Motown in the Movement of MusiQ

Motown

        In the book the medium is the MASSAGE, Marshall McLuhan revealed to his readers different observations and insights to the world around us. McLuhan’s main theory within this book is ways of proving that the media is influencing us with our every move. All media work us over completely (McLuhan 26). The manner in which things presented is just as important as what is being said. During The times of Motown music in the 1960’s the whole image of entertainment changed.

        

        Prior to the change in music in the 1960’s, music was being broadcasted to the public over the radio. People never really knew what the artist looked like because there weren’t many live performances at that time. But at the launch of Motown music, artist was starting to make their live debuts. Founder of Motown Records, Berry Gordy, made a very wise decision with his recording label at this point. The medium of our time…is forcing us to reconsider and reevaluate practically every thought and every action (McLuhan 8). Gordy was the son of an entrepreneur who hoped for the upward mobility of blacks, specifically groomed and cultivated streetwise teens to make them acceptable to Mainstream America. In 1964 he hired Maxine Powell, who had operated a finishing and modeling school, to prep his performers. Powell tried to transform Motown artists into polished professionals (Motown 2). He wanted everyone of his artist to become very uniformed. A few months later Gordy hired choreographer by the name of Cholly Atkins, who taught the performers how to move gracefully. Looking back on old videos and performances from the 1960’s, I remember that in each group they wore the same clothes and did the same dance moves down to the split second. Also, if it was a girl group they would the same hairstyle too. Gordy had assembled a Motown team that could take poor black youths and teach them to talk, walk, dress as successful debutantes and debonair gentleman.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s3Q80mk7bxE THE JACKSON 5: I Want You Back

        Gordy found that in the end, the look was just as important as the sound if you wanted to make if far in the music business. Gordy combined the polished images of the Motown acts with a gospel-based music that could appeal to mainstream America. Blues and R&B always had a funky look to it back in those days, and Motown wanted to have a look that fathers and mothers would want their children to follow. They wanted to kill the imagery of liquor and drugs and how some people thought it pertained to R&B (Motown 4). Therefore when they reject anything that had a strong blues sound to it when choosing material for their artist. Societies have always been shaped more by the nature of the media by which men communicate the by the content of the communication (McLuhan 8). Gordy started to explore the entertainment industry by doing crossover music and images to appeal to different audiences. In place of the blues and R&B, Gordy favored a distinct music grounded by an insistent pounding rhythm section, punctuated by horns and tambourines and featuring shrill, echo-laden vocals that bounced back and forth in a call and response of gospel. Also, in front of an older audience or a white audience, Gordy would prefer to do slower music with less bass and louder vocals.

    

    McLuhan’s theory has proven well the media influences our everyday decisions from the exploration of Motown music. But, Berry Gordy had to make wise decisions to maintain the up keeping of his record label. During the mid-1960s, Gordy established a music empire that included eight record labels, a management service, a publishing company, and grossed millions of dollars a year.  

 

WORK CITED

“Berry Gordy’s Motown Records.” Berry Gordy and Motown Records. 2004. Motown         Records. 1 March 2009  <www.history-of rock.com/motown_records.htm>


McLuhan, Marshall. The medium is the MASSAGE. Pub. Jerome Agel. California:
    Gingko Press, 1967.