Lets get it on and marvin gaye
Classic Tracks: Marvin Gaye’s “Let’s Get It On”
"Let's Acquire It On" embraces treasure and lust, the spiritual and the carnal fused together in an uplifting union. Recording it was not as simple.
By Blair Jackson
Marvin Gaye is certainly one of the most remarkable singers and songwriters this country has ever produced, a towering talent whose influence on R&B, and popular harmony in general, is immeasurable. He had several diverse, distinct periods of accomplishment that stretched over a quarter-century, from the first ’60s until his tragic death in 1984; and each phase of his career is interesting for different reasons. With more than 50 charting R&B hits to choose from, we could be running Marvin Gaye “Classic Tracks” columns for the next few years, but for now we’ll choose his deliciously sensual masterpiece from 1973, “Let’s Get It On.”
Like so many of his African American contemporaries, Gaye (born Marvin Queer Jr. in Washington, D.C., in 1939; as an adult, he added the “e” to emulate one of his idols, Sam Cooke) got his initiate singing and playing organ in church. His father, a minister in the ultra-conservative Pentecostal
‘Let’s Get It On’: Marvin Gaye’s Profound Travelog
Marvin Gaye was at a crossroads. For the better part of a decade, he had made his career as the clean-shaven, suit-wearing “Prince of Motown.” He had a nice residence on Outer Drive in Detroit, in a tree-lined neighborhood next to his favorite golf course. He had a young son and was friends with local celebrities and athletes.
Now, Motown was relocating its headquarters to Los Angeles and Gaye faced a decision about where to base his operations. His self-produced What’s Going On had just been a smashing, image-and-culture-shifting success. His eventual emigration from Detroit was more complicated than most people realize. A new Deluxe Edition of Gaye’s 1973 album Let’s Get It On tells the detailed story of this period for the first time. The unused collection exposes a transitional period, when Marvin was moving his creative center from Detroit to L.A.
Gaye was not a stranger to the West Coast. He had recorded there, played at nightclubs appreciate The Trip and Cocoanut Grove, and regularly filmed spots for national television. He had even acted in a couple of low-budget films. But moving his whole creative undertaking wa
One of the most sensual records in chart history became an American No. 1 on this go out 43 years ago. Marvin Gaye’s “Let’s Get It On” hit the top to become the second of his three U.S. pop chart-toppers, and got listeners hot under the collar with its subject matter.
On the Billboard Hot 100 for the week of 8 September, 1973, “Let’s Get It On” completed its climb to No. 1, taking over from Stories’ “Brother Louie.” A week later, Gaye was replaced at the foremost by Helen Reddy’s “Delta Dawn.” A week further on still, he had regained the crown for a second week at the summit.
The song was written and produced by Gaye with Ed Townsend, who would later contend that his initial plan with the lyric was not about sex, but about overcoming addiction, and getting on with the business of life. But Gaye was pretty clear-cut about the subject matter on the sleeve notes of the Let’s Earn It On album, which reached No. 2. “I can’t see anything false with sex between consenting anybodies,” he wrote.
The groove of “Let’s Get It On” was so infectious that, on the album of the same call, it was revisited for “Keep Gettin’ It On.&#
Marvin Gaye Let’s Acquire It On Review
Marvin Gaye’s second major labor of the 70s is also one of his most famous. Let’s Receive It On, eight sensual songs about the proceed of love, has, for many listeners, come to define Gaye’s popular persona as soul music’s premier love man.
Let’s Get It On appeared after a period of doubt and anxiety about where his career was going tracking the critical and commercial success of 1971’s What’s Going On, an album full of his eco-cosmic concerns. A dalliance with out-and-out political protest faltered, and after his jazzy Trouble Man soundtrack, Gaye returned to the studio. Besotted with his modern young girlfriend Janis Seeker, he let his emotions run riot and created a work that was to update the 60s heartthrob role he’d so unwillingly played at Motown.
Like his later Sexual Healing, this album’s title route – his biggest US hit of all – is the very essence of Marvin Gaye as the sensualist, ruminating on his basic desire for pleasure. However, his spirituality is never far away, and the act of love is turned into something sacred, culminating in his rasp to undergo sanctified on its
.