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Artist:
Marvin Gaye
Balancing raw power with shades of vulnerability, Gaye rose to the top of Motown's roster without the benefit of a supporting vocal group. Whether singing love songs or social commentary, Gaye's voice displays an earnestness and sincerity that are a soul singer's most potent weapons. Among these 47 hits are his memorable duets with Mary Wells, Kim Weston and Tammi Terrell along with Motown staples such as "Can I Get a Witness", "How Sweet It Is", "Ain't That Peculiar" and "I Heard It Through the Grapevine". This set also covers socially conscious 1970s originals such as "What's Going On", "Mercy, Mercy Me" and "Inner City Blues". Only his last hit, "Sexual Healing"...
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List Price: £7.99
Our Price: £3.89
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Artist:
Erykah Badu
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List Price: £7.99
Our Price: £3.20
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Artist:
Marvin Gaye,
Tammi Terrell
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List Price: £7.99
Our Price: £3.64
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Artist:
Various Artists
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List Price: £17.99
Our Price: £9.47
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Artist:
Marvin Gaye
The Very Best of Marvin Gaye pulls together the usual hits from "I'll Be Doggone" to "Grapevine", "What's Going On" to "Let's Get It On" to "Sexual Healing"--all musts for any R&B or pop fan--but this two-CD set also offers treats for the Marvin connoisseur. Foremost are the previously unreleased "Where Are We Going?" which marries Nixon-era (and beyond) social concerns to a lilting groove that brings to mind Spinners records of the period, and an alternate mix of Gaye's rare version of "His Eye Is on the Sparrow". Very Best also pays proper tribute to Gaye's final years at Motown with the full 11-plus minutes of the intense, casually funky "Got to Give It U...
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List Price: £10.99
Our Price: £5.98
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Artist:
Stevie Wonder
Songs in the Key of Life was the highest high-point of Stevie Wonder's career. More sprawling than Innervisions and Talking Book, this 2 LP-plus-EP was also less of a consistent stunner than either of those masterworks. That Songs retains an enormous amount of visionary relevance, though, is demonstrated not only in Coolio's borrowing of "Pastime Paradise" as a template for "Gangsta's Paradise", but in the cold-as-ice synthesized string quartet of "Village Ghetto Land". This is Stevie, so naturally that cut's anger is balanced by the ultra-buoyant "I Wish," "Sir Duke", and "Another Star". --Rickey Wright
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List Price: £10.99
Our Price: £6.49
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Artist:
Stevie Wonder
The songs from this 1972 album perfectly illustrate the contrasting sides of Wonder's complex personality: "Superstition" is a strong rocker, a paranoid bit of wah-wah guitar funk that's as persistent as the best punk music; the opening track, "You Are the Sunshine of My Life", is a pure love song that would sound corny coming from any other voice. A hint of bitterness, perhaps owing to Wonder's then-dissolving marriage, gives Talking Book its edge. But overall it's obsessed with love, and while "Sunshine" is still one of the singer/keyboardist's most beloved songs, the closing "I Believe (When I Fall in Love It Will Be Forever)" is much deeper and more r...
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List Price: £7.99
Our Price: £2.56
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Artist:
Four Tops
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List Price: £4.99
Our Price: £2.81
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Artist:
Marvin Gaye
Sly & The Family Stone might have psychedelicised soul music, but Marvin Gaye personalised it. Although the powers-that-were Motown didn't even want to release the record, the unexpected success of What's Going On, issued in 1971, inspired Stevie Wonder, Curtis Mayfield, and just about every other black artist on the planet to take greater responsibility for their music and its meaning. Gaye co-wrote the songs and produced the album, flavouring it with layer upon layer of his own multi-tracked vocals, oceans of hand percussion, strings, flutes and jazzy horn solos. Spacy and loose as a spliff-fuelled Sunday afternoon jam in the park, the nine songs all playe...
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List Price: £8.99
Our Price: £3.64
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Artist:
Stevie Wonder
One of Stevie Wonder's best albums, and the one where his more fanciful, free-form moments gel perfectly with his knack for irresistible pop singles. 1973's Innervisions swings between delicate and airy ballads, Latin-influenced rhythms (the hit "Don't Worry 'Bout a Thing"), and his own synth-heavy versions of gut-bucket soul (the determined spiritual questing of "Higher Ground"). The striking juxtaposition between "Vision", a barely breathed hope that a world of peace might be upon us, and the great "Living for the City", a funky, pulsing tale of racism, is powerful, haunting, and still all too relevant. --David Cantwell
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List Price: £7.99
Our Price: £3.74
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