As you can see from the song list below, during this time period, they continued their wildly successful hit-making ways through much of the 1970s. It's pretty incredible they wrote three all-time classics, "War," "Just My Imagination," and "Papa Was a Rollin' Stone," on top of all their other classics on the previous two volumes.
Most of their success was for the distinctive Motown record label. But as the 1970s went on, their fortunes declined, as was the case for many Motown related artists. Barrett Strong left Motown by the end of 1973, ending their songwriting collaboration. In retrospect, this clearly was a bad move. Strong tried resurrecting his singing career (he'd had a big hit with "Money (That's What I Want)" way back in 1959). but to very little success. I've included one of his minor solo hits here, "Stand Up and Cheer for the Preacher."
Norman Whitfield fared better for a few years, though he never consistently hit the heights he did while writing song with Strong. His biggest success in the late 1970s was the band "Rose Royce." He plucked them from obscurity and produced several big hits for them. One song he wrote, "Car Wash," was a Number One hit in the US. Some of the other hits, like "Wishing on a Star," were written by others, so they're not included here.
However, the end came quickly for Whitfield. The hits dried up around 1978. A few years after that, he seems to have retired from producing and songwriting. The last song here, "Wherever I Lay My Hat (That's My Home)," was a huge hit for Paul Young in 1983, reaching Number One in Britain. But it actually was written by Barrett and Whitfield (and Marvin Gaye) back in 1962.
Whifield died in 2008 at the age of 68. Strong lived all the way until January 2023, dying at the age of 81.
01 War (Edwin Starr)
02 Just My Imagination [Running Away with Me] (Temptations)
03 You Need Love Like I Do [Don't You] (Clydie King)
04 Superstar [Remember How You Got Where You Are] (Temptations)
05 Smiling Faces Sometimes (Undisputed Truth)
06 Papa Was a Rollin' Stone (Temptations)
07 Take a Look Around (Temptations)
08 It Should Have Been Me (Yvonne Fair)
09 Masterpiece (Temptations)
10 Stand Up and Cheer for the Preacher (Barrett Strong)
11 Car Wash (Rose Royce)
12 Theme Song from 'Which Way Is Up' (Stargard)
13 I Wanna Get Next to You (Rose Royce)
14 Wherever I Lay My Hat [That's My Home] (Paul Young)
https://www.upload.ee/files/17181196/COVRDWhtfildStrng1970-1983Volum3_atse.zip.html
alternate:
https://pixeldrain.com/u/M8jxDgF1
Again, I had a hard time finding good photos of them for the cover. I wound up using different photos and then putting them together. The photo of Strong is from 2004. He's in the front. I don't know what year the photo of Whitfield was taken.
UPDATE: On September 30, 2024, I upgraded the photo with the use of the Krea AI program.
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