Martha and the Vandellas | Research & Encyclopedia Articles

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Martha and the Vandellas Summary

Martha and the Vandellas

Arguably the most soulful of the Motown girl groups, Martha and the Vandellas established themselves as part of "The Sound of Young America" (Motown's company slogan) with the Top Ten single "(Love Is Like a) Heat Wave" in the fall of 1963. Although some of their hits were thought to have political undertones, the songs they made popular during the mid-1960s were, like most Motown singles, African-American dance records with a strong backbeat designed to appeal to a white audience. Martha and the Vandellas emerged as hitmakers almost a year before the Supremes began to dominate the charts, but by 1965 the latter group had overtaken theformer in popularity. As Motown president Berry Gordy, Jr., and the talented songwriting and production team of Holland-Dozier-Holland (brothers Brian and Eddie Holland and Lamont Dozier) focused their attention on the Supremes, they neglected Martha and the Vandellas, as well as other female Motown artists such as the Marvelettes. The success of any 1960s girl group was dependent upon a fragile union of songwriters, musicians, producers, and label executives, giving the female artists themselves very little control over their careers. Like a number of other girl groups, Martha and the Vandellas were unable to sustain their success as recording artists because of their lack of autonomy, in combination with changes in popular music tastes that took place during the mid-1960s.

Martha Reeves

In 1961, Martha Reeves (1941—) began working for Motown Records in Detroit, Michigan, as William "Mickey" Stevenson's secretary in the A&R (artists and repertoire) department. She was already a professional singer, having released a single on Check-Mate, a subsidiary of Chess Records, as part of a group called the Del-Phis, which consisted of Reeves, Rosalind Ashford, Annette Sterling, and lead vocalist Gloria Williams. Reeves was hoping to become a Motown artist, and her break came when she was invited to fill in for an absent background singer. This experience gave Reeves the opportunity to bring in Ashford, Sterling, and Williams, and together they provided backing vocals for several of Marvin Gaye's sessions. Having proved themselves to owner Berry Gordy, Jr., they were allowed to record a song designated for Mary Wells, who missed a scheduled session. Since the Del-Phis were under contract to Check-Mate, the group decided to call themselves the Vels, and the single was released on the Melody label, one of Motown's subsidiaries. When the record failed to become a hit, Gloria Williams quit the group and Reeves was chosen to succeed her as the lead singer.

Combining the names of Detroit's Van Dyke Avenue and Della Reese, one of her favorite singers, Reeves renamed her trio Martha and the Vandellas, and the group was signed by Motown's Gordy Records toward the end of 1962. Their first release bombed, while the second made it to #29 on the pop charts. But their third single was the smash hit "Heat Wave"—a Holland-Dozier-Holland creation featuring Motown's incomparable session players, including Benny Benjamin on drums and James Jamerson on bass guitar—released in the summer of 1963. Despite the group's success, Sterling dropped out the following year to get married. She was replaced by Betty Kelly, who had belonged to a Motown group known as the Velvelettes. A year after their first hit single, which was followed by several less successful releases, Martha and the Vandellas recorded their signature song, after it had been turned down by Kim Weston. "Dancing in the Street," written by Marvin Gaye and Mickey Stevenson, became an adolescent anthem that was later covered by a number of artists, including the Mamas and the Papas, David Bowie and Mick Jagger together, and Van Halen.

According to Reeves in Gerri Hershey's Nowhere to Run: The Story of Soul Music, some white listeners interpreted "Dancing in the Street" as "a call [for blacks] to riot." She explains that the song was intended to be nothing more than an up-tempo dance record. The intensity of this record was matched by the group's 1965 hit, "Nowhere to Run," a Holland-Dozier-Holland effort that to some listeners seemed to symbolize the plight of American soldiers fighting in the Vietnam War. At this point in their career, Martha and the Vandellas were being superseded by the Supremes. Their last TopForty single, "Jimmy Mack," had been recorded approximately two years before it was released in 1967; the song was most likely withheld because of its similarity to the Supremes' material. Imitating other Motown acts, the group changed their name to Martha Reeves and the Vandellas that same year. At the beginning of 1968, Reeves's sister Lois replaced Kelly, and two years later Sandra Tilley took Ashford's place. They continued to perform and record until they disbanded in 1972, when Reeves chose to leave Motown and pursue a solo career on other labels.

During the 1970s, Reeves released several unsuccessful solo albums. Eventually she decided to resurrect the group for oldies revival performances. During the early 1990s, she appeared with the original members of the group and separately with her sisters Lois and Delphine. In 1995, Martha and the Vandellas became members of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Often described as outspoken, Reeves may have failed to achieve the level of stardom reached by other Motown artists, such as Diana Ross, because of her reluctance to conform to the label's strict rules of behavior. As she told Gerri Hershey, "Once I used 'damn' in a song and was heavily chastised." Label owner Berry Gordy, Jr., also played a large role in determining who was worthy of stardom, giving the best songs to acts he favored. While Martha and the Vandellas were able to record a handful of unforgettable pop songs, like many other girl groups they were unable to sustain their careers without the continued support of those who initially helped to create their hit records.