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HOW THE JACKSON 5 GOT SIGNED TO MOTOWN
by Johnny Black
Everybody knows that Diana Ross discovered The Jackson 5, brought them to Motown mogul Berry Gordy, and started the recording career of the most successful pop artist of all time, Michael Jackson.
Everybody's wrong.
In the early summer of 1968, The Jackson 5 was already a popular live attraction which had got as far as releasing a single, Big Boy, on the Steeltown label. The disc did well in their home state of Indiana and, when they were spotted playing live at the Apollo Theater in Harlem by a scout for the David Frost Show, they were offered their first national US tv slot.
Before the show went out, however, they played a support slot at the Regal Theater in Chicago, where the leader of the headline act, Bobby Taylor and the Vancouvers, was so impressed that he phoned Motown executive Ralph Seltzer and convinced him to give the kids an audition on the same day as the Frost Show.
In later years, Seltzer revealed that "Creative considerations aside, I had some concerns about their age and the way they would change when they grew older, in terms of their appearance and their voices, but there was some excitement about them, so I told Bobby Taylor to bring them to Detroit."
Caught between the Frost Show and a Motown audition, Joe Jackson, the young band's manager-father, had a tough decision to make. He cancelled Frost. At nine forty five am on 23 July 1968, The Jackson 5 minibus pulled into a parking space in front of the white bungalow known as Hitsville USA, the Motown HQ in Detroit.
The quintet was filmed performing three songs for ten seated and grim-faced Motown employees who scribbled notes on yellow legal pads. Not once during the audition did anyone applaud. Finally, after a rousing version of Smokey Robinson's Who's Lovin You produced not even a flicker of acknowledgement, nine year old Michael could bear it no longer. "Well, hey, how was that?" he demanded.
Big brother Jermaine shushed him, but a voice from the back of the room said "These boys ain't jivin'. I think they're great." Michael grinned in delight.
His joy was instantly quashed as Seltzer cleared his throat loudly, then thanked them for coming, but gave no indication of how he felt about their act. The group left Hitsville feeling crushed.
Three days later, a call came, inviting them to another meeting with Seltzer. It turned out that, within hours of their departure, Berry Gordy had seen the film and immediately instructed Seltzer to draw up a contract, which Joe Jackson had the group sign without having it checked by his own lawyer.
The only clause Joe saw fit to change was the one binding the group to Motown for seven years. He quite rightly felt this was too long, and convinced Berry Gordy to reduce the term to just one year. What Joe didn't notice was that another clause forbade the group from recording for any other label for a period of five years. Like it or not, if they wanted to release records in that time, they would have to be on Motown, and under Motown's strict conditions.
The deal gave Motown total rights to the name Jackson Five, and also granted the label complete control of every song the band would record. Further, it stipulated that every song would have to be recorded to Motown's satisfaction and, even then, the company was under no obligation to release anything.
To make matters worse, the group received a miserable royalty amounting to less than half a cent per single sold. In other words, they could record as much as they liked but, unless Motown actually released and sold records, The Jackson 5 would earn nothing.
The rotten cherry on top of this unappetising cake came in the form of a clause committing the group to paying back to Motown the costs of arranging, copying, accompanying and recording every song, whether or not it was released. As the group ended up recording hundreds of songs that were never released, even the pittance they earned from their hits was immediately returned to Berry Gordy's company coffers.
"Since Diana Ross was the hottest artist there at the time," said Michael later, "they decided to use her name to introduce us to the public."
And the rest, as they say, is mythology.
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by Johnny Black
Everybody knows that Diana Ross discovered The Jackson 5, brought them to Motown mogul Berry Gordy, and started the recording career of the most successful pop artist of all time, Michael Jackson.
Everybody's wrong.
In the early summer of 1968, The Jackson 5 was already a popular live attraction which had got as far as releasing a single, Big Boy, on the Steeltown label. The disc did well in their home state of Indiana and, when they were spotted playing live at the Apollo Theater in Harlem by a scout for the David Frost Show, they were offered their first national US tv slot.
Before the show went out, however, they played a support slot at the Regal Theater in Chicago, where the leader of the headline act, Bobby Taylor and the Vancouvers, was so impressed that he phoned Motown executive Ralph Seltzer and convinced him to give the kids an audition on the same day as the Frost Show.
In later years, Seltzer revealed that "Creative considerations aside, I had some concerns about their age and the way they would change when they grew older, in terms of their appearance and their voices, but there was some excitement about them, so I told Bobby Taylor to bring them to Detroit."
Caught between the Frost Show and a Motown audition, Joe Jackson, the young band's manager-father, had a tough decision to make. He cancelled Frost. At nine forty five am on 23 July 1968, The Jackson 5 minibus pulled into a parking space in front of the white bungalow known as Hitsville USA, the Motown HQ in Detroit.
The quintet was filmed performing three songs for ten seated and grim-faced Motown employees who scribbled notes on yellow legal pads. Not once during the audition did anyone applaud. Finally, after a rousing version of Smokey Robinson's Who's Lovin You produced not even a flicker of acknowledgement, nine year old Michael could bear it no longer. "Well, hey, how was that?" he demanded.
Big brother Jermaine shushed him, but a voice from the back of the room said "These boys ain't jivin'. I think they're great." Michael grinned in delight.
His joy was instantly quashed as Seltzer cleared his throat loudly, then thanked them for coming, but gave no indication of how he felt about their act. The group left Hitsville feeling crushed.
Three days later, a call came, inviting them to another meeting with Seltzer. It turned out that, within hours of their departure, Berry Gordy had seen the film and immediately instructed Seltzer to draw up a contract, which Joe Jackson had the group sign without having it checked by his own lawyer.
The only clause Joe saw fit to change was the one binding the group to Motown for seven years. He quite rightly felt this was too long, and convinced Berry Gordy to reduce the term to just one year. What Joe didn't notice was that another clause forbade the group from recording for any other label for a period of five years. Like it or not, if they wanted to release records in that time, they would have to be on Motown, and under Motown's strict conditions.
The deal gave Motown total rights to the name Jackson Five, and also granted the label complete control of every song the band would record. Further, it stipulated that every song would have to be recorded to Motown's satisfaction and, even then, the company was under no obligation to release anything.
To make matters worse, the group received a miserable royalty amounting to less than half a cent per single sold. In other words, they could record as much as they liked but, unless Motown actually released and sold records, The Jackson 5 would earn nothing.
The rotten cherry on top of this unappetising cake came in the form of a clause committing the group to paying back to Motown the costs of arranging, copying, accompanying and recording every song, whether or not it was released. As the group ended up recording hundreds of songs that were never released, even the pittance they earned from their hits was immediately returned to Berry Gordy's company coffers.
"Since Diana Ross was the hottest artist there at the time," said Michael later, "they decided to use her name to introduce us to the public."
And the rest, as they say, is mythology.