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Marvin Gaye's Here, My Dear: A Lesser-Known Classic

Posted at 12:20 PM on February 3, 2012 by Peter Valelly

The canonical classic Marvin Gaye album is, of course, What's Going On, and with good reason — it's a sweeping statement that's both personal and political, with Gaye's songwriting agonizing over the tumultuous cultural climate of the late '60s and early '70s, his voice charged with social and political anxieties and aching with desperation. But dig a little deeper into Gaye's catalog, and you'll find more than a few other excellent full-lengths in Gaye's catalog, and none seems to enthrall his fans and followers more than the emotionally abrasive, disco and funk-tinged double-disc masterpiece Here, My Dear.

Shortly before the album was recorded, Gaye was embroiled in court proceedings while divorcing his first wife, Anna Gordy (the sister of Motown Records founder Berry Gordy). Not wanting to pay traditional alimony payments — his extravagant lifestyle had left him nearly broke — Gaye worked with his lawyers to secure a deal allowing Gordy to claim a a fraction of the royalties on the sales of his next album.

Gaye always planned to make the album a symbol of rejection directed at Gordy, initially claiming he would toss off a trite, filler-filled LP using as little time and effort as possible. Instead, the album became quite the opposite: a deeply personal, wounded epic chronicling his and Gordy's relationship and divorce and the aftermath from both.

The result is one of the most tortured and spiteful albums in the history of popular music. Panned by critics at the time for its uncommercial songwriting and sprawling, meandering two-LP format, Here, My Dear has since become a critical and cult classic. Its tracks range from the lush, raw-nerve funk of "Anger" and the wistful "When Did You Stop Loving Me When Did I Stop Loving You" to the out-there disco-funk meanderings of "A Funky Space Reincarnation" before finishing with "Falling In Love Again," a surprisingly tender ode to his second wife, Janis (whom he would divorce a year after the album's release).

So if your knowledge of Gaye is limited to What's Going On or his amazing run of '60s Motown hits, take some time to dig deeper into the darker side of his brilliance with his late-career triumph Here, My Dear. It's a rich and rewarding album that reveals even more dimensions of one of the greatest musicians of the 20th century.

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