Music and fashion have always enjoyed an exquisite harmony, a durable duet illustrated beautifully in Adam White’s glossy book Motown: The Sound of Young America. White’s comprehensive book about the fabled Motor City record company has a double-barreled focus. First, it is an unflaggingly entertaining history of the music industry powerhouse founded by Berry Gordy Jr. (first as Tamla Records in 1959 and then as Motown in 1960).
But it is also a brilliant history of the sartorial flash so closely identified with the Detroit sound. Featuring rare photographs and iconography not only from the Motown archives but also the culture of the time, White’s book showcases the evolving concept of cool and how, in any given year, everyone wanted to look (the galleries of Ebony and Jet magazine covers from the ’60s through the ’80s are reason enough to buy this book!). He also ably traces the rise of Motown’s superstars: Smokey Robinson and the Miracles, Diana Ross and the Supremes, Stevie Wonder, Gladys Knight and the Pips, Marvin Gaye, Lionel Richie, and the Jacksons—while leaving plenty of room in the spotlight for such label rebels as Edwin Starr, Eddie Kendricks, and Rick James, whose music and styles spoke more fiercely to the radical cultural shifts of the time. If this book is not already a style manual for the costume department on the Netflix series The Get Down, it certainly should be. It’s a pop culture gem that’s a must for both music lover and fashion junkie, or anyone, for that matter, who appreciates cool.
Motown Records Archives. Courtesy of the EMI Archive Trust and Universal Music Group.
Berry Gordy presents a copy of an LP to Rev. Martin Luther King of his address to the Freedom Rally held in Detroit on June 23, 1963, pictured with singer and civil rights activist Lena Horne and jazz musician Billy Taylor, the composer of “I Wish I Knew How It Would Feel to Be Free.”
Motown Records Archives. Courtesy of the EMI Archive Trust and Universal Music Group.
Stevie Wonder in London early in early 1966, promoting his latest release, “Uptight (Everything’s Alright).” It became the musician’s first British chart success, part of his total Motown tally of 25 Top 20 hits over the next 20 years.
Courtesy of EMI Group Archive Trust
Tammi Terrell gives a wave in the street outside Motown HQ.
Courtesy of the Paul Nixon Collection
The Undisputed Truth in 1971: Joe Harris, Brenda Joyce Evans (front) and Billie Rae Calvin.
Motown Records Archives. Courtesy of the EMI Archive Trust and Universal Music Group.
Florence Ballard, Mary Wilson and Diana Ross in London’s Manchester Square, outside the headquarters of EMI Records, in October 1964.
Courtesy of EMI Group Archive Trust
The Supremes on the same visit, sporting the outfits later displayed on the front of their 1964 release, A Bit Of Liverpool. The album featured their versions of Beatles hits and other songs associated with the so-called “British Invasion” of the USA that year.
Motown Records Archives. Courtesy of the EMI Archive Trust and Universal Music Group.
Chris Clark in the studio with Berry Gordy, Lamont Dozier and Stevie Wonder.
Courtesy of the Paul Nixon Collection & Miss Chris Clark
Bandleader Earl Van Dyke with the in-house Motown musicians who played on the Tamla-Motown UK package tour, pictured in London in 1965. From L to R: guitarist Rover White, percussionist Jack Ashford and drummer Bob Cousar, with Van Dyke.
Private collection
The Jackson 5’s first dozen Top 20 hits for Motown; the first four went to No. 1. The group’s extraordinary popularity permitted adolescent tendencies on photo shoots.
Motown Records Archives. Courtesy of the EMI Archive Trust and Universal Music Group.
The Jackson 5 taping their ABC-TV network special Goin’ Back to Indiana, in Los Angeles in July 1971.
Motown Records Archives. Courtesy of the EMI Archive Trust and Universal Music Group.
Motown's iconic style is catalogued in a new collection, Motown: The Sound of Young America.
via Amazon
