![]() Guests at February’s MusiCares event were treated to bottles of wine featuring names such as My Girl Chardonnay and Being With You Pinot Noir. So when somebody picks one of mine, that’s a dream come true for me.” Robinson recently launched a line of wines ![]() He adds: “Most of the people who have recorded my music are songwriters themselves. “As a songwriter, I want to write music that people will be singing forever,” he says. Robinson’s songs have been covered on thousands of recordings through the decades, but he says it never gets old. One week, “we had eight of the top 10 records on the Billboard chart, you know? We had a lot of moments like that.” Hearing his songs interpreted by other artistsĪt MusiCares, Robinson watched proudly as an array of singers, from Brandi Carlile to Chloe X Halle, performed his compositions made famous by the Temptations, Marvin Gaye, his own Miracles and others. ![]() There were thousands of those instances for me,” he says. And we haven’t.”įrom Motown's modest origins – when he joined Gordy and three employees in a West Grand Boulevard home office in 1959 – the label's story became a series of triumphant milestones, Robinson recalls. And we made a pact when we very first met that we would never let anything come between us. “I just think we’re people who have that charisma together, that gelling with each other, those parts of the person that make you best friends,” Robinson says. The night was a tribute to two longtime friends who together spearheaded the Motown empire. In February, Robinson and Motown founder Berry Gordy were jointly honored for the first time, celebrated as the 2023 MusiCares Persons of the Year at a glitzy pre-Grammy ceremony in LA. “That’s the flavoring on this.” Smokey’s special bond with Berry Gordy The album’s lead single, “If We Don’t Have Each Other,” has a slide-dance feel that’s a departure for Robinson, who heralds the album as an updated spin on his vintage style: “I’m really excited about it because it’s a mixture of old and new at the same time,” he says. On the breathy title track, Robinson sings of “eye-gasms, when I look at you it makes me feel better than good” and “ear-gasms, when I hear your voice my eardrums start to quiver.” But ‘gasms’ is any good feeling you might have.” “I think when people hear the word ‘Gasms,’ their mind first goes to orgasms. “I know that’s a controversial title,” Robinson says, laughing. When “Gasms” was announced in January – along with a track list featuring song titles such as “I Wanna Know Your Body” and “I Fit in There” – it certainly raised eyebrows in some quarters of the R&B world, where fans are accustomed to a Smokey Robinson who sticks to a PG brand of romance. 5 homecoming show at Detroit’s Fox Theatre, and his team is in talks with film companies about a Smokey biopic that may begin production later this year. “Gasms” comes as Robinson embarks on a busy round of touring that will include an Aug. Robinson recalls listening to the Flamingos' jukebox tune at a Detroit confectionery while hanging out with childhood friend Aretha Franklin: “I regretted that she didn’t get a chance to hear (my version) because it was one of our favorite songs,” he says of the late Detroit star. In one case, Robinson even reaches back to his Motor City youth with a heartfelt cover of the 1960 personal fave “Beside You,” as once recorded by the doo-wop group the Flamingos. They find Robinson applying his feathery, falsetto-touched voice to assorted love songs and sultry late-night serenades. Some of the new songs have actually been in the works for years (indeed, three tracks feature work by Ricky Lawson, the acclaimed Detroit session drummer who died in 2013). Smokey Robinson just dropped his first album of new material in 14 years, a nine-track collection provocatively titled “Gasms.”Īt 83, the iconic Motown singer-songwriter says he’s feeling creatively charged, still randomly struck by song inspirations in his day-to-day life, whether driving or playing golf – ideas he often records with a quick call to his own voicemail.
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