‘Inner City Blues’: the Marvin Gaye song inspired by a Detroit newspaper headline
Two years before penning Let’s Get It On, the album that would largely be responsible for Marvin Gaye‘s cultural recognition, he delivered a record that is arguably the greatest of all time, placed him as a musical pioneer of social consciousness and delivered one of the greatest protest songs of all time.
1971’s What’s Going On was Gaye’s magnum opus, that’s for sure, and a large part of that is because of how well the individual songs knit together, but moreover, stand alone as titan tracks of the record. There’s a compelling case to be made for each of them being the premier representation of the record, particularly the title track and its follow-up, ‘What’s Happening Brother’.
But it was the closing track that knit this artistic masterpiece together and framed Gaye as one of the most important social voices in art. ‘Inner City Blues’ simply had everything great about the preceding record bundled into one: jazz sensibilities, psychedelic interludes and conventional rhythm and blues that formed a bedrock for philanthropic lyrics that plainly stated the road blockers faced by the modern citizen.
The verses are pointed: “Inflation no chance / To increase finance / Bills pile up sky high / Send that boy off to die” – while the chorus is liberating and transcendental, devoid of the structures that bog Gaye down in the verse.
His vocal improvisations in the chorus provide a relief that ultimately allows the juxtaposition of the song’s title to make sense – sure, in the shadows of the city, pain awaits, but reframe it into blues, and you have the musical escape that’s much needed.
Given that school of thought, it’s unsurprising that the lyrics and the title came after the sonic arrangement. The music was the innovator in this regard and provided the relief, all Gaye needed to do was pen the lyrics, and he had his social anthem. A quick look at the world around him provided him with the words, before a chance newspaper title brought it all together.
In 1998, co-writer James Nyx Jr recalled, “Marvin had a good tune, sort of blues-like, but didn’t have any words for it. We started putting some stuff in there about how rough things were around town. We laughed about putting lyrics in about high taxes, because both of us owed a lot. And we talked about how the government would send guys to the moon, but not help folks in the ghetto.”
Adding, “But we still didn’t have a name, or really a good idea of the song. Then, I was home reading the paper one morning, and saw a headline that said something about the ‘inner city’ of Detroit. And I said, ‘Damn, that’s it – ‘Inner City Blues’.”
It was a perfect title for a song that encapsulated the true grit of living in America during the 1970s – mainly, because it conveyed the subtle sense of optimism that existed within the song, despite its overarching fears… in the city, and in the song, there is an emphasis on community and the liberation that comes from embracing that, and combining all of that, Gaye and Nyx Jr crafted the perfect protest song.
