Fact #101143
When:
Short story:
The Jackson 5, including Michael Jackson, release their debut single for Motown Records, I Want You Back, in the USA.
Full article:
THE STORY OF I WANT YOU BACK
by Johnny Black
There was no other option. The kid would have to sit on the trash can and sing the song from there.
At eleven years old, Michael Jackson was too short to sing into the suspended boom microphone at Motown studios, so producer Deke Richards had found a trash can that raised him to just the right height. With two of his brothers, Jermaine and Jackie, singing harmonies on either side of him, Michael belted out the spurned lover lyric of I Want You Back, precociously simulating the passionate intensity of a man twice his age.
Another Motown star, Gladys Knight, had recognised that passion over a year earlier when Michael's group, The Jackson 5, had supported her at The Regal in Chicago. Knight was so impressed that she arranged for several Motown staffers to come down and see the group, but they couldn't see what she did, and nothing more was done.
Even so, Knight's enthusiasm was undiminished and, before long, she was instrumental in convincing Bobby Taylor of Motown act The Vancouvers to re-present the band to the label. This time, the Jackson Five was offered a deal and, soon after, they were offered a song, I Want To Be Free. It was written by Freddie Perrin and Fonce Mizell, a composing duo who were making inroads into Motown while the label's usual hit-making trio of Holland, Dozier and Holland were otherwise engaged - suing the company for allegedly unpaid royalties.
Ironically, the song had been intended for Gladys Knight but, recognising the snappy melody as ideal for the Jackson Five, Motown supremo Berry Gordy Jr ordered a re-write of the lyric.
Once the basic instrumental tracks were laid down, the quintet started work on the vocals. As Deke Richards recalls, "I started having the boys rehearse at my apartment in West Hollywood. The kids worked a tremendous amount of hours on this song - a minimum of six hours a day to a maximum of twelve."
Every evening, Richards took the tapes to Gordy, and the pair would discuss possible refinements before the group returned to the studio the next morning to continue work. "It got down to the difference between flat and sharp notes on the chorus, that's how precise this production was. Eventually it was re-titled - I Want You Back."
Michael Jackson later revealed that, "I must have recorded that thing two dozen times. That was hard work. ... I remember falling asleep at the mike. I wondered if it would ever be finished."
"We kept adding and subtracting to the very end," recalls Richards. "In fact, my original intro to the song started off with just the guitar but, at the last minute, I wanted a piano glissando at the top. I had Freddie And Fonce go in there and run their fingers down the piano to really kick the song off."
The five kids from Gary, Indiana were pushed to the limit by a final session that ran until two in the morning. When it was over, with costs at $10,000, it had become the most expensive song in Motown's history. "At that time," points out Richards, "the cost of a Motown single was averaging between two and three thousand."
The final mixdown was done on October 2, and the debut single by The Jackson 5 was released on the 7th.
It pained Gladys Knight to see them make their first tv appearance as a Motown act, on Hollywood Palace, on the 18th, billed as 'Diana Ross's proteges'. In her autobiography, Gladys wrote, "Not only did we not get credit for first spotting them, neither did Bobby Taylor. For years after that, Motown's press releases said that The Jackson 5 had been discovered by none other than Miss Cute."
Within days, Berry Gordy had arranged for the impressionable Michael to move in with Diana Ross. It was a deft manoeuvre, not just distancing Michael from his family but also, because Diana Ross was now Gordy's lover, bringing him directly into the mogul's sphere of influence.
Two days before the month was out, Gordy tightened his grip on Michael to a stranglehold. Their original Motown contract had been signed in Detroit, Illinois, but the company and the Jacksons had now moved to Los Angeles, California, USA.
Seemingly just as a formality, the group was asked to appear in a Californian court on the 29th, where the contract was examined to ensure that it satisfied that state's labour laws. Asked if they were happy with the contract, the group and their manager father, Joe Jackson, all affirmed that they were. "I think this is a good contract," stated Michael. "I really do. I got no problem with it."
Six years later when a rather less satisfied Jackson 5 sued Motown over that same contract, he would come to regret those words.
(Source : feature by Johnny Black for Mojo magazine, date uncertain)
Tweet this Fact
by Johnny Black
There was no other option. The kid would have to sit on the trash can and sing the song from there.
At eleven years old, Michael Jackson was too short to sing into the suspended boom microphone at Motown studios, so producer Deke Richards had found a trash can that raised him to just the right height. With two of his brothers, Jermaine and Jackie, singing harmonies on either side of him, Michael belted out the spurned lover lyric of I Want You Back, precociously simulating the passionate intensity of a man twice his age.
Another Motown star, Gladys Knight, had recognised that passion over a year earlier when Michael's group, The Jackson 5, had supported her at The Regal in Chicago. Knight was so impressed that she arranged for several Motown staffers to come down and see the group, but they couldn't see what she did, and nothing more was done.
Even so, Knight's enthusiasm was undiminished and, before long, she was instrumental in convincing Bobby Taylor of Motown act The Vancouvers to re-present the band to the label. This time, the Jackson Five was offered a deal and, soon after, they were offered a song, I Want To Be Free. It was written by Freddie Perrin and Fonce Mizell, a composing duo who were making inroads into Motown while the label's usual hit-making trio of Holland, Dozier and Holland were otherwise engaged - suing the company for allegedly unpaid royalties.
Ironically, the song had been intended for Gladys Knight but, recognising the snappy melody as ideal for the Jackson Five, Motown supremo Berry Gordy Jr ordered a re-write of the lyric.
Once the basic instrumental tracks were laid down, the quintet started work on the vocals. As Deke Richards recalls, "I started having the boys rehearse at my apartment in West Hollywood. The kids worked a tremendous amount of hours on this song - a minimum of six hours a day to a maximum of twelve."
Every evening, Richards took the tapes to Gordy, and the pair would discuss possible refinements before the group returned to the studio the next morning to continue work. "It got down to the difference between flat and sharp notes on the chorus, that's how precise this production was. Eventually it was re-titled - I Want You Back."
Michael Jackson later revealed that, "I must have recorded that thing two dozen times. That was hard work. ... I remember falling asleep at the mike. I wondered if it would ever be finished."
"We kept adding and subtracting to the very end," recalls Richards. "In fact, my original intro to the song started off with just the guitar but, at the last minute, I wanted a piano glissando at the top. I had Freddie And Fonce go in there and run their fingers down the piano to really kick the song off."
The five kids from Gary, Indiana were pushed to the limit by a final session that ran until two in the morning. When it was over, with costs at $10,000, it had become the most expensive song in Motown's history. "At that time," points out Richards, "the cost of a Motown single was averaging between two and three thousand."
The final mixdown was done on October 2, and the debut single by The Jackson 5 was released on the 7th.
It pained Gladys Knight to see them make their first tv appearance as a Motown act, on Hollywood Palace, on the 18th, billed as 'Diana Ross's proteges'. In her autobiography, Gladys wrote, "Not only did we not get credit for first spotting them, neither did Bobby Taylor. For years after that, Motown's press releases said that The Jackson 5 had been discovered by none other than Miss Cute."
Within days, Berry Gordy had arranged for the impressionable Michael to move in with Diana Ross. It was a deft manoeuvre, not just distancing Michael from his family but also, because Diana Ross was now Gordy's lover, bringing him directly into the mogul's sphere of influence.
Two days before the month was out, Gordy tightened his grip on Michael to a stranglehold. Their original Motown contract had been signed in Detroit, Illinois, but the company and the Jacksons had now moved to Los Angeles, California, USA.
Seemingly just as a formality, the group was asked to appear in a Californian court on the 29th, where the contract was examined to ensure that it satisfied that state's labour laws. Asked if they were happy with the contract, the group and their manager father, Joe Jackson, all affirmed that they were. "I think this is a good contract," stated Michael. "I really do. I got no problem with it."
Six years later when a rather less satisfied Jackson 5 sued Motown over that same contract, he would come to regret those words.
(Source : feature by Johnny Black for Mojo magazine, date uncertain)