'A smile is just a frown. Turned upside down.'
Norman Whitfield, Motown's hotshot writing, arranging and producing maestro came up with this in the early seventies and recorded it with two artists on the label's roster, The Temptations and The Undisputed Truth. This was a tried and tested Motown method of sifting out hit records. Remarkably the latter's three minute recording cut The Temptations sprawling, orchestral, twelve minute kitchen sink epic off at the knees in terms of punch. It was a Number 3 hit on the main Billboard Pop Chart in 1971 boiling down all the dark urban paranoia down of the times to its essence. The sixties were over. Strangely the group's follow up Papa was a Rolling Stone was a flop so it was given in turn to The Temptations and became their biggest hit.
'Smiling faces sometimes pretend to be your friend. Smiling faces, show no traces of the evil that lurks within. Can you dig it?'
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