Chart entered : 5 February 1966
Chart peak : 14
Number of hits : 56
Stevie is our first artist to be born in the 1950s; he's one of those celebrities who's always going to be a bit younger than you think he is.
Stevie was born Stevland Morris in 1950 in Michigan. He was six weeks premature and his sight never developed. Technically he isn't fully blind but has no functional sight. He moved to Detroit at an early age when his parents split up and soon became a young prodigy on harmonica , keyboards, drums and bass. In 1961 his mother brought him to the attention of Ronnie White of The Miracles who heard him sing his own song "Lonely Boy". Duly impressed White took him to Berry Gordy who signed him to Tamla on a five year deal where his royalties would be put in trust until he turned 21.
He was put to work with producer Clarence Paul who came up with the name "Little Stevie Wonder" for his recordings. He was barely 12 when he released his first single in 1962, the Berry Gordy / Clarence Paul song "I Call It Pretty Music But The Old People Call It The Blues" on both sides. The A-side is straight early Motown pop ( with Marvin Gaye supplying the backbeat ) while the B-side is a bluesier take. Both feature Stevie's unbroken voice and a generous helping of harmonica. Stevie's youth meant the record got a fair bit of attention and it just missed out on the US charts.
Stevie's next release was an instrumental album "The Jazz Soul Of Little Stevie Wonder" which was largely written by others and didn't sell but does feature the original version of "Fingertips". His next single in October 1962 was a duet with Clarence Paul on the latter's song "Little Water Boy" . Ostensibly a financial haggle between a grown man and a young boy over fetching water, there's a decidedly queasy feel to the song which the intermittent grunts do nothing to assuage. It's not surprising it wasn't a hit. Tamla then rushed out another album ( recorded the previous year ) , the rather tawdry "Tribute To Uncle Ray". It was mainly comprised of Ray Charles covers and did nothing to enhance his reputation.
His third single in December 1962 "Contract On Love", written by Holland, Dozier and erm Bradford ( ?) , is a neat Four Seasons pastiche featuring future Temptation Eddie Kendricks but its chances were scuppered by a very rough production from Holland and Dozier that sounds like it was recorded in a garden shed.
However Stevie had already recorded the song that was to change his fortunes. In June 1962, he joined the Motortown Revue and his set at Chicago's Regal Theatre had been recorded. The harmonica-led , ( mainly ) instrumental "Fingertips " from his first LP was performed twice and released as a single in May 1963 with the performances labelled Parts 1 and 2 and placed each side of the disc. The song is heavily influenced by Charles but the raw excitement is well captured and it stormed to number one in the US charts making him the youngest performer to get there. It was his first UK release but didn't catch here. The whole set was then released as the album "Recorded Live : The 12 Year Old Genius" which likewise shot to the number one spot despite its brief running time ( less than 25 minutes ).
Stevie's career longevity was by no means assured at this point. Over the next couple of years it seemed quite possible that he would go down as a novelty act who couldn't cross over to adult success. His next single "Workout Stevie, Workout" in September 1963 is a studio recording and a rather flimsy song ( like "Fingertips" written by Paul and Henry Cosby" ) played too fast. It peaked at number 33. He was then put in the studio to work on an album of standards "With A Song In My Heart". Released at the end of the year with the "Little" tag dropped it made a minor showing on the R & B chart and missed out on the main chart altogether.
His first single of 1964 with the "Little" reinstated, probably by mistake, heralded Tamla's next mis-step, a bizarre attempt to link Stevie to the surf craze. "Castles In The Sand" is a nicely-arranged string-driven ballad in the Drifters vein rendered virtually unlistenable by Stevie's vocal. His voice was breaking and he sounds horribly off-key throughout. It was lucky to get as high as 52. The next single in May "Hey Harmonica Man" avoided the problem by giving him little to do vocally . Eddie Kendricks and Melvin Franklin handle most of the vocals on a song that betrays an awareness of the English Invasion bands particularly the Stones. It halted Stevie's downwards trajectory by peaking at number 29. The album that followed, "Stevie At The Beach" confused everyone and shoe-horning him into two cheap beach movies didn't do him any favours either. The third single from it "Happy Street" , a vacuous bit of R & B didn't register.
Neither did "Kiss Me Baby" in March 1965 , the first single to bear his name on the writing credits ( along with Paul ) but otherwise an unexceptional harmonica workout. Stevie was touring Europe ( including some dates with The Stones ) at the time and with Tamla reluctant to invest in another album he badly needed another hit. He managed it with a version of "Hi-Heel Sneakers" recorded live in Paris in April 1965 and released in August. It's an energetic though undistinguished version but it did the job and got to number 59.
This one came next in November 1965 and turned his fortunes around. Henry Cosby and Sylvia Moy wrote the song based around Stevie's driving riff apparently influenced by the Stones' Satisfaction. The lyrics express the joy of a poor man whose rich girlfriend can see past his trappings to the man inside. Melodically it's a bit one-dimensional, that relentless pounding beat and simple punctuating brass fanfare are the hooks along with Stevie's now adult, elastic vocal. Though less of a hit here than in the States where it reached number three; it has made the top here when re-written, lyrically as Billy Joel's Uptown Girl and musically as Wham's I'm Your Man.
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