Motown’s Funk Brothers Instrumental Track – “Going To A Go Go”

There’s so much to learn from the old Motown records in terms of arrangements and groove. You can hear more when you strip off the lead vocal and just listen to the instrumental track laid down by The Funk Brothers (the Motown house band), which is what we’ll do today with Smokey Robinson and the Miracles 1965 hit “Going To A Go Go.” Here’s what to listen for.

1. This was the early days of stereo when all you had available for panning on consoles was hard left and half-left, hard right and half-right, and center. As a result, most instruments are panned in one of those left or right positions except for the bass. Most instruments are panned in the half positions (about 10:30 and 1:30), drums are left, tambourine right, guitars  and horns right. Ad lib vocals and claps are hard left and piano and the sax solo is hard right.

2. The guitar sound is very interesting because its three guitar players all playing the same line, so it sounds like a huge 12 string.

3. The long and smooth Motown reverb blends everything together.

4. There’s some background vocals that you don’t hear that well on the final mix that can be clearly heard here, like the “Go go’s” during the second verse, the “ooh’s” answering the sax solo. and the “Come on’s” during the third verse.

5. What’s interesting is the drums are fairly buried in the mix and its the claps and tambourine that carry the groove of the song.

6. James Jamerson’s bass plays a very disciplined line that doesn’t vary much, which is very different from other Motown records that he played on.

All in all, this is another great example of why Motown’s Detroit-made hits were so appealing. When you had a studio full of great musicians playing at the same time, coupled with some great songs and arrangements, it’s hard to go wrong and listening to this instrumental track shows why.