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Motown Junkies

~ because it's what's in the grooves that counts

Motown Junkies

Category Archives: Smokey Robinson & the Miracles

674. The Miracles: “Choosey Beggar”

August 2, 2014

A success all round, then, leaving aside the nagging curiosity as to what might have happened with just a couple more days’ work: a fitting way to cap the best year so far in the Motown careers of both Smokey Robinson and the Miracles, now restored to their full powers. Roll on 1966. (8)

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673. The Miracles: “Going To A Go-Go”

July 27, 2014

Genuinely excellent, the sort of thing that helps give Motown its good name. And it’s better than anything the Miracles have ever done in this mode until now, there’s no doubt about it. Excellent. Just not quite as excellent as some of the Miracles’ 1965 highlights. (8)

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637. The Miracles: “Since You Won My Heart”

September 7, 2013

It’s hard to see this as anything other than filler, both on the album and on this single – once again, I doubt many fans have this at the top of their lists of Miracles favourites – but at least it’s very pretty filler. (5)

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636. The Miracles: “My Girl Has Gone”

August 28, 2013

It’s not bad, and I’ll never turn down the chance to hear the golden-era Miracles doing what they do best. It’s just that after all the riches they’ve given us recently, and with all the riches they’re going to be giving us just around the corner, this feels like a stopgap, and therefore something of a let-down. (5)

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603. The Miracles: “A Fork In The Road”

April 2, 2013

Sumptuous in its beauty, quietly devastating in its lyrics… I don’t know how he’s doing this. (8)

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602. The Miracles: “The Tracks Of My Tears”

March 31, 2013

For the second time in a row, the Miracles are shafted out of a (10) simply because I’ve only got fifty to award, and I’d run out of them. But, again, if you were to say this one was your favourite Miracles single, favourite Motown single, even… I’d get it. (9)

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553. The Miracles: “All That’s Good”

November 24, 2012

A listener at the end of 1964 might well have wondered, with good reason, whether the Miracles really had a place in Motown’s brave new world of corporate greed and thundering cash registers. This pair of sides not only put such doubts to rest, but showed the Miracles to be at the vanguard of the company’s very best acts. Quite exceptional stuff. (8)

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552. The Miracles: “Ooo Baby Baby”

November 21, 2012

At a Q&A event in a high school classroom later in the year, Berry Gordy was asked by one of the students: “How do you find guys like Smokey Robinson?” His reply was curt: “You don’t find guys like Smokey Robinson.” (9)

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512. The Miracles: “Baby Don’t You Go”

August 5, 2012

After the bland rock-out blind alley of the A-side, it’s just good to hear the Miracles back on something like their usual form. (7)

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511. The Miracles: “Come On Do The Jerk”

August 3, 2012

A waste of the talents of everyone involved, wafer-thin and surprisingly ill-suited to its lead singer; even Smokey isn’t taking this seriously, so there’s really no reason we should bother. (3)

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468. The Miracles: “Would I Love You”

March 30, 2012

Too slow and gentle, and (more importantly) too meandering, for commercial success, and lacking the killer hook to take it to the very top level – but it’s beautiful and it’s honest, and if a record has those things going for it, you can’t really say too much against it. (7)

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MOTOWN JUNKIES

This is Motown Junkies, an unofficial track by track history of Motown: in-depth analysis and discussion of both sides of every Motown single ever released between 1959 and 1988. Enjoy!

 

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Motown Junkies

This is Motown Junkies, an unofficial guide to every Motown single ever released, or planned for release, on every US Motown label (or via Tamla Motown in the UK), featuring reviews of each A-side and B-side in chronological order. New reviews appear every couple of days.

Think of it as an unauthorised track-by-track companion to the magnificent The Complete Motown Singles CD box sets, and beyond, with marks out of ten.

I'm NOT Paul Nixon.

FURTHER INFORMATION

More info about the blog (and me) can be found here. If you want to leave a comment on any review, please feel free to do so - all feedback, corrections, disagreements and encouragements gratefully received. If you've something you'd rather not say in public, I can be contacted at fosse8 at gmail dot com.

(Oh, and if you arrived here looking for the Motown Junkies music group, they're nothing to do with me, I'm afraid - but they are very nice people, and they can be found at www.motownjunkies.com instead.)

HOW TO USE THIS BLOG

You can jump straight to the full list of reviews so far in the Master Index, or browse by label instead.

If you're looking for something a bit more specific, you can click an artist's name in the "Artist" menu at the top of the screen to see a little biography and all the reviews we've done for them so far. Only people whose records I've already discussed appear there at the moment - more names will be added to the lists all the time as I work my way through Motown's history, so do keep checking back!

Alternatively, the front page displays excerpts from the most recent reviews, and on the right hand side of the screen you'll see a list of the most recent entries and also a sampling of the most popular entries from the last 48 hours, as well as the latest comments left by visitors.

Dive in, explore and have fun!

LEGAL STUFF

This is an unofficial site, and is not affiliated in any way with Universal Motown, Hip-O Select or any of the artists referred to in the blog.

Where indicated, label scan images appear by kind permission of Lars "LG" Nilsson (as originally prepared for the Complete Motown Singles series).

Digital images courtesy of Gordon Frewin are supplied for use at motownjunkies.co.uk by arrangement. All applicable rights reserved. No unauthorised republication is permitted.

Many label images were kindly provided by Robb Klein, together with invaluable historical research.

All text © Motown Junkies, 2009-19. All rights reserved.

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