What's Going On: Obie Benson's Berkeley Bus Ride and a Smuggled 1971 Single

SPEAKER_1 (0:00)

Imagine holding the master tapes to a track that is now universally recognized as one of the absolute greatest achievements in American music history.

SPEAKER_2 (0:08)

Right, a total classic.

SPEAKER_1 (0:10)

Yeah. And you look the artist dead in the eye, and you tell them that this monumental masterpiece is just unlistable garbage.

SPEAKER_2 (0:19)

It is wild to even think about.

SPEAKER_1 (0:22)

But that is exactly what the head of Motown Records did to Marvin Gaye in 1970 regarding the song, What's Going On.

SPEAKER_2 (0:29)

It's just a stunning piece of historical irony. I mean, the track was despised so intensely by the label's founder that it literally had to be smuggled out to the public.

SPEAKER_1 (0:39)

Wow.

SPEAKER_2 (0:39)

Yeah, by a pair of rogue executives operating entirely behind his back.

SPEAKER_1 (0:43)

Okay, let's unpack this.

SPEAKER_2 (0:44)

Okay.

SPEAKER_1 (0:45)

Because I am genuinely obsessed with the idea that a song this polished, this permanent sounding was born out of complete chaos.

SPEAKER_2 (0:55)

It really was chaos.

SPEAKER_1 (0:57)

So for this deep dive, we are looking at the messy human story behind the track. And for you listening to figure out how this song broke every single rule at the Motown factory, we actually don't start in a recording studio in Detroit, do we?

We start on a tour bus in California.

SPEAKER_2 (1:14)

We do. And to really grasp the DNA of this song, you have to realize that it wasn't even conceived by Marvin Gaye.

SPEAKER_1 (1:21)

Really?

SPEAKER_2 (1:21)

Yeah. The initial spark actually came from Renaldo Benson, widely known as Obie, who is a core member of the legendary vocal group, The Four Tops.

SPEAKER_1 (1:29)

Right. OK.

SPEAKER_2 (1:30)

So in May of 1969, their tour bus arrived in Berkeley, California, precisely as this massive historical flashpoint was detonating.

SPEAKER_1 (1:39)

Oh, right. They pull into town to what became known as Bloody Thursday.

SPEAKER_2 (1:42)

Exactly. So a violent clash had erupted at People's Park between anti-war activists and heavily armed law enforcement.

And, you know, picture Obie Benson. He makes his living singing these impeccably choreographed joyful pop songs.

SPEAKER_1 (1:56)

Right. Total entertainment.

SPEAKER_2 (1:57)

Yeah. And he's sitting on this tour bus, which is essentially this rolling symbol of polished entertainment. And out the window, he is watching a brutal, chaotic riot unfold. He's seeing tear gas and batons.

SPEAKER_1 (2:11)

That cognitive dissonance must have been staggering. You're just trying to get to your next gig. And suddenly you are front row for a breakdown of society.

SPEAKER_2 (2:18)

And it completely broke his heart. You know, Benson wasn't a political radical. He wasn't looking to pen a fiery manifesto or anything.

SPEAKER_1 (2:25)

He was just a musician. Right.

SPEAKER_2 (2:26)

He was just profoundly confused by the logic of it all. He kept asking himself, like, how a country could send its young people to fight a deadly war overseas and then simultaneously deploy armed authorities to attack those same young people on the streets of their own cities.

SPEAKER_1 (2:41)

It just didn't make sense to him.

SPEAKER_2 (2:42)

Exactly. So he teamed up with a songwriter named Al Cleveland to try and distill that raw confusion into a song.

SPEAKER_1 (2:49)

But having the lyrics is really only half a battle. Because when Benson takes this newly written track back to The Four Tops, they completely reject it.

Which is wild. Why would they turn down a song written by their own group member?

SPEAKER_2 (3:01)

Mostly because of the brand. I mean, The Four Tops felt the material was simply too heavy and too controversial.

SPEAKER_1 (3:07)

They didn't want to touch it.

SPEAKER_2 (3:08)

Right. They looked at the lyrics and saw a political protest track, and that was absolutely not the business they were in.

Benson argued with them though. What's fascinating here is that Benson didn't view it as a protest song at all.

SPEAKER_1 (3:20)

No, he didn't.

SPEAKER_2 (3:21)

No. He saw it as an honest, desperate plea for basic human understanding. But the group wouldn't budge.

SPEAKER_1 (3:28)

So we have this orphan track. It's got a great concept. It's born from this crazy tourist on a battlefield moment. But the people it was written for won't touch it because it doesn't fit their emotional reality.

SPEAKER_2 (3:37)

Exactly.

SPEAKER_1 (3:38)

Which makes me wonder, who at Motown actually possessed the internal turmoil required to pull a song like this off? And that brings us to Marvin Gaye.

SPEAKER_2 (3:47)

Right. So Benson brings the concept to Gaye. And initially Gaye didn't want it for himself either.

SPEAKER_1 (3:52)

Oh, I didn't know that.

SPEAKER_2 (3:53)

Yeah. He thought it would be a good fit for another vocal group called The Originals.