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Motown M 1048 (AA), August 1963
b/w You Lost The Sweetest Boy
(Written by Smokey Robinson)
Stateside SS 242 (B), November 1963
B-side of You Lost The Sweetest Boy
(Released in the UK under license through Stateside Records)
Mary Wells’ only double-sided hit, which seems strangely appropriate on this occasion; this is one of those instances where the two sides of a single complement each other to form a whole that’s somehow greater than the sum of its parts. If this review starts to read as though I’m winning some kind of bet every time I use the phrase “like the A-side”, or some variation thereof, well, please forgive me.
What’s Easy For Two Is So Hard For One isn’t usually cited as a stepping stone between her earlier Smokey Robinson-penned calypso-inflected hits and her million-selling Motown swansong My Guy, but that’s all I can ever hear when I’m listening to it.
Perhaps it’s just that near-identical rhythm pattern and horn riff, complete with a drum fill leading up to (and down from) a heavy dead-stop caesura – bom ba bom ba bom / ba bom ba-bom ba-bom / ba BOM BOM (BOM BOM!)… – which always prompts me, in Pavlovian reaction style, to start singing along with the wrong lyrics – Nothing you can say / can tear me away / from my guy (my guy!). Whatever it is, even though this lacks the beautiful chord progression of its successor, I can’t stop myself trying to sing the main line of the later mega-hit over the main line of this earlier, much smaller hit.
My Guy, apart from being a brilliant song on almost every level, always seemed to me to be a distillation of many of the musical ideas tried out here in kernel form by Smokey, along with many of those tried out by the Holland-Dozier-Holland team on the A-side, You Lost The Sweetest Boy; neither side here is completely successful, but Smokey Robinson was the most astute polisher of ideas in all of pop history, repeatedly finding new songs by going back to fix his own previous efforts with new ideas he’d had on subsequent listens. As You’ve Really Got A Hold On Me is to A Love She Can Count On, so You Lost The Sweetest Boy and What’s Easy For Two are to My Guy – combined, distilled, filtered and polished to within an inch of their lives.
But that’s quite enough about My Guy. What of this record’s own merits?
The title always struck me as misleading, like it belongs to a more ponderous ballad. It doesn’t – this is a breezy, uptempo, handclap-heavy R&B-pop jaunt, and while it’s not as frantic or entertaining as the A-side, nor is it anything like Mary’s previous Smokey-penned calypso-style midtempo hits; here, they’re definitely trying something new.
(It’s actually a bad choice of title – the lyrics feature a different phrase, What two can easily do, repeated twice back-to-back in the chorus, which would have made a much better title.) It’s interesting, because this is the one that’s always described as being more conventional than the rollicking, invigorating ideas-gumbo of the A-side, when really it’s just as experimental (of which more later); it just somehow “feels” more straightforward, and I can’t pin down why that is, but the title – which sounds like a Jo Stafford pop hit from 1952 or something – is certainly a part of it.
In my mind, whenever I sing the chorus of this to myself in my head – not the energetic verses, mind you, just the chorus (featuring Mary and the backing vocals taking back control of the tempo from the band, Mary letting the backing singers do the heavy lifting as she smoulders over the top with a smooth-as-silk delivery, breaking into her breathy, almost spoken-word style with a staccato, near-acapella section at the end: What two can easily do / What two can easily do / Is so hard / To be done / By one) – it somehow always comes out at about half speed, again as though this were a ballad. For some reason, the chorus has always sounded to me as though it should appear in a much slower, more stately song. Not sure why. I’m digressing. Let me cut to the chase.
This is a record full of ideas for the future career of Mary Wells, none of them fully-realised yet, most of them being tried out once and then discarded, to the extent that it sounds like four or five different songs all smooshed together with no great care – but that’s not necessarily a bad thing in itself. The lyrics, an early precursor to Marvin Gaye and Kim Weston’s It Takes Two, are throwaway fluff, but Mary – showing more nuances of character than on the belting A-side – has a ball with them, throwing in pretty much her entire bag of vocal tricks, running the gamut from breathy to sultry to idiosyncratic to full-voiced to smirkingly well-acted to heartbreakingly sincere. If there were such a thing as a showreel for aspiring singers, this would be what Mary Wells sent out when auditioning for parts, containing as it does a couple of seconds of just about everything she could do.
Still, What’s Easy For Two shares a couple of less welcome features with the A-side, too. The pounding instrumental intro is the best thing about the entire record – organ riff, handclaps and stomps aplenty, starting out right on the beat with no warning, just straight in, BANG BANG BANG BANG in a four-to-the-floor dancefloor assault that’s over too soon, very quickly paring the drums back and moving to a breezier bass-driven rhythm with handclaps on the second beat – but it sets a tone that again threatens to sideline Mary on her own single. As this is a record of putative ideas, that avenue gets explored too. Just as Mary’s given plenty of opportunities to shine vocally, so is she also occasionally pushed right back into the mix, in favour of either the band or the gospel-style backing vocals as featured on You Lost The Sweetest Boy.
Most importantly, perhaps, the fact that I can’t help but compare it to a string of other records, including its singer’s most famous record, seems to bear out my theory that the song doesn’t have much an identity of its own. Perhaps confused by the various different approaches taken throughout, or perhaps just lost in Smokey’s overwhelming efforts to construct a coherent song out of all these ideas and thus ironically coming across more conservative than the record really is, it all seems somehow inessential, both in tune and concept; like the A-side, it’s just not quite right.
Still -and again, just like the A-side – that’s not to say it’s not fun on its own terms. The American public thought so, sending it into the R&B Top Ten and pop Top 30 in its own right (probably at the expense of You Lost The Sweetest Boy), and deservedly so, even if the A-side didn’t deserve to be pulled back by its own flip, and even if this is one of the few Mary Wells records that doesn’t sound as though it should have charted any higher than that.
Like the A-side*, this is fun without ever sounding in danger of becoming a classic; if it’s not quite as strong as You Lost The Sweetest Boy (and it isn’t), it’s nonetheless a good, enjoyable Mary Wells record, which is praise enough in its own right.
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!)
* (Ten times, if anyone was keeping score.)
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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Motown Junkies 
This song deserves at least a 9! – For the spacious, easy humanity, for the simple – and slightly – erotic tone of the irresistible invitation – for its celebration of the simple availability of those joys which make life worth living. I am STUPEFIED that you rate this song lower than Never Again, or those Henry Lumpkin songs (which I’m pleased to have heard, but really!) Of course, that’s what makes this site so wonderfully addictive – the different ways in which a song intersects with our sensibilities – but yours are so fine-tuned that, in this case, I’m baffled and chagrined.
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De gustibus non est disputandum, and all that. I’m honestly not hearing any of what you mention; to me it sounds cluttered rather than spacious, facile rather than celebratory. I think it’s good fun, but while with some of these reviews much depends on how I feel on the day (the A-side could have been higher for instance), I can’t imagine finding hidden depths in this one. To each their own – I’m just one voice, and that’s why the comments section is here!
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— And to me, what you hear as ‘facility’ is the ‘unbearable lightness of being…’ But I don’t mean to be disputatious – I just want everyone to love what I love, and can be quite unreasonable about it… It breaks my heart that my wife doesn’t like the Brahms Clarinet Quintet as much as I do, but that’s nothing to the joy we get from sharing something by Mahler, Verdi… or Reach Out I’ll Be There; by the same token your columns on Heat Wave and I’ll Try Something New more than console me for not being on the same wavelength as you in this case….
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I apologize for my somewhat intemperate reaction! I’ve been telling myself that it’s the column, not the grade, which counts (what’s in the grooves)… unfortunately we’re so conditioned to prize evaluation over insight – it was as if I myself had come home from school with a disappointing report card! But shame on me for using Mary as a stick to beat Henry Lumpkin with; henceforth I promise not to splutter quite so indignantly.And even though I still passionately differ with you about the song’s ultimate value, I learned a lot from your column – paradoxically, you’ve made me appreciate the song even more than before.
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No apologies necessary – “dissent is encouraged”, as it says on every page! ‘Splutter’ away to your heart’s content, your contributions are always very much appreciated.
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The one major fault with this song is Smokey’s attempt to graft his usual 1962 Carib conga beats onto it, which has a slightly different rhythm. The effect, in the first two verses, is jarring. Otherwise, not a bad number.
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To me, it sounded like bongos (maybe Stevie Wonder’s?) but whatever the instrument, it seemed totally incongruous with musical theme of the song and had no reason to be there.
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This is the first Mary Wells record that I have genuine childhood memories attached to (the others I would catch up with soon enough). 4th grade, 9 years old, Frankford section of Philadelphia, the elevated train to school every day, the little sandwich shop where I played this on the jukebox, right across the street from the hospital my kid brother was born in, in May. When that week came, my sister and I were staying with my aunt and uncle who drove us to school every day, with “My Guy” ceaselessly on the radio (along with the Dixie Cups’ “Chapel Of Love.”) In fact, “My Guy” was at the top of Billboard the week my brother was born.
I love your essay on the song, do not quibble with your grade, but have to give it an 8 myself, just out of affection, and how this wishful, optimistic song takes me back to a time when my greatest worry was whether my homework was done. 🙂
Mary’s gonna be gone so soon now. The one 20th Century single I always owned (still do) since 1965 was “He’s A Lover.” I know you’re not reviewing that stuff, but it’s a marvelous song, a perfect fit for her voice, which defends her man from a state of obvious contentment, paced and structured in a way I think Smokey would have approved. Not the Motown sound, but it has the same enduring charm.
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When I started the site, I had every intention of allowing people free rein to discuss every entry from a musical perspective, but never imagined so many great personal stories would also follow. Thanks for sharing, Dave, as always!
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It’s hard to separate my objective assessment of this disc with the subjective memories of being absolutely obsessed with it when I purchased it at age 12. I’d already bought one other Motown 45 by then (“Heat Wave”), and loved it, but I kept spinning this one repeatedly for weeks. I didn’t even know “You Lost the Sweetest Boy” was the intended A side; in L.A., they only played the flip on KRLA, the best radio station in town.
I’d probably give this the same score as you if I’d had heard it later in life, but this was definitely a “9” for me at the time! I was going through a tough time–my father was dating (and would soon marry) a woman I didn’t care for–and I found refuge in my pop records. The bouncy, carefree vibe of this single saw me through many conflicted days.
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Like Nick in Pasadina, I thought KRLA was the best station in LA. In fact, I first heard YLTSB on KRLA where it charted in Oct’63. It stalled out at #32 in Nov. “What’s Easy…” Didn’t chart on KRLA untill Jan 11,1964 but got up to #12. The other station in town KFWB also played
YLTSB in Oct-Nov ’63 where it peaked @ “27.
“What’s Easy..” Charted on KFWB Jan 25 and got up to
#20. Altogether a 7 month run for Motown 1048 in LA.
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Cmon, give Mary a little more love here!! 3rd best song in her catalog behind My Guy and The ONe Who Really Loves You.
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While I can’t agree, I’d hasten to add none of the things that stopped me giving this a higher mark are anything to do with Mary – I tried to single her out for individual praise in the review for that very reason!
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KGFJ was the best station in L.A., like KDIA was in San Francisco/Oakland, and WVON in Chicago and WDIA in Memphis.
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In Miami, Fl YLTSB was the A side & got up to #12 on the Pop radio stations & #2 on the Soul Stations WEFT was played in early ’64 & did about the same from what I remember. On Billboards Hot 100 Whats Easy was on the chart for 17 weeks!
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Since I just got the Marvelettes “Fovermore” set, I have to comment on their version of this song. I like Mary’s version, but theirs is pretty good too.
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That organ swings like a pendulum do! (Earl Van Dyke?)
There is nothing between 1960-1964 by Mary i don’t like (well “Oh, Little Boy” took some getting use to)and at first i thought you were being unfair with your ratings. Then i took down the 2-disk set Motown Universal issued after her death and realized it wasnt about the ratings—your evaluations are dead on. Thanks for the reawakening and if anyoneis interested in Mary post-Motown look no further that the 1965 Atco Single “Dear Lover” produced by Carl Davis and the 1968 Jubilee single “The Doctor” co-written by her husband Cecil Womack.
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How can you give this only “6”. I’d give it at LEAST “8”. I see that you don’t like Calypso beats or other slower midtempos all that much.
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I just love the happy beat of this song. It gets your toes a-tappin’. An easy “8” to this junkie.
Hey, did anyone else notice that the title in The Complete Motown Singles is “What’s Easy For Two So Is Hard For One”?
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I am the one that like this better than the A side? I do realize why this was put on the B side but it definitely stand up to the test of time better than the A side. This one is a lot more jazzy
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From the day the record was released I’ve always preferred this to the A side. And when it started stealing chart momentum from “You Lost the Sweetest Boy”, Motown execs began thinking this was this bouncy, sweetly swinging Smokey style was the one to go with for her next A side. Result: Mary’s masterpiece “My Guy” – for which “What’s Easy for Two” is a clear precursor.
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