Marvin Gaye’s “What’s Going On” (1971) grew out of a few converging pressures: a country in turmoil, a brother’s war stories, and a man in personal crisis.
The spark: a police riot in Berkeley
In May 1969, Four Tops member Renaldo “Obie” Benson was on tour in Berkeley, California, when he witnessed police violently confronting anti-war protesters at People’s Park. He was shaken by it and wondered aloud why there was so much hatred. Back at Motown, he began shaping the idea into a song with the writer Al Cleveland, but the Four Tops were not keen on recording something so political. Benson took it to Gaye instead, who reworked it, added his own melodic and lyrical ideas, and made it his own.
Gaye’s own turning point
By then, Gaye was a reluctant hitmaker. He had been Motown’s polished romantic star, but he was disillusioned. His singing partner Tammi Terrell had died in March 1970 after a long illness, and he had withdrawn from performing for a time. His younger brother Frankie had returned from Vietnam with stories of what he and fellow soldiers had seen and endured, which gave Gaye a direct window onto the war’s human cost. He was also troubled by poverty, racial injustice, drug abuse, and environmental damage in America. He wanted to say something beyond love songs.
The fight with Motown
Berry Gordy, Motown’s founder, resisted. He thought the song too political and commercially risky, and he reportedly dismissed it as unlike what Gaye’s audience wanted. Gaye essentially went on strike, refusing to record anything else until it was released. When Motown finally put out the single in January 1971, it sold extremely well, which forced Gordy to back down and let Gaye make a full album.
Making the record
The album was recorded in 1970 and 1971 with Motown’s session band, the Funk Brothers, along with orchestral arrangements by David Van De Pitte. The loose, conversational feel comes partly from the vocal layering: Gaye overdubbed his own voice, and the overlapping lead lines create the sense of several people talking at once. The song’s famous party-like background chatter came from friends and musicians in the studio, some of them Detroit Lions players, and the atmosphere was deliberately relaxed.
What it became
The album What’s Going On is often cited as one of the first Motown albums where the artist had full creative control, and it is widely treated as a landmark of soul music. As a concept album, it flows as a continuous suite and addresses war, inequality, drugs, and ecological concern from the perspective of a returning Vietnam veteran. It regularly appears at or near the top of “greatest albums” lists.
