Berry Gordy was always wary of adding another, more political, agenda to the music of Motown. He had allowed references to the war in Vietnam, but only in the context of a girlfriend hoping her boyfriend would come home safely. Gordy generally wanted his company to stay neutral in respect of social or racial issues, although he had supported the release of the Dr. Martin Luther King albums in 1963. Motown’s philosophy was based on a belief that was shared by everyone on the payroll that bringing Black music into the mainstream was a major contribution to breaking down racist barriers. If Black and White music lovers could listen together, sing and dance together, then mutual respect would grow and prejudice would be reduced. The music itself was an agent for change and progress.
In 2009, Mary Wilson spoke about being part of this process: “We represented a social environment that was changing. The experience we had known being black was not being bona fide citizens, not being able to drink out of the same water fountains, playing to segregated audiences. When that started to fall away, and you saw that music was one of the components that was helping it fall away, that’s when it really felt like we were doing something significant.” (Quoted in Andscape article, by Kelley L. Carter).
Detroit 1967: burnt out buildings.
Photo: Phil Cherner (Wikimedia Commons)
Then, in 1967, riots broke out in Detroit, that threatened everything that Motown had achieved. The summer of 1967 was hot and in the inner-city Black communities, discontent was growing. There was rioting in over one hundred and fifty cities in the USA, including Detroit, which was the worst-affected.
The riot was triggered by a police raid on an unlicenced drinking venue (known as a “blind pig”) in the early hours of July 23rd, which led to a confrontation between the police and local residents. The ensuing rioting lasted for five days, with forty-three people killed and over a thousand people injured. Shops were looted and many buildings were set on fire. Store owners put signs on their premises that read “Soul Brother”, in an attempt to deter the looters, but that didn’t always work. Two Detroit recording studios were razed to the ground. The Hitsville building was about half a mile from the location where the riots started, but it escaped the broken windows and fire damage that affected so many businesses in the city. On July 28th, the Motown staff were able to return to work and carry on with their mission.
The Andscape article referenced above is actually an interview with Mickey Stevenson in which he discusses the impact of the riots. Stevenson had left Motown early in 1967, but he was still in Detroit, when the riots broke out. He reiterates Mary Wilson’s analysis: “I believe in my heart, and quite a few of us do — Smokey, we talk about this all the time – Motown was God’s game plan, and we all bought into it. That whole sound happened at a time when our country was at its worst. And the love of the music … reached everybody. This music’s got so much love, and so much caring in it. Those moments … while you’re listening … all that hatred, all that dislike for one another, was no longer there. That changed the world.” (Andscape.com).
Martha Reeves is another of the Motown artists who has discussed the Motown mission in the light of the 1967 riots. Her view is perhaps the most important of all, as “Dancing in the Street” was adopted as one of the songs that Civil Rights activists would sing as they marched. As a result, some radio stations refused to play the song. The lyrics are clearly an invitation to dance, but young Black demonstrators injected another meaning into the word “dance” and it became a call to protest. For Martha Reeves, however, it was just a call to sing and dance, part of Motown’s non-confrontational mission to bring Black and White (and everyone else!) together. In Susan Whitall’s book “Women of Motown”, Reeves is quoted giving her assessment of the song and its impact: “It was a beautiful feeling, when we were so full of hate and anger and everybody was so full of unrest, that we saw people actually join together, get out of their cars and dance to a song [Martha And The Vandellas’ 1964 smash hit Dancing In The Street] that meant we should rejoice… The Motown sound was a very big influence in the civil rights movement. It was not that we marched or paraded; we just promoted it through love.
Dr. Martin Luther King credited Motown with creating social and emotional integration long before his political movement started. But, above all else, Motown was a business phenomenon. In just a few years, it grew to become the largest company in the USA in Black ownership. During the 1960s Motown placed seventy-nine songs in the top ten of the Billboard Hot 100 Singles chart. For a small record company in Detroit to achieve global success producing an up-dated form of Black R&B music defies belief, yet it happened, thanks to the talents and hard work of all the iconic singers, writers, musicians, producers, engineers and back-office staff who came together in Detroit. Above all, it happened thanks to the genius, vision and determination of Berry Gordy.
Several recording studios were destroyed during the Detroit riots, but Motown was untouched. 1967 was a watershed year, with the imminent loss of Holland, Dozier and Holland, but Motown continued to grow in Detroit for five more years.
