A fine little record, blessed with a great band performance and considerably more spiky and energetic than might have been expected, but it’s hard not to wonder whether this could have been even better if someone else had sung it. (7)
A shrieking, warbling, directionless bossa nova cover of a song that was already teetering on the precipice of first-grade singalong territory, this is just about as bad as it gets. (1)
The tone is resolute and inspirational, both for and about we who must survive rather than those taken from us. Keep calm and carry on. (9)
Even if it’s not a great record, even among the rest of the Miracles’ output in 1963, it’s charming, bouncy and joyful, and I still (whisper it, blasphemer!) actually prefer it to Mickey’s Monkey. (6)
I was absolutely prepared to hate this going in, but it’s both charming and disarming, and filled with character and what I assume are bold choices. Either way, it’s lovely. Bravo. (6)
Oddly unsatisfying when compared to Eddie Holland’s original version; Martha turns in a very fine vocal performance, but arguably for entirely the wrong song, while the rest of it just doesn’t hang together properly at all. (5)
This just isn’t as good a record as Heat Wave; it’s a perfectly adequate sequel, and a fun little Vandellas single in its own right, but they’d come down from a whole other plane in order to make it. (7)
By Motown’s 1963 standards, it sounds positively prehistoric. Not awful, just generic and boring. (3)
A terrific little blues-pop record. A real pity this couldn’t have been included on The Complete Motown Singles: Volume 3; it certainly merited a place. (7)
It’s not terrible – there’s something in Smokey’s pained, awkward delivery which always brings me back for more, so they must be doing something right at least – but it’s very much a remnant from an era Motown was already leaving behind forever. (4)
This is manifestly better than Mickey’s Monkey on almost every possible level, even though it shares most of the same ingredients. (8)
Motown Junkies 