Marvin Gaye Wrote “What’s Going On” About The War
Photo Credit: Jim Britt/Michael Ochs Archive/Getty Images
Did you know the song “What’s Going On?” was almost never released. The track was written by Obie Benson for The Four Tops. They were uninterested in the protest song, though. Gaye latched onto the song after hearing about the experience his younger brother Frankie was having fighting in Vietnam.
Of course, one of the most famous protest songs of the anti-war movement needed more than Gaye to make it on the radio. Berry Gordon, the head of Motown, only released “the worst thing I’ve ever heard in my life” because they needed new music from Gaye.
