applauding. I was overwhelmed by the reaction. It felt so good.
Our only "break" during the Motown-to-Epic switch was the TV show. While that was all going on, we heard that
Epic had Kenny Gamble and Leon Huff working on demos for us. We were told we'd be recording in Philadelphia
after our shows were all done.
If there was anyone who stood to gain the most from switching labels, it was Randy, who was now part of the Five.
But now that he finally was one of us, we were no longer known as the Jackson 5. Motown said that the group's
name was the company's registered trademark, and that we couldn't use it when we left. That was hardball, of course,
so we called ourselves the Jacksons from that time on.
Dad had met with the Philly guys while negotiations were going on with Epic. We'd always had great respect for the
records that Gamble and Huff had overseen, records like "Backstabbers" by the O'Jays, "If You Don't Know Me By Now," by Harold Melvin and the Blue Notes(featuring Teddy Pendergrass), and "When Will I See You Again," by the Three Degrees, along with many other hits. They told Dad they'd been watching us, and they said they wouldn't mess
with our singing. Dad mentioned that we were hoping to have a song or two of our own included in the new album,
and they promised to give them a fair hearing.
We'd gotten to talk with Kenny and Leon and their team of people, which included Leon McFadden and John
Whitehead. They showed what they could do for themselves when they made "Ain't No Stoppin' Us Now" in 1979.
Dexter Wanzel was also a part of this team. Kenny Gamble and Leon Huff are such pros. I actually got a chance to
watch them create as they presented songs to us and that helped my songwriting a lot. Just watching Huff play the
piano while Gamble sang taught me more about the anatomy of a song than anything else. Kenny Gamble is a master
melody man. He made me pay closer attention to the melody because of watching him create. And I would watch,
too. I'd sit there like a hawk, observing every decision, listening to every note. They'd come to us in our hotel and
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play a whole album's worth of music for us. That's the way we'd be introduced to the songs they had chosen for our
album - aside from the two songs we were writing ourselves. It was an amazing thing to be present for.
We had cut some demos of our songs at home during our breaks from shooting, but we decided to wait on those - we
felt there was no sense putting a gun to anyone's head. We knew that Philly had a lot to offer us, so we'd save our
surprise for them later.
Our two songs, "Blues Away" and "Style of Life," were two hard secrets to keep at the time because we were so proud of them. "Style of Life" was a jam that Tito directed, and it was in keeping with the nightclub groove that
"Dancing Machine" got us into, but we kept it a little leaner and meaner than Motown would have cut it.
"Blues Away" was one of my first songs, and though I don't sing it any more, I'm not embarrassed to hear it. I
couldn't have gone on in this business if I had ended up hating my own records after all that work. It's a light song
about overcoming a deep depression - I was going for the Jackie Wilson "Lonely Teardrops" way of laughing on the outside to stop the churning inside.
When we saw the cover art for The Jacksons album, the first we cut for Epic, we were surprised to see that we all
looked alike. Even Tito looked skinny! I had my "crown" Afro then, so I didn't stick out so much, I guess. Still, once we performed our new songs like "Enjoy Yourself" and "Show You the Way to Go," people knew I was still second from the left, right out front. Randy took Tito's old spot on my far right, and Tito moved into the old place Jermaine
had. It took a long time for me to feel comfortable with that, as I've mentioned, though it was through no fault of
Tito's.
Those two singles were fun records - "Enjoy Yourself" was great for dancing. It had rhythm guitar and horns that I really liked. It was also a number one record. For my taste, I leaned a little more toward "Show You the Way to Go"
because it showed what good regard the Epic people had for our singing. We were all over that record and it was the
best one we did. I loved the high hat and strings fluttering alongside us like birds' wings. I'm surprised that song in
particular wasn't a bigger hit.
Though we couldn't spell it out, we kind of hinted about our situation in a song called "Living Together," which Kenny and Leon chose with us in mind. "If we're going to stick together, we've got to be a family. Have yourself a
real good time, but don't you know it's getting late." The strings pointed and thrust like they did in "Backstabbers,"
but that was a Jacksons' message, even if it wasn't in the Jacksons' style - yet.
Gamble and Huff had written enough songs for another album, but we knew from experience that while they were
doing what they did best, we were losing some of our identity. We were honored to be a part of the Philly family, but
that wasn't enough for us. We were determined to do all of the things we had wanted to do for so many years. That's
why we had to go back into our Encino studio and work together again as a family.
Going Places , our second album for Epic, was different from our first. There were more songs with messages and
not as many dance songs. We knew that the message to promote peace and let music take over was a good one, but
again it was more like the old O'Jays' "Love Train" and not really our style.
Still, maybe it wasn't a bad thing that there was no big pop hit on Going Places because it made "Different Kind of
Lady" an obvious choice for club play. It was positioned in the middle of side one, so there were two Gamble and
Huff songs sandwiching it, and our song stood out like a ball of fire. That was a real band cooking, with the Philly
horns giving it one exclamation point after another, just as we'd hoped. That's the feel we were trying for when we
were making demos with our old friend Bobby Taylor before going to Epic. Kenny and Leon put the finishing
touches on it, the icing, but on this one we'd baked the cake ourselves.
After Going Places was in the stores, Dad asked me to accompany him to a meeting with Ron Alexenburg. Ron
signed us for CBS, and he really believed in us. We wanted to convince him that we were ready now to take charge
of our own music. We felt that CBS had evidence of what we could do on our own, so we stated our case, explaining
that we'd originally wanted Bobby Taylor to work with us. Bobby had stuck with us through all those years, and we
had thought he'd be a fine producer for us. Epic wanted Gamble and Huff because they had the track record, but
maybe they were the wrong jockeys or we were the wrong horses for them, because we were letting them down in
the sales department through no fault of our own. We had a strong work ethic that backed up everything we did.
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Mr. Alexenburg was certainly used to dealing with performers, although I'm sure that among his business friends he
could be just as cutting about musicians as we musicians could be when we were swapping our own stories among
ourselves. But Dad and I were on the same wavelength when it came to the business side of music. People who make
music and people who sell records are not natural enemies. I care as much about what I do as a classical musician,
and I want what I do to reach the widest possible audience. The record people care about their artists, and they want
to reach the widest market. As we sat in the CBS boardroom eating a nicely catered lunch, we told Mr. Alexenburg
that Epic had done its best, and it wasn't good enough. We felt we could do better, that our reputation was worth
putting on the line.