DISGRACELAND - Motown Records: Pimps, Prostitutes, the Detroit Mafia and the Sound of Teenage America

Episode Date: October 8, 2019

Motown Records is one of the most successful musical industry endeavors of all time. The music and the megastars Motown produced, like Smokey Robinson, Diana Ross, Stevie Wonder, and the Jackson 5, defined a generation. But that success is marred by rumors – rumors that the record label and its innovative owner were controlled by the "black hand" of the white American mob.To see the full list of contributors, see the show notes at www.disgracelandpod.com.This episode was originally published on October 8, 2019. To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoicesSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This is exactly right. Double Elvis. Disgrace Land is a production of Double Elvis. The stories about the rise of Motown Records are insane. The record label's founder, Barry Gordy, was once a pimp. Star singer Martha Reeves was once held at gunpoint. Star singing group, the four tops, patrolled the stage of their concerts in the Jim Crow South

with loaded pistols for protection. And the record label's success was believed by many to be a direct result of an illicit partnership with the Motor City Mafia. Motown Records is by any measure one of the most successful music industry endeavors of all time and was undoubtedly one, if not the most successful black-owned music business of its day. The music and the megastars Motown produced, Smokey Robinson, Diana Ross, Stevie Wonder, and the Jackson Five, defined a generation. Their impact remains tattooed onto the skin of both black and white America where it lives on, beloved by men and women of all ages from all backgrounds. To this day,

you cannot think at the 1960s without hearing an indelible Motown song swinging in the background, but that success story is marred by rumors. Rumors at the record label and its innovative owner were controlled by the quote-unquote black hand of the white American mob. Rumors that to this day still circulate despite claims to the contrary by Motown alum. Mafia or no mafia, there is one thing that is 100% certain, and that is that Motown Records made great music, undeniably some of the greatest music ever made. That music you heard at the top of the show, that wasn't great music. That was a preset loop for my Melotron called Mellow Red Sauce MK1.

I played you that loop because I can't afford the rights to mule train by Frankie Lane. And why would I play you that specific slice of jackass cheese could I afford it? Because that was the number one song in America on January 11, 1950. And that was the day Barry Gordy fought his last fight as an amateur boxer and began seriously considering a career in the music industry, thus setting the course to forever change the sound of teenage America. On this episode, pistol packing four tops, mule train cheese, Detroit Mafia, and Motown Records.

I'm Jake Brennan, and this. is disgrace land. Jackie Wilson, aka Mr. Excitement, he of the operatic five octave voice and singer of the smash hit tune Lonely Teardrops, was doing his best to mansplain his way into the pants of the young woman he was ushering back to his Manhattan apartment.

It was cold, winter in the city, a city that at the moment in 1961 seemed to be ever-changing in a reflection of Jackie Wilson himself. Exciting. Jackie went on. You see, all these black entertainers talking about how Elvis ripped off their music. They ain't wrong, but what they don't say is that all these black entertainers ripped off Elvis's dance moves.

That's a fact. Know how I know? Because I saw that boy dance on stage for the first time and knew I had to get some of that swivel in my step. That's why they call me, Black Elvis, baby. Jackie's date was smitten. He could have told her he was the black JFK and she would have bought it. Jackie was a showstopper and as such a panty-dropper and he knew it. He liked the ladies and his current date like the singers.

Previous to Mr. Excitement, Jackie Wilson, she was with Mr. Wonderful, Sam Cook. And Jackie didn't mind. She was gorgeous and young. Jackie interlocked his arm with hers, pulling her tighter to his side as they made their way down the upper Manhattan Street. He raised his shoulders, bringing the collar of his top coat closer to his neck. sheltering it from the falling snow as he increased his stride down the sidewalk and up the streets to his apartment's front door. He quickly worked the key into the hole and pushed it open. The warmth from the entryway hit him first, and then, right in the abdomen.

He spun around on his feet. His date screamed, a second bullet, then pierced the skin of his ass. Jackie Wilson fell to the ground and into semi-consciousness. He could feel himself spiraling. Fear and adrenaline pulsed through him, as did the melody. to his hit song, Lonely Teardrops. Jackie didn't know why and didn't care. He didn't know what was happening,

but he knew enough to hold on to whatever thought he could, to not drift away into oblivion. So he thought about lonely teardrops, if for no other reason, then to not have Elvis's swinging hips be his last mortal thought. The song was a smash, and when it was, Jackie was as surprised as any.

The songwriter, a local boxer from back in Detroit, a hustler really, was as pugnacious as Jackie was, smooth. Barry Gordy. Some guys get by on talent. Other guys get by on drive. Jackie was driven, but more than anything, he was a natural talent. Barry Gordy, on the other hand. Jackie knew it when he met him. Nothing was going to stop that little dude from making it. Which isn't to say that Barry Gordy wasn't immensely talented. He was. And Jackie was amazed at the mini black-owned empire Barry was building in the wake of the success of lonely teardrops. Jackie Wilson knew how to do one thing with money, spend it. Barry Gordy, on the other hand, invested the bread he made from

lonely teardrops into himself and made the pivot from songwriter to record label owner, first with Raber records and then with Tamla records, and of course, more hits, Barrett Strong's money, that's what I want, a song Barry co-wrote and then shop around by The Miracles, a group led by Gordy's new best friend and creative partner, the immensely talented Smokey Robinson. Jackie likes Smoke. He had both talent and drive for days. Shop Around went to number one on the R&B charts and number two on the pop charts. Barry Gordy by now had rolled his record companies under one label, Motown Records.

Motown, a phrase he coined to represent his hometown, the Motor City, Detroit. Motown's sound that was being developed by Barry Gordy and Smokey Robinson was a projection of Gordy's idealized vision of what America could be. To Barry Gordy, that's what Jackie Wilson and all the others could never understand. It wasn't about black versus white or white stealing from black or vice versa. It was about black and white. Why did there need to be two sets of record charts, R&B for black music and pop charts for white music? Why did there need to be two types of radio stations? Black stations that played R&B for black kids and white stations that played pop for white kids? And why did there need to be

two types of stars, black and white. Jackie Wilson had proved that a star could easily cross over into another market despite the color of his skin. Motown, as Barry Gordy saw it, wasn't black music and it wasn't white music, it was just music. Made by blacks, sure, but made for all of America. As idealistic as that sounds, it also has the benefit of being an incredibly smart business strategy because it meant the size of Motown's audience was potentially twice that of labels that serviced only the black market. It was an audacious strategy and it only worked because of the vision, drive, discipline, and talent of Barry Gordy. He knew that in order to reach this wider market and to cross over, that Motown music needed to have certain qualities. A song, whether

it was a dance tune or a ballad, needed to be exciting, lyrics needed to be in the present tense, money, that's what I want. I can't concentrate. Shop around. Melodies needed to be simple, easy to remember, encounter melodies were encouraged. Distinguished Motown singles by having the lead singer work against the ensemble backing vocalists as opposed to in unison. Choruses needed to stand out, hand claps, exaggerated drumming, and overall, the song needed to have hooks for days, not just a hooky vocal melody, but a hooky baseline, a hooky guitar riff, Even the tambourine needed to sound purposeful. Above all, the song needed to feel good.

It needed to swing to get kids, black kids, and white kids, out of their seats and dancing. Barry Gordy took it a step further and mixed everything he recorded specifically to sound good coming out of tiny Ford Motor Company car speakers, which were being made right down the road in Dearborn, Michigan, because he knew that that was where the majority of his product would be consumed, in back seats by horny teenagers. The recipe was a success in the sound of Young America was born. The sound would result in more number one hits for Barry Gordy than Jackie Wilson or Elvis Presley would ever have combined.

The black Elvis would eventually recover from a shooting. It was learned later that he was shot by a jilted lover, but he'd never fully regain his chart shooting stride again. And Elvis Presley would capture America's love and affection once more after his stint in the army. But by the end of the decade, Elvis's star would be in the same. steep decline while Motown's empire would be ever expanding with a stable of chart-topping artists, including the temptations, the Supreme, Stevie Wonder, the Jackson Five, and Marvin Gay, among others. Such success was a ways off for Barry Gordy back in 1961, but it certainly wasn't unimaginable. In fact, quite the opposite. It was part of the plan. Success was a personal

a manifestation. Just as the Motown sound projected a certain kind of post-racial idealism, Barry Gordy and his record label projected a certain kind of predetermined success. Which is why Barry Gordy was standing on his front lawn at 2648 West Grand Boulevard, shouting furiously at the workers standing high above him on rickety ladders. They couldn't get the sheet off at the sign of the front of the house. It was supposed to be the grand unveiling of Motown's new studio and company headquarters, but was instead turning into an anti-climactic hitch. The white sheet was flapping off of the right side of the front of the modest two-floor single family,

revealing only part of the sign, the letters L-L-E-U-S and A. There was a small group of forgiving staff and family assembled on the front lawn watching Barry pace about the yard, incensed, barking out orders. The sheet mercifully began to slip off. More letters. The sign now read, V, Lowe. I-I-L-E-U-S-N-A. Across the street, two men sat in an inconspicuous white Ford Fairlane, watching the scene on Gordie's front lawn unfold.

Sucking on Paul Malls, their bellies full of sludgy black coffee and cakey old-fashioned donuts. They had no idea what the letters on the sign were going to eventually spell, but it was potentially the most exciting thing they'd seen in days. The sheet slipped again, finally revealing the sign in its entirety. H-I-T-T-S-V-Hittsville USA. Of course, that made sense. Both men agreed that the boldness was pure Barry Gordy. Hitzville, USA, audacious, projecting.

They called it. That would be it for the day. They fired up the fair lane and headed back to their own headquarters. There was no sign on their front door, though. No letters. But if there was, it would have read. I nearly swallowed the butt of his Cuban when the Mexican went down in three. The black featherweight was a lock to lose, but he didn't. And now Black Jack was

about to make the fat man 200 lighter. He thought about smacking the kid around, but it wasn't his fault. He didn't know he was supposed to go down in three. He just fought, hard, nearly punching above his weight, winning but taking a beating in the process before connecting with an inspired right that put the Mexican down for the count. After the fight, the featherweight stood outside the wrecked center, staring at the poster stapled to the telephone pole. On one side, there was a picture of Duke Ellington, advertising an upcoming concert of his in Detroit. On the other side, the same promoter was advertising an upcoming fight on another night, and so, next to the Duke, there was a picture of the heavyweight, sunny Liston.

The difference between the two men couldn't have been more stark. Ellington was sophisticated, refined, regal-looking, like he was going somewhere. Liston looked beat up, bruised, brutish, and despite his ferociousness, like he wasn't long for this world. The young featherweight, Barry Gordy, like everyone else, had heard the rumors about Liston, that he was owned by the mob, controlled by guys like Fat Tony and Blackjack, the two imposing impeccably dressed Italian men sitting ringside for his fight earlier that evening. Barry didn't know if they were true or not.

It seemed like the only way for a boxer to get his shot was in partnership with the mob, working for wise guys who told you when to stick and when to land. If this was what getting your shot looked like, like Sonny Liston, beaten up and battered, a thousand-eared stair, then Barry wanted no part of it. He made up his mind on the spot. He would work for no man. He would be his own boss.

More like Sir Duke here, distinguished, going places, master of his own domain. Music seemed like the right racket to mix himself up in, so Barry Gordy quit boxing and opened a record store. It took almost no time before it failed, and so Barry needed to do what he had to do to get by. In Detroit in the 1950s, there were plenty of honest blue-collar jobs to be had, but they were square jobs with bosses, never again. Barry had stopped lying to himself that he would live that life, and he wasn't going back.

And so he stumbled into what a lot of enterprising and charming black men from the city did back then. He used his charm to put together a stable of women and tricked them out. It wasn't quite Duke Ellington, but it was a job, and he was his own boss. boss. Running girls started to bring in some cash and Barry tried sacking it away when he could, using what little was left over from surviving to finance his dream of making it somehow in the music business. Owning a record shop was out, so his next endeavor was to write songs. Writing songs was easy. Pimping was not. Barry lacked the killer instinct necessary to succeed. He was an easy-going pimp and let his girls come and go as they pleased, refused to beat

on them to keep them in line. As a result, the money was strictly small time until it was non-existent. But his hustle out on the street had brought him the time he needed, time to meet Smokey Robinson and his new songwriting partner and lover, the gorgeous and classically trained Raynomah Lilies, Ray for short. Barry and Ray scored local hits with Smokey, Jackie Wilson, and Merve Johnson, only for Barry to hungrily tear open royalty checks and find them worth $3.19. for producing Smokey Robinson in the Miracles. Was this a joke? Smokey said Barry should start his own label.

And lucky for Barry, the Gordy family set aside savings every month for real estate and business investments. Less lucky. Without the unanimous consent of the family, nobody could withdraw a cent. So Barry went home, but he didn't ask them to invest. He asked them for a small loan, just enough for one pressing of one record,

to prove his pen, his e-enacted. in his theories about the music industry. And they said, yes, so long as he paid interest. Barry, with $800 now in his pocket, was relieved, but nowhere near as relieved as Ray, who, unbeknownst to Barry, had tricked herself out a short time ago for a measly $17 to put food on their table. But with this meager investment, the tricking, the pimping, and the fighting, all seemed to settle in as part of their past, and the future finally looked wide open.

Ray soon married Barry, in part because she had what he had, in any means-necessary approach to entrepreneurship, in the sense that whatever Ray and Barry had to offer the world was meant to have. If it wasn't destiny, it was at least spotting their lane and shooting their shot. They could see their future like it was already real, massive success based on tearing down the walls between R&B and pop, between black and white, a world where they didn't work for anyone,

a world where they were their own boss, or more accurately, where Barry was boss. They wanted to pluck that vision from their heads and put it into the world. At the same time, it felt like a magnet in their future pulling them forward, a North Star. And with $800 and no record even pressed yet, it was also, for the moment, a mirage. Barry bought the house on West Grand Boulevard, Hitzville, USA in 1959. It was the mirage brought to life. Their projection made real.

Barry Gordy's Manifest Destiny. Outside, it was the picture of success, but inside where the sausage was made, it was a stone-cold hit-making machine. Barry knew the opportunity would only be here once, and he wasn't going to mess it up. Unlike the girls he ran, when it came to running a studio, Barry Gordy ran a tight ship. In that first year alone, the label released 15 singles. Two years later, in 1961, they released 51. In 1963, they released 77, and this was not volume for you. for the sake of volume, these were radio-dominating hits, eventual classics, the standards of today.

Can I get a witness by Marvin Gay? Heatwave by Martha and the Vandellas. Two lovers by Mary Wells. You've really got a hold on me by the miracles. When the love light starts shining through his eyes by the Supremes, fingertips by Stevie Wonder, etc. The FBI agents outside clocking this surprisingly successful young black man's every move smelled a rat. This guy was dirty, had to be. How else could you explain his success?

Plus, they knew about his mafia connections through his days as a boxer. They wondered what was really going on inside that house on West Grant. They couldn't see beyond the front door, but if they could, they would have first seen the desk of Janie Bradford, the receptionist working on her own songwriting. Past her set the swave Martha Reeves, secretary to head of Motown A&R, Mickey Stevenson, as well as gatekeeper to the office of Ray.

known as Mother Motown. Ray and Mickey would flip in and out of the hall in their offices, checking in on Maxine Powell, who handled Motown's finishing school for new artists. That's right, a finishing school. After Barry's family had made good on their seed loan, they insisted he hire Maxine after they'd heard that Smoky and the miracles got booed off the Apollo stage

for bumping into each other during their act. It was money well spent. Various Gordy's would be heard pacing around the floor above where they now ran accounting and manufacturing the sturdy industrial gears of the business, and the smell of the soul food that Miss Lily cooked for lunch every day at one o'clock would waft up the stairs from the kitchen. But the now-legendary Motown magic happened in the studio in the garage.

If the sad-sac g-men staking out the joint from outside had been so lucky, they'd have seen drummer Benny Papadita Benjamin and bassist James Jamerson laying it down, thick. Jamerson supposedly developed his heavy sound to replicate the look of a well-endowed woman's buttocks as it bounced down the street. The other Funk brothers, as the Motown musicians had come to call themselves, included Eddie Chank Willis,

Joe Messina and Robert White on guitar, Johnny Griffith, Joe Hunter, and Earl Van Dyke on Keys, Mike Terry and Hank Cosby on sax, Jack Ashford and Bongo Brown on percussion. It was a never-ending murderer's row are the best jazz and blues session musicians in the Midwest, and it turned out in America and thus in the world. And listening in on the sessions,

huddled over the board in the basement control room would be the in-house hit writing and production power trio known as H.D.H., the brothers Eddie and Brian Holland and Lamont Dozier. And if the feds made it past all of that, and periscope their view up, out of the studio, into the upper floors of Motown HQ, in a tiny office near Barry Gordy's, they'd find the office of a heavy set impeccably dressed Sicilian man with calloused hands and thick knuckles

that hinted at his hard scrabble past in the cement business he was barney yales the only white employee at motown and he was so very out of place so out of place that he seemed that he could be we'll be right back after this word word arthur reeves was feeling herself she was on a roll since moving up the motown ranks from secretary to lead singer and star attraction of Martha Reeves and the Vandellas, she'd scored three consecutive hits. Come and get these memories, heat wave, and their latest, quicksand. In her sets on the 1963 Motor Town Review tour were one of the nightly highlights on a bill packed with chart-topping talent, including Smokey Robinson and his miracles,

the Temptations, the Four Tops, and Barry Gordy's newest attraction, Little Stevie Wonder. To top it all off, today was one of those days. You know the kind. Or no matter what you do or wear or get into, you just kind of look good. Your hair sits right. Your clothes fit perfectly and you have that natural, constant gleam in your eye. Martha was waiting patiently for the bathroom, admiring herself in the massive floor-to-ceiling mirror in the Louisville Kentucky Holiday Inn.

She dug on her outfit, a high-necked striped pullover that did little to conceit. her natural curves and high-waisted slacks tapered to expose her ankles. They were off day closed, no show today, just travel. They weren't staying at this hotel, just stopping off. Martha kept her eyes on the mirror, thought about her hair. The humidity was doing its damnedest to mess up her vibe. She'd need to reset her hair under her handkerchief once she got into the bathroom. Then she heard it.

That snap, the sound of immediate fear. It came from her right. As she bent her neck to see what was going on, her eyes still pinned on herself in the mirror. She managed to only turn her head a fraction before seeing the long barrel of a 12-gauge shotgun intrude into the right-hand side of the mirrored image in front of her. Then she felt it.

The cold steel pressed to her skull, just above her right ear. Hell are you doing in here, fugger? Said nothing. She was frozen in fear, sickened by the smell emanating from the redneck cop threatening to blow her brains out. It was the smell of piss, chewing tobacco and cheap cologne over body odor that refused to quit. I asked you a question, fugger.

But that she was just waiting to use the bathroom in the hotel lobby. The cop said nothing but lowered his gun, arched his head back, and took in Martha Reeves. It was clear to him, even with this limited IQ, that this one was not from around. Where are you from? Detroit, dropped a shotgun to a... What the hell are you doing down here? Don't you know you ain't supposed to be in this here hotel? This is a white hotel and you I will use you.

Martha quickly made her apology and asked to leave. The cop told her she could go as long as she got the hell out of Kentucky and never came back. Martha got back on the bus and along with the rest of the review, headed to Nashville for the next day's show. News of the incident was on everyone's minds. The four tops weren't surprised. They expected this behavior in the South, which is why they brought guns, pistols. Up to this point, they kept them hidden on the bus, but that night they packed them for the show.

They had a deal with the temptations. They'd watch the temps back if the temps watched out for the tops. So that night, while the temptations rocked the National Coliseum to 10,000 mostly white teenagers, the four tops stood at the side of the stage loaded for bear. Their pistols tucked into their backside waistbands surveying the crowd. ready to shoot out any of the cops or rednecks who might mess with them. And when the tops took the stage, the temptations did the same for them, but without guns with baseball bats.

Held discreetly at their sides, they watched the crowd from the wing of the stage. Nothing happened that night, but the southern leg of the tour was a steady stream of racist humiliations. Shockguns waved in their faces by Old Town Down Home Crackers, near beatdowns over Jim Crow's seating at restaurants and hotels, stray rounds found in the tour bus, a bus that looked extremely similar to the Freedom Rider buses that had become the flashpoint

of civil rights activism that summer. Barry Gordy's vision of breaking the color line and music was manifesting in ways more complicated than he ever imagined. A few days later, back in Detroit, Barry caught wind of the story. He was furious. But a few other Detroit locals were, too,

for different reasons. And they wanted to talk to Barry about the tour and the rumors that a group of black musicians were traveling through the south, causing trouble for all those nice white folks. It was time, they thought. Enough fucking around. Bring Barry Gordy in and see just what the hell he's up to. When Barry got the call, when he learned that the FBI wanted to talk to him,

he was nervous and high-tailed in downtown to speak to Hoover's boys. But as he made his approach, walking down Michigan Avenue, his nervousness turned to anger. His success was the result of any means necessary. approach, sure, but why was he getting hassled? His success was obvious. He could hear it all around him. As cars rolled by, Smoky, Marvin, the Supremes, they all blasted out of car windows, reminding him of what he'd accomplished. His efforts, his creativity, his business acumen, and his hustle were literally reshaping American culture and he was what? Being sent for? Being

hauled in by the feds to explain himself? It was total bullshit and he knew it. He'd been his own boss long enough that he'd forgotten the feeling of being under the gun, under the thumb of the man. But now that he'd arrived at the next level, his artists in the south were having the gun flashed upon them, and up north the hand of the man was waving it right at him. When he got to FBI HQ and into the office, he could not believe what he saw. Up on a bulletin board were the faces of every living Detroit mafioso and small-time hood arranged in hierarchical order starting with Angelo the chairman Melly at the top and flowing down to his capos, his brother Frank and nephew, Little Vince.

Barry recognized them, of course. They ran all the jukeboxes in the city, had their fingers in a lot of club bookings, co-owned a few local white record labels. One was even named White Music Company. Barry even recognized members of their respective crews, Big Mike and Jimmy Q, Tony the Bowl, and Machine Gun Pete, all spread out before him on the cork board.

On a second bulletin board, there were gory crime scene photos, made men and civilians alike lying dead like rats on Detroit streets, bloodied, mangled, destroyed, different kinds of hits than the ones Barry was used to. On a third bulletin board, there was a timeline flowing left to right. It was a biographical map of Barry's life going as far back to his time in the military, serving as a chaplain's assistant in the third artillery in Korea. Then as a boxer, then his failed stints as both the record store owner and a pimp.

to his early days of marriage and ultimately to his founding of Motown. Tight strings of yarn ran from his timeline to pictures of guys who were also worryingly on the first board. Bigfoot Eddie Wingate, the black owner of the 20 Grand Club, where the Motown family loved to hang out and play, was apparently running the biggest book in Black Detroit under the protection of the carrado crew. These ominous branches were followed by a chronological listing of every hit Motown had ever made. Barrett Strong's money, the marvellettes, please, Mr. Postman, do you love me by the contours, and on and on and on.

And the hit list had branches, too, correlated to a list of radio stations spread out across the Midwest, East Coast, West, and to the south. And the whole timeline culminated with two photos, one on top of the other. Barry's photo was on top. Under it, there was one word. Below Barry's image, an FBI given title. There was another photo. This one of the impeccably groomed Barney Ailes,

the man with the office at Motown H.Q, right upstairs near Berries, a man who had proven himself to be indispensable to Barry Gordy and mysterious to most everyone else. Motown's promo man, the Sicilian, the first white man on the Motown payroll. And under his photo, there was also a title, It Read. The gun felt heavy in Barry Gordy's hand. Then again, it was 1988.

Everything felt heavy. If he was going to do it, well, you better go ahead and do it. Shoot him for their run now. Bang, bang. You spawned it. It's yours to kill. Do it. You won't.

Very Gordy was no shrink, but he was smart enough to know full well what the dream was about. The faceless beast haunting him was his baby, his pride and joy, his business Motown records, and the gun wasn't a gun, but rather a pen. The pen he would use to sign away ownership of his baby and to effectively kill his baby. The offer was too good to be true. $61 million for ownership of Motown, $61 million in a good night's sleep. The headaches were too many. The overhead was too high.

The cash flow was always too low. The competition was now too tough and the stress was almost all-consuming. MCA Incorporated, the massive music industry conglomerate and owners of MCA records wanted to do bad. Barry could taste it and Barry wanted out. But as rumors of the sales started circulating, so too did the whispers that Barry Gordy was a sellout, selling out a black business to corporate white business interests. And Barry couldn't stop thinking about it. It was all he thought about, actually, the deal.

actually, the deal, and the ramifications, positive and negative. 61 million makes a lot of problems go away, but could he deal with the sellout rap? Political fundraisers were never his bag socially. Barry, like most musicians, was more comfortable with dim lighting and smoke-filled nightclubs for social events. Hotel ballrooms with their bright lights and carpeted floors were a touch-geast-straight, even for a Jesse Jackson fundraiser. But shit, it was Jesse Jackson.

the first black man with an actual puncher's chance of nabbing the Democratic Party's nomination for president of the United States. When Barry got the invite, he knew he had to attend, even if the timing was brutal. The deal was on his mind every damn minute. He'd been going round for round with MCA for the past several months, and they were close but for a few details, and with every day that passed, more rumors and more flak back from the black community, and all of that added up to the dreaded sellout rap for Barry.

Jesse Jackson was no exception. Barry saw him coming from across the room. That big head, those giant eyes and catchers mid-hands. Barry sized him up. Ex-boxers never forget how to fight. And Barry knew that if it ever came down to it, despite their difference in size, he could whip Jesse, if for no other reason than the fact that Jesse lacked that killer instinct.

Talent, sure, maybe. The verdict was still out. But drive? nothing compared to Barry Gordy's. Jesse grabbed Barry's hand and got right to the point. Selling Motown would be a blow to black people all over the world. Barry started to make his case, but Jesse wasn't having it. He just started drifting again, through the crowd.

Jesse made his point. Didn't matter what Barry said, Jesse had his contribution already. Sometime afterward, Barry Gordy found himself sitting at a bare conference room table and holding that pen. It rested heavy in his hand. just like the gun in his dream. He signed, and with that signature, many think he killed Motown. The backlash was swift as he expected.

But unexpectedly, rumors began to swirl. Rumors that Barry sold out under orders from the mob. Rumors that Motown was at best mob affiliated and at worst, the mob front. The effrontery was hard for Barry Gordy to swallow. His success was unparalleled in the music industry. More than any other record label, his record label shaped American culture. In the 1960s alone, the label had 79 top 10 records on the Billboard Hot 100.

Motown's songs were recorded by the Beatles and the Rolling Stones and were ubiquitous on car stereos and jukeboxes, and even today, more than a half-century removed from the label's heyday, no style of music is more representative of a decade in a culture than the Motown sound is with the 60s. And this was all achieved during a time of intense racial division in this country and on a hunch that America, despite its divisions at the time, was ready for a different vision of itself,

one that didn't sound black or white, one that sounded in a word, American. The fact that this was achieved by a black man fronting a black-owned business, a business he started with a loan from his black family, isn't enough. It can't be the truth for some. Just as Barry Gordy projected his post-racial vision of America through Motown's music, much of America, to this day, still projects a regressive vision of this country onto Motown's legacy.

A vision that a black man couldn't possibly make it in America without the help of a white man. No, for some, Barry Gordy must have been dirty. He must have been working with the mob. How else can you explain his success? It had to be the mafia. Please. Sure. Barry Gordy, like a lot of men who fought their way out of their station and into the upper

echelon of the music business, had in any means necessary approach to entrepreneurship. In the early days, he pimped, and yeah, he liked to gamble and hung out at nightclubs in the 60s that were owned and operated by gangsters. And yeah, his records played on jukeboxes that were also mob-controlled, just like every other record played on every other jukebox at the time. And yeah, those records ended up on those jukeboxes through the efforts. of Motown's Sicilian promo man. But to explain away his success as being the product

of anything but his drive and talent is a bigger crime than any crime Barry Gordy may have committed. Disgraceland was created by yours truly and is produced in partnership with Double Elvis. Credits for this episode can be found on the show notes page at disgracelandpod.com. If you're listening as a Disgraceland All-Axist member, thank you for supporting the show.

We really appreciate it. And if not, you can become a member right now by going to disgracelandpod.com slash membership. Members can listen to every episode of disgrace land ad free. Plus, you'll get one brand new exclusive episode every month.

Weekly unscripted bonus episodes, special audio collections, and early access to merchandise and events. Visit disgracelampod.com slash membership for details. Rate and review the show and follow us on Instagram, TikTok, Twitter, and Facebook at DisgracelamPod,

and on YouTube at YouTube.com at Disgraceland Pod, Rockerola.