“What Now My Love” – Martha Reeves & The Vandellas
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This is my nominee for the best lyrical version of “What Now My Love”.
The song has been recorded by many performers over the past 60 years. I’ve listened to quite a few of the recordings and most versions just sound wrong to me. It’s a song about heartache, yet singers often do an upbeat, jazzy version, which doesn’t work if you pay attention to the lyrics. Also, a lot of the arrangements have an intro (sometimes extending well into the song) that sounds better suited to military marching music than a song of this nature. And an unbelievable number of the performances are simply bad, including ones by artists I normally like.
Martha Reeves gets it right, in my opinion. She sings the song appropriately, like someone who’s in serious emotional pain. And there isn’t that bizarre military beat found in some other versions. This is the gold standard for how “What Now My Love” should be done.
This is my nominee for the best lyrical version of “What Now My Love”.
The song has been recorded by many performers over the past 60 years. I’ve listened to quite a few of the recordings and most versions just sound wrong to me. It’s a song about heartache, yet singers often do an upbeat, jazzy version, which doesn’t work if you pay attention to the lyrics. Also, a lot of the arrangements have an intro (sometimes extending well into the song) that sounds better suited to military marching music than a song of this nature. And an unbelievable number of the performances are simply bad, including ones by artists I normally like.
Martha Reeves gets it right, in my opinion. She sings the song appropriately, like someone who’s in serious emotional pain. And there isn’t that bizarre military beat found in some other versions. This is the gold standard for how “What Now My Love” should be done.
