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The Temptations: Cloud Nine / Puzzle People

 A l b u m   D e t a i l s


Label: Motown Records
Released: 1969 / 1969
Time:
79:35
Category: Soul, Funk, R&B
Producer(s): Norman Whitfield
Rating:
Media type: CD
Web address: www.thetemptations.net
Appears with:
Purchase date: 2012
Price in €: 1,00





 S o n g s ,   T r a c k s


Cloud Nine (1969)

[1] Cloud Nine (B.Strong/N.Whitfield) - 3:27
[2] I Heard It Through The Grapevine (B.Strong/N.Whitfield) - 3:00
[3] Runaway Child, Running Wild (B.Strong/N.Whitfield) - 4:37
[4] Love Is A Hurting Thing (B.Raleight/D.Linden) - 2:28
[5] Hey Girl (G.Goffin/C.King) - 2:38
[6] Why Did She Have To Leave Me (B.Strong/N.Whitfield) - 2:56
[7] I Need Your Lovin (B.Strong/N.Whitfield) - 2:35
[8] Don't Let Him Take Your Love From Me (B.Strong/N.Whitfield) - 2:31
[9] I Gotta Find A Way (B.Strong/N.Whitfield/E.Holland/C.Grant/E.Kendricks) - 2:56
[10] Gonna Keep On Tryin Till I Win Your Love (B.Strong/N.Whitfield) - 2:32


Puzzle People (1969)

[11] I Can't Get Next To You (B.Strong/N.Whitfield) - 2:53
[12] Hey Jude (P.McCartney/J.Lennon) - 3:29
[13] Don't Let The Joneses Get You Down (B.Strong/N.Whitfield) - 4:45
[14] Message From A Black Man (B.Strong/N.Whitfield) - 6:01
[15] It's Your Thing (R.Isley/O.Islay/R.Islay) - 3:13
[16] Little Green Apples (B.Russell) - 3:43
[17] You Don't Love Me No More (B.Strong/N.Whitfield/R.Penzabene) - 2:29
[18] Since I've Lost You (N.Whitfield) - 2:38
[19] Running Away [Ain't Gonna Help You] (B.Strong/N.Whitfield) - 2:46
[20] That's The Way Love Is (B.Strong/N.Whitfield) - 3:13
[21] Slave (B.Strong/N.Whitfield) - 7:23

 A r t i s t s ,   P e r s o n n e l


Cloud Nine (1969)

Dennis Edwards - Vocals (Tenor)
Eddie Kendricks - Vocals (Tenor/Falsetto)
Paul Williams - Vocals (Tenor/Baritone)
Melvin Franklin - Vocals (Bass)
Otis Williams - Vocals (Tenor/Baritone)
Norman Whitfield - Producer


Puzzle People (1969)

Dennis Edwards - Vocals
Eddie Kendricks - Vocals
Paul Williams - Vocals
Melvin Franklin - Vocals
Otis Williams - Vocals

The Funk Brothers - Instrumentation

Norman Whitfield - Producer


Reissue:

John Matousek - Compilation Producer, Mastering
Alana Coghlan - Design
Lisa Auld - Design

 C o m m e n t s ,   N o t e s


1986 CD Gordy GCD08016GD


Cloud Nine (1969)

Cloud Nine is the ninth studio album by American musical group The Temptations for the Gordy (Motown) label released in 1969. The album is a watershed for several reasons. It is the first regular Temptations studio LP to feature Dennis Edwards as the replacement for David Ruffin, who was fired in June 1968. In addition, it marks the beginning of the Temptations' four-year delve into psychedelia recording, at the behest of producer Norman Whitfield, in a fusion genre referred to as "psychedelic soul." The album went to number four on the Billboard Pop Albums Chart and the group received their first Grammy Award in 1969.

Norman Whitfield took the Temptations into psychedelic territory after a suggestion from the group's defacto leader, Otis Williams. Williams had been discussing Sly & the Family Stone's music, and the changes it brought to the soul music industry, with his friend, producer Kenneth Gamble. Gamble agreed with Williams that Sly Stone's funkier production style and multi-lead vocals was here to stay and that it was time to learn to adapt to it. While Williams, Whitfield, and Williams' then-wife Ann Cain were standing outside of the Casino Royale nightclub in Motown's home city of Detroit during the summer of 1968, Williams suggested that Whitfield might try to produce something like Sly & the Family Stone's "Dance to the Music" for their next single. The Temptations had been successful with romantic ballads such as "My Girl" and midtempo numbers such as "(I Know) I'm Losing You", but Williams, taking Gamble's advice, felt that it was time to update the group's sound. "Man, I don't want to be bothered with that shit," remarked Whitfield, who regarded the Family Stone sound as a "passing fancy".

Regardless of his original opinion of Sly Stone's work, by the fall of 1968, Whitfield had the Temptations recording "Cloud Nine", which featured all five members (Otis Williams, the newly drafted Dennis Edwards, and founding members Eddie Kendricks, Paul Williams, and Melvin Franklin) trading lead vocals over a Family Stone-like instrumental track. Although Otis Williams denies the connection, "Cloud Nine's" lyrics have frequently been cited as empathizing with drug use [1]. The song seems to suggest that the best way for someone to deal with the problems that come with being poor and black in America was to "ride high on 'cloud nine'". "Cloud Nine" was a number six hit on the US pop singles chart, and a number two hit on the US R&B singles chart, and won Motown Records its first Grammy Award, for Best Rhythm & Blues Group Performance, Vocal or Instrumental.

The album's second single, "Run Away Child, Running Wild", delved further into unusual territory for the Temptations, turning a story about a lost runaway into a nine-minute epic of doo-wop vocals, droning organ lines, and hard-hitting drums similar to those typically heard in Sly & the Family Stone and James Brown records. Halfway through its running time, "Run Away Child" segues into an instrumental jam session (the single mix only includes the vocal half of the song). Future Temptations songs produced by Norman Whitfield, such as "Hum Along and Dance", "Smiling Faces Sometimes", and "Papa Was a Rollin' Stone", would further emphasize extended instrumental passages, often allowing said passages to overshadow the songs' vocals.

"Run Away Child" was a number-one hit on the US R&B singles chart, and, like "Cloud Nine", a number six hit on the US pop chart. Earl Van Dyke, who performs the prominent organ solo during the instrumental section of the record, recorded his own instrumental version of "Run Away Child, Running Wild", which was released as a single the same year.

The rest of the Cloud Nine album is made up of more standard Temptations fare, most of which is relegated to the flip side of the LP. "Why Did She Have to Leave Me (Why Did She Have to Go)" features Dennis Edwards delivering a Ruffinesque lead on a slow ballad, and the Eddie Kendricks-led "I Need Your Lovin'" also finds the group in familiar surroundings. Edwards, Kendricks, and Melvin Franklin share the lead on "Love is a Hurtin' Thing", while "I Gotta Find a Way (To Get You Back)" is a showcase for Edwards alone. Paul Williams is given two solo numbers, "Hey Girl" and "Don't Let Him Take Your Love From Me", re-recorded as an upbeat single for The Four Tops the same year. The ballad "Gonna Keep on Tryin' Till I Win Your Love", led by Edwards, would later be re-recorded by the group in 1971 for the Sky's the Limit LP, with Kendricks on lead.

The one song that does not fit into either the ballads classification or the psychedelic soul classification is the Temptations' cover of the Gladys Knight & the Pips version of "I Heard It Through the Grapevine". Stripped to its rhythm track, the Temptation's version of "Grapevine" retains the tempo of Knight's hit version, but uses a less gospel based and more pop/blues based vocal arrangement.

After receiving positive critical reception for his new production style, and winning the Temptations a Grammy with "Cloud Nine", Whitfield would take the Temptations even further away from "My Girl" and onwards towards trippier singles such as "Don't Let the Joneses Get You Down", the #1 hit "I Can't Get Next to You", "Psychedelic Shack", and "Ball of Confusion (That's What the World Is Today)" before hard-edged psychedelic soul fell out of favor with audiences.



Puzzle People (1969)

Puzzle People is the eleventh studio album released by The Temptations for the Gordy (Motown) label in 1969. Produced entirely by Norman Whitfield, Puzzle People takes the next step along the path that Cloud Nine started, and takes the Temptations further away from a classic soul sound, and more towards the realm of psychedelic soul. Although a few ballads, including "Running Away (Ain't Gonna Help You)," are still present, the album is primarily composed of Sly & the Family Stone/James Brown-derived proto-funk tracks such as the lead single "Don't Let the Joneses Get You Down," and the number-one Billboard Pop hit "I Can't Get Next to You." Also included are psychedelic-styled covers (recorded with distored guitars, clavinets, and spacy reverb and sound effects) of contemporary songs such as The Isley Brothers' "It's Your Thing," The Beatles' "Hey Jude," and Roger Miller's "Little Green Apples."

As opposed to the recordings of the David Ruffin/"Classic 5" era, the lead vocals here are frequently traded back and forth between the group members, with each of the two singles featuring all five Temptations on lead, and Dennis Edwards, Eddie Kendricks, and Paul Williams dominating most of the leads on the album tracks.

The lyrics on some of the original numbers, written by former Motown artist Barrett Strong, were becoming increasingly socially conscious and political. "Slave" deals with the injustice in the prison system, while "Message From a Black Man" is a Black power song with a militant refrain: "no matter how hard you try/you can't stop me now." "Message From a Black Man" was a popular radio request in 1969, although the Temptations themselves, who thought the record too forward, never performed it live.

Puzzle People was released on the same day (September 23, 1969) as Together, a duets album of covers by the Temptations and labelmates Diana Ross & the Supremes. It peaked into the Top 5 on the Billboard Pop Albums chart, and spent fifteen weeks at number one on the R&B Albums chart.
 

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