Chords for Marvin Gaye - What's Going On Part 2

[Bb] Oh my god, he's so cute. _ _
He [Eb] had this very boyish kind of air about him.
I believe [Bb] every woman who ever saw Marvin Gaye had a crush on Marvin _ _ Gaye.
[C] _ _ _
_ [Ab] You must understand at that time I was [Db] totally obscure as an [Bb] artist.
_ I [Dbm] [Eb] hadn't even had a single record or anything.
I was just a musician, a [D] studio musician, a session drummer and [N] songwriter
trying to hustle my way around in Motown. _ _ _ _ _ _ _
Marvin was [E] surrounded by a [Bb] remarkable array of talent.
[Fm] _ [A] The Miracles, _ [Eb]
Martha and [A] the Vandellas, [F] and the Temptations.
_ [Eb] Enter the black popular music.
_ [Bb] _
[Eb] Black people had not had an institution like Motown.
When it got [Gb] around that this was becoming a [B] mecca, people started going [C] up that way. _ _
Most of the people that came _ to Berry Gordy at that time
had absolutely [E]
no clue _ [A] of [Bb] what we were to do and how we [Em] were to achieve [Bb] it.
We were expecting Berry Gordy to make us a star.
_ [Ab] He was just [Eb] not building a group of artists, he was building a name.
_ _ _ [Ab]
29 [C]-year-old Berry Gordy was Motown's founder and driving force.
A former [Fm] boxer [A] and factory worker, [F] Berry Gordy had a grand ambition.
To make Motown the [Gm] General Motors of the recording industry.
_ _ _ Oh [Ab] yes, Motown [Bb] was much like the [B] factory that Berry Gordy had worked in
[C] and with the assembly line.
Take the song from the writer, give it to the producer.
Producer, give it to the [F] artist.
Producer, then turn it over to the engineers.
You didn't even get to [Bb] mix your own music then.
_ _ Everybody had a job [Db] or designated [Eb] _
whatever your expertise was in
and that's what [Bb] you did.
[C] _ _ Many people [Eb] think that the [Gm] Motown family is mythical.
They [C] think that it cannot possibly have been that [F] everybody there
had [Abm] a family [F] type relationship.
But [Bb] that's exactly how it was.
We all dated each other, you know what I mean?
[C] It was that kind of thing.
This [B] was our [F] neighborhood and we [Ab] just went in there
and everybody [Bb] wanted to come there. _
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ [A] _
[Bb] _ _ Berry Gordy's sister, Anna, worked at the company.
_ _ [Eb] _ _ _ _
She was 36.
Marvin [Bb] was just 21.
_ _ _ _ _ _ Before long, they were [F] an item. _ _ _ _ _
_ _ [G] _ [F] _ _ _ All sweet, [C] is the green love I knew.
_ _ [F] [C] Yes, baby.
She was older.
_ _ [F] But you know how young men [C] like [F] older [C] women
and older women like younger [F] men?
And I don't think they were thinking [C] about age.
It was just an attraction.
_ [F] No, Anna was a good-looking woman.
Anna was a good-looking woman.
Anna was a fine woman.
_ _ _ I would have married her.
I'm 17.
I would [C] have married her.
[Am] [G] I believe one of the reasons that [F] Marvin was attracted to her
[Ebm]
was because I [F] think she reminded him of his mother. _
[C] And I'm sure that the fact that she was the sister of the president
of the record company didn't hurt any either.
_ With his marriage to Anna,
Marvin was entitled to a seat at the Motown family table. _
But always rebellious, he yearned to carve out his own musical identity.
He wanted to be part of Motown.
He just didn't want to sing Motown.
I was a bit spoiled.
I was a prima donna.
I [F] was the president's brother-in [B]-law,
and I was rather ridiculous about [E] things. _
But the other [G] acts were doing, I don't know,
I seem to sort of enjoy being able to say,
I don't have to do [Cm] that.
[Bm] You guys do that.
[N] I don't have to do that.
_ [G] _
_ _ Quiet night, quiet star,
_ [A] _ _ _ quiet chord from my [Dbm] guitar,
_ [Cm] _ _ _ floating on the [C] silence [Cm] _ [B] that [Bb] surrounds us.
_ [C] _ _ [Gm] _ If [Bbm] you think [Ab] about how [Db] he begins at Motown,
[Ab] here he [Em] is at a company [Ab] that has discovered it has [Eb] sort of [G] teenage hits,
kind of a new [N] fangled rhythm [Gm] and blues.
_ And [E] he doesn't want to do it.
He wants to sit on a stool [Bm] and smoke a cigarette and be [Am] cool.
He wants to [Gb] be Frank [A] Sinatra.
_ Ambitious as he was,
_ Marvin's dream was to reach a [Eb] wider audience,
white as well as black.
[Bbm] He says, no, I'm not going to [E] give you rhythm and blues,
and [F] he's able to cut [Bb] an album of _ standards,
[E] of a kind of a [Db] jazzy [Cm] Frank Sinatra _ [G] style.
[C] But it doesn't work. _
[N] Marvin couldn't pull that off
because the people weren't buying that on the records during that time. _
And then he suddenly is looking around and he's seeing _ Mary Wells has a hit
and Smokey Robinson and the Miracles have a hit.
Because he's a competitive person, [G] he wants the hit.
He [Ab] writes and sings a song called _ Stubborn Kind of Fella.
I [C] ask my mom's about her because I [Am] want her.
_ _ _ _ _ [A] _ _ _
[E] So even when he _ capitulates,
[A] he does it with a kind of _ defiant honesty
_ [D] that will be his hallmark throughout his career.
_ [G] _ _ _ _
_ _ _ _ _ _ [C] _
[Am] Marvin _ _ [D] _ _ _ [G] _ _
[C] _ _ _ _ _ [A] _ _ _
_ _ [D] _ _ _ _ [G] was a genius, but he was a very [C] competitive person.
Marvin [A] wanted to get there first.
[Bb] He wanted to be [D] acknowledged as the only one,
and he wanted to be seen [Eb] as the [F] superior one.
When he's on stage with Stevie Wonder,
[C] _ _ and Stevie Wonder goes out and really [N] basically kicks his butt.
_ I mean, who's going to compete against Stevie Wonder?
He's blind, he's a kid, and he's a genius.
That's a hell of a combination.
_ And Marvin was not nice in the way he framed it.
Don't let that little blind sucker go on before me anymore.
He wanted to do things his way, first of all.
What he thought was the right road to take for his career.
_ And a lot of times Barry and him would disagree on things like that.
They would _ argue _ profusely.
I couldn't deal with many of the political _ problems
that I had [Ab] to encounter at Motown.
And many times it sort of spilled over into personal [E] disagreements,
and in some cases some violent, semi [F]-violent [Eb] disagreements
between Barry and myself.
[Ab] _ _ [Eb] _ _
[Ab] _ _ [Eb] _ [Ab] _ _ [Eb] _ _ [Ab] _
_ [Eb] _ _ [Ab] _ [Eb] _ Despite [Ab] his conflicts with the company,
Marvin turned out a [Eb] string of hits.
[Db] In less than two years, his dreams were [Ebm] realized.
He was a star [Ab] and [Db] a sex symbol.
[Ab] _ Marvin was the most versatile, _ probably R&B singer, soul singer of the era,
maybe of all time, because Marvin could sing a mellow,
he could sing raw, he could sing soft, he could sing a little [N] falsetto.
He was a person who could sing any kind of music you put in front of him.
And I mean really sing it.
He would Marvinize it.
And he would do some stuff that, you know,
I wanted to keep everything he did on every take,
and just put it all on the record, but you couldn't do that, you know.
Marvin was a true recording artist, in that he was happy in the studio
because he could control his environment.
He was uncomfortable as a performer.
He had performance anxiety.
I got [F] no money in my pocket, I'm gonna have to hitchhike.
When [Ab] we went on the Motown Revue tours,
we had to stand [Fm] backstage and help him to learn [G] how to do the hitchhike,
because he couldn't [C] really dance, [B] or he looked very awkward.
[C] Marvin, hitchhike, _ _ hitchhike, _ _ _ hitchhike, hitchhike, hitchhike, hitchhike.
[Bbm] Couldn't dance a lick.
_ _ [Eb] Couldn't dance a lick.
He had his [C] foot like a whiteboard. _ _
_ _ _ _ _ _ I used to say Marvin.
_ _ As I think about Marvin, I say,
he's someone that was [Dm] so brilliant, but so [G] unsure.
We'd just stand there and just watch him on the side of the stage.
And he was just, _ and [Gb] even in his not knowing how to dance,
he was so beautiful.
And how can you not know how beautiful you are?
_ _ [Ab] _ _ _
If you ain't a pretty _ face, _ baby
_ And I've been so _ _ _ _ _ _ boring, _ _ _ baby _ _ _
Marvin [Fm] was the [Db] Prince of Motown.
[Gbm] But it was an [Fm] uneasy crown he wore.
_ [Bbm] He [Eb] was filled