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MOTOWN RECORDS = $800 & A DREAM!!
by Jacky Jasper
Did you know that 50 years ago, Berry Gordy founded Motown Records with an eight-hundred-dollar bank loan? Today, Berry Gordy has a net worth of about $350 million.
Gordy is a living example of a man who created something out of nothing, and is laughing all the way to the bank. He even out-lived Michael Jackson, the youngest artist on the roster.
I’m sad to say that everyone on the team did not collect. It’s a fact that Florence Ballard aka “Flo” was forced to apply for welfare. (For those of you who don’t know, Flo was an original member of “The Supremes”…ask Diana Ross.) Flo died at the age of 32, with three children — ON WELFARE. Flo is reported to have suffered from chronic depression — I wonder why? She was diagnosed with coronary thrombosis, and apparently didn’t have the money for health care. Her death is said to be “one of rock’s greatest tragedies.
Motown Records was the home for major black acts including, Marvin Gaye, Stevie Wonder, Smokey Robinson, The Temptations, The King of Pop – Michael Jackson, and my friend the Late Rick James.
At a time when racism was prominent throughout American culture, Motown’s music bonded blacks and whites across the country. The Detroit-based musical enterprise also opened up lanes between Europeans and black music. As a result, music was forever changed.
By 1980, Gordy agreed to just $61 million from MCA in return for Motown Records and its long priceless list of musical art from the greats. That’s just $6 million dollars more than what David Bowe received for his publishing. What an a$$hole!!! Apparently Gordy had no respect for the artists on his roster. And, we as black people often ask ourselves why we don’t get anywhere. I’ll tell you. It’s because of people like Berry Gordy, who drain our spirits, souls and talents and sell it for silver.
Sound familiar Puffy? These people are no heroes to me. Know why? Because they’re a bunch of soul-sucking vampires. Don’t you agree?
Jacky Says: MOTOWN RECORDS = $800 & A DREAM!! http://diaryofahollywoodstreetking.com/motown-records-800-a-dream/
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Proof & proof again that the mindset of an individual with a passion to succeed will succeed. Berry Gordy in my mind found a world of hidden talent and gave us all the music of a time to be long remembered. Thank you Berry Gordy…God Bless You.
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Ike Reply:
September 29th, 2011 at 20:46
Yes, Berry Gee gave us Motown but at what costs? Berry recorded so much material that still sits in Universal Records’ vaults-unpublished!!
Artists at Motown were ripped off just like Morris Levy, The Chess Brothers, and other record company owners ripped off their artists.
Yep, there was a gap that was filled with the soulful sounds of Motown but it’s a god damned shame that this black man ripped off artists just like his white counterparts.
Berry did not even report his sales to RIAA so he could get legitimate gold records. Berry pressed and presented his own gold records that weren’t worth the frames they were in. Nobody but Smokey Robinson knew what was up because Berry was using Smokey’s talent as his King Midas.
Thanks Jacky for once again reminding these artists that the power is a click away on the net.
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It really annoys me when people make grand judgements about people or things without doing research first. If you truly knew how record companies operate, you might understand better about what you are trying to say. Berry Gordy did not set up the business model for how record labels operated during his tenure at Motown.
What he did do is to create a vehicle where Black music was redefined as a valid art form other than being called ” race music”. There was no model set in place for what he did because it was the first of it’s kind. Sure, mistakes were made, but still to this day there has not been another Motown. Let’s celebrate the man for his contribution to society
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