Not a bad thing, of course, but this is nonetheless a formula record. It’s surprising to note that this is really the first “straightforward” verse/chorus pop song the Supremes have cut since teaming up with HDH – there are no big, ambitious changes, no complicated transitional phases, no cyclical structures. (One does rather feel for the Marvelettes, whose release schedule is now inadvertently synchronised with that of Motown’s biggest stars and their greatest in-house competitors, but them’s the breaks.) Of the four singles released by the Supremes in 1964 (everyone forgets Run, Run, Run), this is probably the least immediate, the most conventional it’s still undeniably brilliant, and leaving it on the LP would have been a real shame. In the end, it wasn’t really a fight at all. Whatever the reason, Nella couldn’t be allowed to succeed. (Dodds’ version, a passable but unexciting cover, surely wouldn’t have garnered much traction without America’s legion of newly-minted Supremes fans). Perhaps it would have been too much to bear to see a Supremes song – a song he owned – climb the charts on the back of his hard work.
Perhaps the fiasco with Mary Wells’ very public walkout had stung Gordy’s pride. But object he did Motown, who’d once been lucky not to have been sued into oblivion (by Scepter, of all people) for brazenly ripping off the Shirelles, now fired off lawsuits with alarming ease whenever they felt a copyright was being infringed. This was Motown's biggest-selling studio album of the Sixties not bad for a 'no-hit' group.Berry had made much of his living chasing a buck wherever one might be found, and so it strikes a modern observer as a bit rich that he objected so strenuously whenever anyone tried to turn the tables. The Supremes' second LP, which caused all the trouble. No, more likely this was released for a simple reason: because no matter what the circumstances, Berry Gordy wasn’t going to let anyone take liberties. But in real life, the Supremes would issue Stop! In the Name of Love just three months later anyway, so it’s difficult to envisage where Motown might have been planning to squeeze this hypothetical extra single into the schedules. The message is clear: don’t mess with Motown.Īll of which makes sense, until you ask the crucial question: why? Why bother? I mean, “oh no, Nella Dodds might have taken a Jobete song up the charts, making an already-rich Motown incrementally richer” – is that the kind of thing that would have HDH quaking in their boots? Why would Motown be so keen to squash it? One possible answer is that they were planning to release Come See About Me as the Supremes’ next single, and Nella’s version might have stolen its thunder. Denied her big break, Dodds went on to have a short music career with a couple of respectable hits, but she’s largely – and unfairly – been forgotten to history. Berry Gordy went ballistic, demanding Motown release the Supremes’ cut as a single to squash Nella’s version the result was a third straight Number One hit for the girls, while Nella Dodds’ record foundered. Wand picked what they saw as the LP’s most accessible track not yet used on a Supremes 45, Come See About Me, they worked hard to mimic the production, instrumentation and backing vocal arrangements of the Supremes’ original, and Dodds’ version hit the stores in early October of 1964. With Baby Love all over the airwaves, Florence Greenberg reasoned: why not? A 14-year-old would-be starlet, she auditioned for Scepter/Wand by singing along to the recently-released Where Did Our Love Go LP and boasting about her passable Diana Ross impersonation. The answer most Motown buffs will give you is two words: Nella Dodds.
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