Marvin Gaye ~ I Heard It Through The Grapevine 1968 Soul Purrfection Version

"I Heard It Through The Grapevine" was written by Norman Whitfield and Barrett Strong in 1966. As was the practice at Motown, Berry Gordy pitted Motown artists against each other by having them arrange and record the same song and then he would choose which version would be released as a single. His reasoning was that it brought out the very best from the artists and the losing versions were locked up in the Motown vaults. The Miracles recorded the song first and it finally saw release in 1968 on their "Special Occasion" LP. The second group to record it were the Isley Brothers, then Marvin recorded his version, followed by Gladys Knight & The Pips fiery version that got released first and peaked at #2 in 1967. For Marvin's version, Whitfield took the song and slowed it down adding tom toms for an arrangement that sounded mystical and foreboding resulting in a sound that resembled a tightly coiled serpent ready to strike complete with the rattle by tambourine. There was nothing sounding like this on the radio back in 1968 and the stunning arrangement helped the song stay at #1 for seven weeks on the Hot100 and the R&B chart. Whitfield took the song in a totally new direction, you can hear the despair and feeling of betrayal in Marvin's voice over the simmering rhythm track. Whitfield has admitted that he was going for a Ray Charles type sound (think "Hit The Road Jack"). After the song was recorded, Motown executives received a call from station WVON Chicago who had played the song at one of their hops and the audience response was phenomenal. Once it hit the airwaves, the station was flooded with calls. The next call came from Ernie Leaner at United Record Distribution in Chicago who ordered 100,000 singles of "Grapevine" and the rest is history.