Black Pop From The Sixties: The Supremes - Where Did Our Love Go 1964 (1986 Motown, Reissue)

Even though this long-player was the second collection to have featured the original Supremes lineup with Mary Wilson, Florence Ballard and Diana Ross, Where Did Our Love Go (1964) was the first to significantly impact the radio-listening and record-buying public. It effectively turned the trio who were called the 'No-Hit Supremes' by Motown insiders into one of the label's most substantial acts of the 1960s. Undoubtedly, their success was at least in part due to an influx of fresh material from the formidable composing/production team of Brian Holland, Lamont Dozier and Eddie Holland (HDH). They had already proven themselves by presenting "(Your Love Is Like A) Heatwave" to Martha & the Vandellas and providing Marvin Gaye with "Can I Get a Witness."

Motown-head Berry Gordy hoped HDH could once again strike gold and boy, did they ever. Equally as impressive is that the Supremes were among the handful of domestic acts countering the initial onslaught of the mid-'60s British Invasion with a rapid succession of four Top 40 sides. Better still, "Where Did Our Love Go," "Baby Love" and "Come See About Me" made it all the way to the top, while "When the Lovelight Starts Shining Through His Eyes" (#23), "Run, Run, Run" (#93) and "A Breath Taking Guy" (#75) were able to garner enough airplay and sales to make it into the Top 100 Pop Singles survey.

HDH weren't the only contributors to the effort, as William "Smokey" Robinson supplied the catchy doo wop influenced "Long Gone Lover," as well as the aforementioned "Breath Taking Guy." Norman Whitfield penned the mid-tempo ballad "He Means The World to Me," and former Moonglow Harvey Fuqua co-wrote "Your Kiss of Fire." With such a considerable track list, it is no wonder Where Did Our Love Go landed in the penultimate spot on the Pop Album chart for four consecutive weeks in September of '64 making it the best received LP from Motown to date. In 2004, the internet-based Hip-O Select issued the double-disc Where Did Our Love Go [Expanded 40th Anniversary Edition] in a limited pressing of 10,000 copies.

The package included the monaural and stereo mixes, plus a never before available seven-song vintage live set from the Twenty Grand Club in Detroit and another 17 unreleased studio cuts documented around the same time.(Lindsay Palmer)

The classic Supremes album. It had three number one's and several top fourty hit singles. It was the first album with three number 1 singles from one album in the billboard history. The album remained for 89 weeks in the Billboard album charts and sold according to Motown ultimately 3,000,000 copies. It was a perfect pop album for people from 5 to 105, black or white, yellow or red in the middle of the sixties and of course it came exactly in the right time. Two years later, the album would have had no chance in the changed zeitgeist of those years. Anyway, it is one of the greatest pop albums of the twentieth century and it made history. And it was the start of a world career for Diana Ross. Enjoy.(Frank)

    Flac (zippy)                                               Flac (M)

    mp3 (zippy)                                              mp3 (M)