Soul Strut 100: #92 - Marvin Gaye - Here, My Dear

RAJRAJ tenacious local 7,782 Posts
edited December 2017 in The Soul Strut 100
I will slowly be unveiling the Top 100 Soul Strut Related Records as Voted by the Strutters Themselves.

#92 - Marvin Gaye - Here, My Dear



Please discuss your reactions to this record. The thread will be archived later here.

Related Threads:

Here, My Dear Finally Gets The Deluxe Treatment

Underappreciated Marvin Gaye LPs

Marvin Gaye appreciation

Awesome Revenge Tracks RR
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  Comments


  • pcmrpcmr 5,591 Posts
    now we are talking
    thanks for the links to former threads
    classic album and one that i understood more because of batmon and other's analysis
    a grower that never ceases to amaze me

  • CousinLarryCousinLarry 4,618 Posts
    Such a complicated album, full of contradictions, but not in a bad way. Marvin gets right to the point, but it also feels laid back and meandering. Supremely funky, yet really damn sad. Brilliant stuff.

    What is the deal with the two covers?

    Here, My Dear vs. Here My Dear

  • JuniorJunior 4,853 Posts
    I'm delighted to see this in here but at the same time extremely disappointed that it's not a lot higher - maybe the assumption that everyone now recognises its greatness has worked against it?

    I don't know for certain since I can't remember back that far but I have a deep seated feeling that Here, My Dear was an album that the Strut really got me to listen to. I was aware of it before this forum and knew enough of it to feel I had a grasp but I believe it was post one of the mentions on here bitd that really got me to sit down and spend time with it and recognise just how incredible it is.

    The whole thing is fantastic from start to end and covers so much ground musically that to me its easy to forget what a lot of the content is about and get swept away on the production and harmonies. When you do stop and listen to the content for a minute it's like a slap in the face. One thing that has always struck me is that I hear a real contradiction between the amount of attention to arrangements and the complexity of many of the songs and what feels like rough edges in the final editing. Keeps a rawness to the songs that might otherwise get lost.

    An album that really feels timeless to me I have also been known to listen to Time To Get It Together on loop for extended periods.

  • RAJRAJ tenacious local 7,782 Posts
    This tracks gives me goose bumps:


  • bassiebassie 11,710 Posts
    Junior said:
    I'm delighted to see this in here but at the same time extremely disappointed that it's not a lot higher - maybe the assumption that everyone now recognises its greatness has worked against it?

    I don't know for certain since I can't remember back that far but I have a deep seated feeling that Here, My Dear was an album that the Strut really got me to listen to.


    It goes to show how SStrut is one giant privatemindgarden lol ??? this record is strangely off people???s radar, but if I extricate my point of reference from the Board, maybe it???s not so strange after all? Big big music fans have asked me what I???m playing when I put this record on ??? at home and out ??? and I am surprised.

    I can still remember being in a record store when I heard it for the first time. The guy at the counter put on Is That Enough???
    Oh.
    My.
    Goodness.
    The opening to that song still gives me chills.

    It is easily the Gaye record I listen to the most.

  • batmonbatmon 27,574 Posts
    imma get tipsy and go in later

  • JuniorJunior 4,853 Posts
    bassie said:
    Junior said:
    I'm delighted to see this in here but at the same time extremely disappointed that it's not a lot higher - maybe the assumption that everyone now recognises its greatness has worked against it?

    I don't know for certain since I can't remember back that far but I have a deep seated feeling that Here, My Dear was an album that the Strut really got me to listen to.


    It goes to show how SStrut is one giant privatemindgarden lol ??? this record is strangely off people???s radar, but if I extricate my point of reference from the Board, maybe it???s not so strange after all? Big big music fans have asked me what I???m playing when I put this record on ??? at home and out ??? and I am surprised.


    Ha, yeah this is what I was trying to get at. I was wondering if it's seen as too predictable by people on this board - a relatively easy to come by album by a household name- totally overlooking how little love or listening time it gets from the general population. I know a fair few big music fans who know of the album and could tell you a few tracks on there but don't actually really know the album itself.

    B/w

    batmon said:
    imma get tipsy and go in later

    Yes.

  • one of my top 5 albums of all time ever

  • finelikewinefinelikewine "ONCE UPON A TIME, I HAD A VINYL." http://www.discogs.com/user/permabulker 1,416 Posts

  • after 20 years of being a marvin gaye superfan, this is album i come back to most frequently.

    it must be one of the most self-indulgent, yet brilliant albums i can imagine. i think it's fair to say that it is on this record that he took the overdubbing of his own voice to a new and since unmatched level.

    while i like every song, "anna's song" is my shit.


  • HarveyCanalHarveyCanal "a distraction from my main thesis." 13,234 Posts
    It's my 3rd favorite Marvin Gaye album, but that's like saying shelter is my 3rd favorite personal need after food and water.

  • OligeeOligee 289 Posts
    The story behind Here, My Dear is pretty crazy. Apparently he was married to Berry Gordy's daughter and having an affair with a really young girl. He wanted out of his contract with Motown so Berry Gordy had him write this album to his daughter. Marvin Gaye wrote the record both for Berry Gordy's daughter and for the other girl. Definitely his darkest record.

    I'm all about Sparrow


  • NerdAlert said:
    The story behind Here, My Dear is pretty crazy. Apparently he was married to Berry Gordy's daughter and having an affair with a really young girl. He wanted out of his contract with Motown so Berry Gordy had him write this album to his daughter. Marvin Gaye wrote the record both for Berry Gordy's daughter and for the other girl.

    uhh, that is not the story at all really...i'll leave it to someone else to lay that all out...

  • bassiebassie 11,710 Posts
    NerdAlert said:
    The story behind Here, My Dear is pretty crazy. Apparently he was married to Berry Gordy's daughter and having an affair with a really young girl. He wanted out of his contract with Motown so Berry Gordy had him write this album to his daughter. Marvin Gaye wrote the record both for Berry Gordy's daughter and for the other girl.

    That's not really how it happened, but you can find it out with a little more reading.

    NerdAlert said:
    Definitely his darkest record.

    It's definitely been described as this - but I have never found it so.

  • OligeeOligee 289 Posts
    Hahaha, I forgot to say, correct me if I'm wrong

  • HollafameHollafame 844 Posts
    NerdAlert said:
    Hahaha, I forgot to say, correct me if I'm wrong

    That goes without saying here.

  • batmonbatmon 27,574 Posts
    Id say In My Lifetime and Dream Of A Lifetime are darker albums.

    Im not tipsy yet.

    And Berry didnt make Marvin write this for Gwen. Gwen complained to Berry about the project.

    She was livid.

  • bassiebassie 11,710 Posts
    batmon said:


    She was livid.

    I would not want my shit put out on the street like that either!

  • DelayDelay 4,530 Posts
    "Distant Lover" is one of the greatest slow jams of all time

  • batmonbatmon 27,574 Posts
    bassie said:
    batmon said:


    She was livid.

    I would not want my shit put out on the street like that either!

    "She had more records than meeeeeeeeeee.........."

  • batmonbatmon 27,574 Posts
    Possum Tom said:
    "Distant Lover" is one of the greatest slow jams of all time

    Lets Get It On should pop up later.

  • DustedDonDustedDon 830 Posts
    "Anger" is amazing.

  • motown67motown67 4,513 Posts
    An album that took me a while to fully get into, but now think is a classic. Got my girl turned onto it too. She plays Anger all the time.

  • dayday 9,611 Posts
    4YearGraduate said:
    one of my top 5 albums of all time ever

    No question. Kind of surprised this wasn't in the Strut's top 10 at least.

  • bassiebassie 11,710 Posts
    It's a pretty interesting lowest nine; I can't wait to see the top ten. I am half-expecting to see mostly rare chin-strokers as opposed to actual classic game-changing, foundation-setting shit that belongs in the top ten...in true SStrut Top 100 style!

  • BurnsBurns 2,227 Posts
    2 LP's full of Marvin Gaye material.
    Dark and melodic.
    I never know the songs off this album, always play thru and flip em.
    Picked it up because of the talk about it on SS.
    Love the album.
    Isn't there a three six mafia sample on this somewhere?

  • batmonbatmon 27,574 Posts
    I think Soulstrut'sMotown explained the two versions of the album BITD and i would like to own both just because.
    Here My Dear vs 'Here My Dear.' or some shit like that.

    Ill prep this shit by saying i have about 4 covers of Just To Keep You Satisfied.

    Kenny Lattimore smooths the shit out.
    Lisa Stansfield flips it on the woman tip.
    Howard Hewitt kills it while directing it towards his ex-wife Nia Peeples.
    Randy Crawford absolutely owns the shit.

    That song is pre-cursor to Here My Dear and is the redhead cousin on the Lets Get It On album.
    Its its a wierd cap off for an album that is pretty much a testiment to his newfound lust for Jan his 17 year old lover.
    R. Kelly type shit decades before muthafuckas got their panties in a bunch.

    Ill run thru some shit ive already dropped here at SS.

    Back in the day of running thru records for just obvious braeks and luups, my boy had this shit and we both didnt grab on to anything to flip.
    Much later I borrowed it along w/ a pile of other shit to check what he wasnt listening to. "Let me check this shit out." How can a Marvin do a double album with all this wierd ass symbolism on a gatefold cover, at not have no joints? Fuck the packaging in itself is incredible.

    After really sitting down with it I became a fan, but it wasnt until I read Divided Soul that the album really made sense.
    Ritz cheerleads this shit hard. We all gave What's Goin' On its propers and Lets Get It On is some Black Manhood lesson type shit, but Here My Dear is Marvin bukkit naked w/ a mirror full of line-out white girl. Gaye stretched the game w/ his political opus and sexual opus, yet to me he fused both of that shit by discussing his personal politics. I cant recall another album by another artist that turns their dirty drawers inside out to let you see the skid marks. 2-Pac is one dude who brought that sensiblity to Hip Hop. Exposing your shit.

    A couple of years ago i was rappin w/ an older Brotha about music. He 'axed' me what the "best' Gaye album, trying to see if knew my shit.
    I answered Here My Dear and he was convinced that I "knew my shit". The whole "only heads" rep this album is very much a part of its mystique. Like some password type shit. I really think it only really picked up steam in the millenium. Cats were not rockin this shit out.
    No one fuckin sampled the shit BITD, and i wonder if it to this day has been flipped.
    After it got Deluxed I wonder if that came too late while the (non-rekkid collectro)MP3 generation didnt get to take a hit off this shit.
    Back in the late 80's/early 90's when Motown started to re-release their classics(I think that was around the time the Motwon Cafe opened up) Here My Dear was not in the CD racks. Divided Soul was writtin in '85 and he stated how shit was criminally out of print, and by the re-issue of the book in '91 it still wasnt on CD. The first edition is '94 w/ pretty good packaging, until that Deluxed joint w/ Ritz's essay.

    The common critique is that its a revenge/divorce record but its kinda like a flip of Lets Get It On. LGIO ??? Jan Love w/ %3 Gwen "hatt".
    Here My Dear starts out w/ Gaye praising his new young thang right to his Old-ass Ex-Wifes face on the fuckin intro track! (IM WAY OFF ON THAT. its about Gwen.) % Jan Love and u Gwen hatt. Falliing In Love Again is breath of fresh air w/ out the sexual tension of Lets Get It On.

    On the extra Geek Level, this album could be a college course. On the real. Dude stretched the game three times IMO. And Here My Dear is is the culmination of his past gains. Dude had a Post Up game and a Three Pointer. Dude put that shit together to become a serious Inside -Out Threat.

  • white_teawhite_tea 3,262 Posts
    Came across this one at a good time, right in my early 20s when I started to learn the real depths of relationships between people. "Funky Space Reincarnation" started popping up on a lot of mixes I was listening to at the time, so I sought it out on that strength, only to be absolutely, completely blown about by the rest of the record -- "When Did You Stop Loving Me, When Did I Stop Loving You" still being my favorite; Lake Baikal deep, with like a thousand Marvin Gaye voices helping me through some tough times. It's definitely up there for me, at the very least Top 20.

  • batmonbatmon 27,574 Posts
    Burns said:
    .Isn't there a three six mafia sample on this somewhere?

    Sippin On Some Syrup

  • SpacechoSpacecho 176 Posts
    I got put on to this record by Soul Strut! Thanks y'all!
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