the last paragraph when I say there is “no hoot” I meant “hook” 🙂
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I amended it for you (because I’m nice like that), but I think “there’s no hoot!” is, in its way, an equally valid criticism of this one… 🙂
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>I amended it for you
Can you fix mine too? I’m so used to hitting a “post” button and THEN proofreading!
Also, from this to Schoenberg!! I was going to make a joke about this being composed with the “7-tone method” but then I heard the #4 in II7 near the end of the bridge.
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At first I heard this song as sounding like John Lennon in general, but you’ve nailed it on Sexy Sadie – for example “you made a fool of every o- o- o- one …”.
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WordPress doesn’t let visitors edit comments unfortunately (and the interface for me has become much more unwieldy since that time!) but I’ll fix them when I can 🙂
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It may be interesting to note that John Lennon, in a 1969 interview, singled out this track as one of his very favorite records.
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Which just goes to show how subjective these things are, really. With no exaggeration whatsoever, I have literally no recollection of what this sounds like at all – without listening to it again, I honestly couldn’t sing this back to you now if you had a crossbow pointed at my head.
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>”It may be interesting to note that John Lennon, in a 1969 interview, singled out this track as one of his very favorite records.”
As I listened to it I was getting that impression strongly, although I couldn’t hear any specific part that he re-used.
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Here’s a way you might get a handle on this one.
Lennon didn’t just admire this track, he used it. Sexy Sadie from the White Album is clearly a 100% homage to it. Both lyrically and musically it’s essentially the same (albeit with special Lennon magic added). It’s the first thing I thought of the first time I heard Sadie. So I was hardly surprised when I later read how much affection he had for the original.
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“Essentially the same”? Buh? Lyrically, I’ll grant you – I’d never have picked up on that on my own, but yes, you’re absolutely right, listening to both records again there are entire phrases Lennon clearly nicked wholesale.
But musically? I’m just not buying that. Sexy Sadie is full of weird, beautiful things (chord changes, vocal ideas, messing around with off-time and off-key elements, airy flights up the scale, lengthy instrumental passages) that just aren’t found on this record; even the rough draft on Anthology 3 doesn’t really sound anything like this to my ears. I think it’s a real stretch to claim they’re essentially the same song just because one clearly “borrows” great swathes of lyrics from the other; if they were both sung in Portuguese, I’m not convinced I’d ever notice a connection at all.
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Just to fill out this discussion, note that this track is one of 5 Miracles tracks on John Lennon’s “Jukebox” list. I agree that it’s not really so much a song as a doowop vamp (with a middle section that inverts the progression) to showcase Smokey’s vocal soloing. (the other 4 are Tracks of My Tears, I’ve Been Good to You and What’s So Good About Goodbye and Shop Around, and the list dates from 1966). If we were thinking in terms of larger musical structures rather than “songs”, this might be a “vocal solo” in a larger piece.
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I know there isn’t any remedy, but I keep bumping up against the fact that it helps to have been there, in the moment, in the context of terrible competing songs on Top 40 radio. Play Mack the Knife by Bobby Darin and then this. If I played a WW1 era song, there’s just no way I can appreciate it as my grandmother might have, she would undoubtedly be smiling with memories, I would be hearing a one-dimensional record.
I’ll try to refrain next time…..try, I said.
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Fair enough Mr. Nixon. 🙂
Yet, it is the first thing I thought of when I heard Sadie. And although the lyrics are what sold it for me, if it were only the lyrics I would never have made the connection, since the sentiments are pretty typical pop sentiments. It was the combination of the lyrics and the tortured way it trundles forward, almost dirge like that made the connection for me initially. Clearly Lennon had a taste for this sort of thing as it’s all over his White Album stuff (not to mention Walrus). But when I got to Sadie it suddenly seemed to me to answer the unasked question,
“where is all this dirge-stuff coming from?” as this record has a lot of that quality as well. Objective or verifiable?
of course not, but as I say, I was not surprised at all by the time I read the interview where he named it a favorite record of his.
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Apparently DARYL HALL loved this Miracles song TOO !!
On his YouTube series, “LIVE FROM DARYL’S HOUSE, he had Miracles’ lead singer Smokey Robinson as a special guest, and he and his band did several Miracles hits, including…..
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I think you gave this pretty good quality Miracles’ ballad a “5” because it’s an average Motown song. But an average MOTOWN song, and an average Miracles’ song is quite a bit better than an “average” song. I give this one a “7”. But, then, I’m old enough to have been a mid teenager when this was out, so, I could well be the same age as a lot of your readers’ grandparents.
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