421. Marvin Gaye - Here, My Dear (1978)

















Track Listing

1. Here My Dear
2. I Met A Little Girl
3. When Did You Stop Loving Me When Did I Stop Loving You
4. Anger
5. Is That Enough
6. Everybody Needs Love
7. Time To Get It Together
8. Sparrow
9. Anna's Song
10. When Did You Stop Loving Me When Did I Stop Loving You
11. Funky Space Reincarnation
12. You Can Leave But It's Gonna Cost You
13. Falling In Love Again
14. When Did You Stop Loving Me When Did I Stop Loving You

Review

I just love the Gaye, nothing like a bit of hard Gaye action to make my day. Still this isn't the steamy Gaye loving that we have come to expect, or even the Gaye interventionism of What's Going On. This is a oeuvre of Gaye spite.

Marvin got dumped by Anna, Marvin is miffed, she is getting the royalties for this album so he goes ahead and titles it Here, My Dear and proceeds to chronicle the collapse of their relationship. Venting his spite mixed with tenderness as it always is in a hurtful breakup. He hates her now, but he loved her once... and maybe a little bit now.

OK, there are problems with the album, it is a bit monotonous, it sounds a bit like little shifts of the same song, it is sprawling over two albums and it can feel like too much of a good thing and it is overly autobiographical, making you feel like telling him to pucker up.

It is because of those things that this is not the perfection of What's Going On or Let's Get It On. Still, quite listenable.

Track Highlights

1. Is That Enough
2. Anger
3. You Can Leave, But It's Going To Cost You
4. When Did You Stop Loving Me, When Did I Stop Loving You

Final Grade

8/10

Trivia

From Wikipedia:

When Here, My Dear was released in the end of 1978, it was panned by consumers and critics alike, who called the album "bizarre" and "uncommercial". The album's lack of success angered Gaye to the point that he refused to promote it any further. Motown stopped promoting Here, My Dear in early 1979, by which point Gaye had gone in to self-imposed exile.

The album was re-evaluated in the years following its original release, and is today seen as a landmark in Gaye's career. It is voted as one of the greatest albums in music history including Mojo Magazine (1995) and Rolling Stone magazine's critics poll (500 Greatest Albums of All-Time) (2003), among others.


What a beautiful video for Anger, Thank you Youtube!: