‘You mean Mr Gordy's not here?’ Joseph asked, unable to hide his disappointment.
When Seltzer explained that Gordy was in Los Angeles, Joseph said that they should reschedule the audition when he was back in Detroit. He wanted his sons to audition for the boss, not his flunkies. However, Seltzer explained that they intended to film the audition, and then have it sent to Gordy on the West Coast. ‘Mr Gordy will render a decision at that time,’ he said.
‘He'll render a decision,’ Joseph repeated, more to himself than to Seltzer.
‘Yes, he will,’ Seltzer said, nodding his head. ‘Mr Gordy will render a decision at that time.’
‘Mr Gordy's gonna render a decision,’ Michael repeated to Marlon.
‘What's that mean?’ Marlon whispered.
Michael shrugged his shoulders.
After all of the boys' equipment was lugged in from the van and set up, eight more staffers who did not introduce themselves filed into the studio, each with a notepad. Michael was ready to speak into the microphone when he heard someone in the corner snicker and say, ‘Yeah, the Jackson Jive.’ (‘The Jackson Jive’ is an old slang expression.) It sounded like an insult. Ralph Seltzer cleared his throat and glared at the person who made the remark.
‘First song we'd like to do is James Brown's “I Got the Feeling”,’ Michael announced. ‘Okay? Here we go.’ He counted off – ‘A-one, a-two, a-three’ – and then Tito on guitar, Jermaine on bass, and Johnny Jackson on drums began to play.
‘Baby, baby, baa-ba. Baby, baby, baa-ba. Baby, baby, baa-ba,’ Michael sang. He grimaced and grunted, imitating James Brown. ‘I got the fe-e-e-lin' now. Good Gawwd almighty!’ He skated sideways across the floor, like Brown. ‘I feel goooood,’ he screamed into the microphone, a wicked expression playing on his little face.
Suzanne dePasse and Ralph Seltzer smiled at each other and nodded their heads. The other Motown executives kept time to the music. Joseph, standing in a corner with his arms folded across his chest, looked on approvingly.
After the boys finished, no one in the audience applauded. Instead, everyone feverishly wrote on their notepads.
Confused, the youngsters looked at each other and then at their father for a hint as to what they should do. Joseph motioned with his hand that they should continue with the next number.
‘Thank you. Thank you very much,’ Michael said, as though acknowledging an ovation. ‘We 'predate it.’
Michael then introduced the group, as he did in their live show, after which they sang the bluesy ‘Tobacco Road’.
Again, no applause, just note-taking.
‘Next song we'd like to do is a Motown song,’ Michael announced. He paused, waiting for smiles of acknowledgement that never materialized. ‘It's Smokey Robinson's “Who's Loving You” Okay? Here we go. A-one, a-two, a-three…’
They closed the song with a big finish and waited for a reaction from the Motown staffers. Again, everyone was writing. ‘Jackson Jive, huh?’ someone in the room said. ‘These boys ain't jivin'. I think they're great.’
Michael beamed, his eyes dancing.
Ralph Seltzer cleared his throat and stood up. ‘I'd like to thank you boys for coming,’ he said. His voice gave no hint of how he felt the audition had gone. He shook each of their hands before walking over to Joseph and explaining to him that the company would put them all up at a nearby hotel. ‘I'll be in touch with you,’ Seltzer concluded, ‘in two days…’
‘When Mr Gordy renders a decision,’ Joseph said, finishing Seltzer's sentence. He didn't sound happy. The boys were also clearly disappointed. As they filed out, no one said a word.
Two days later, Berry Gordy saw the sixteen-millimetre black-and-white film. He made a quick decision. ‘Yes, absolutely, sign these kids up,’ he told Ralph Seltzer. ‘They're amazing. Don't waste a second. Sign 'em!’
On 26 July 968, Ralph Seltzer summoned Joseph into his Motown office for a meeting. During the two-hour conference – while the boys waited in the lobby – he explained that Berry Gordy was interested in signing The Jackson Five to the label, and then outlined the kind of relationship he hoped the company would develop with the Jackson youngsters. He spoke of ‘the genius of Berry Gordy’ and Gordy's hopes that The Jackson Five would become major recording stars. ‘These kids are gonna be big, big, big,’ Seltzer enthused, his manner much more cordial than it had been on their first visit. ‘Believe me, if Mr Gordy says they're gonna be big, they're gonna be big.’ Joseph must have felt like he was dreaming.
Then Seltzer presented Joseph with Motown's standard, nine-page contract. It never occurred to Joseph that he should probably have shown up with independent legal counsel for such an important discussion, and Seltzer hadn't suggested it.
‘Berry did not want outside lawyers looking over any of our contracts,’ Ralph Seltzer would explain in an interview long after he and Gordy had parted ways. ‘Quite simply, he did not want outsiders influencing the artists. I thought it was more than fair for an artist to be able to take the contract home and read it, think it over. Berry told me that if I ever allowed an artist to take a contract home, that artist would not sign the contract. I tried once, and he was right: the artist did not sign. It was best, Berry decided, that potential contractees read over the agreement in my office and then just sign. If they had a problem with that, they did not become Motown artists. It was that simple.’
Seltzer began with clause number one, which stated that the agreement was for a term of seven years.
‘Hold it right there,’ Joseph interrupted. ‘That's too long.’
Joseph felt that they should be committed for only one year. That brief length of time was unheard of at Motown, where the minimum arrangement was five years. Gordy felt it took that long to fully develop an artist, and then see a return on the company's investment.
Ralph Seltzer picked up the telephone and called Berry Gordy in Los Angeles. He explained the problem and handed the phone to Joseph, whom Berry had never met. After a brief conversation, Joseph hung up.
‘He said he was gonna think about it,’ Joseph told Seltzer, who smiled knowingly. Two minutes later, the phone rang again. It was Gordy wanting to talk to Joseph. He explained to Joseph that, as far as he was concerned, the real issue was a basic matter of trust. If Joseph really believed in Gordy and Motown, he wouldn't mind having his children obligated to the company for seven years. After all, Gordy was willing to pay for their accommodation, recording sessions, rehearsal time, and so forth. However, if Joseph insisted on changing the clause, then it would be changed, ‘because, after all, I just want what's best for the kids,’ Gordy explained.
Joseph smiled and gave Richardson the thumbs-up signal. He handed the phone to Seltzer who got back on the line and spoke to Berry for a moment. Then Seltzer put Gordy on hold and summoned an assistant into his office who took some quick dictation from Gordy. About five minutes later, the assistant returned with a new clause, which stated that the group was obligated to Motown for only one year. Joseph beamed; he had won a strategic battle against Berry Gordy.
Ralph Seltzer quickly explained the rest of the contract. Joseph nodded his head, then called his boys into the office.
‘We got it, boys,’ he announced.
‘Oh, man, that's too much!’
‘We're on Motown!’
‘We got us a contract!’
They all began jumping up and down and hugging one another.
Ralph Seltzer gave each boy a contract. ‘Just sign right there on that line, fellas.’
They looked at their father.
‘Go ahead. It's okay. Sign it.’
Though Joseph had not even read the contract – he just had it explained to him – and neither had any of his sons, each boy signed.
‘And here's an agreement for you, Mr Jackson,’ Ralph Seltzer said, handing Joseph a paper. ‘This is a parental approval agreement and it says, quite simply, that you will make certain that the boys comply with the terms of the contract they just si
gned.’ *
Joseph signed the agreement.
‘Well, congratulations,’ Ralph Seltzer said with a smile and a firm handshake for Joseph. ‘And let me be the first to welcome you to Motown.’
In years to come, many would wonder why Joseph Jackson allowed his sons to sign Motown contracts – and why he himself would sign an accompanying agreement – without first reading the documents? In litigation against Motown, years later, Joseph would explain, ‘I did not read these agreements nor did my sons read these agreements because they were presented to us on a take-it-or-leave-it basis. Since my sons were just starting out in the entertainment field, we accepted these contracts based on the representations of Ralph Seltzer that they were good contracts.’
Ralph Seltzer would disagree, and in a way that was a bit unsettling. ‘I have no recollection of ever saying to Joseph Jackson or The Jackson 5 that the agreement being offered by Motown was a good agreement.’
Later, after leaving Ralph Seltzer's office, Joseph telephoned Richard Arons, the man he had hired as his lawyer and the group's unofficial co-manager. Arons would recall, ‘Joseph called me up and said he had signed with Motown. There wasn't much I could offer at that point.’
It's easy to understand why Joseph would just sign the deal. It was Motown, after all. However, there were significant problems with the contract, many of which would cause trouble for the family later on down the road.
Clause Five, for instance, stated that The Jackson 5 would be unable to record for any other label ‘at any time prior to the expiration of five years from the expiration or termination of this agreement’. This was a standard Motown clause that applied whether an act was signed for seven years, five years, or, as in the case of The Jackson 5, one. So Berry Gordy's concession to Joseph Jackson proved meaningless; The Jackson 5 were still tied up for at least six years.
Furthermore, the third clause stated that Motown was under no obligation to record the group or promote its music for five years, even though this was purportedly a one-year contract! Some other contractual stipulations that Joseph might have questioned had he read the agreement: Motown would choose all of the songs that the group would record, and the group would record each song until ‘they have been recorded to our [Motown's] satisfaction’. However, Motown ‘shall not be obligated to release any recording’, meaning that just because a song was recorded, it would not necessarily be issued to the public. The group was paid $12.50 per ‘master’, which is a completed recording of a song. But in order for the recording to be considered a master, the song had to be released. Otherwise, they were paid nothing. In other words, they could record dozens of songs and see only one issued from that session, and that would be the one for which they'd be paid. As for the rest, well, they would just be a waste of time.
It's been written that the Jacksons received a 2.7 per cent royalty rate, based on wholesale price, a standard Motown royalty of the 1960s. Actually, according to their contract, the boys would receive 6 per cent of 90 per cent of the wholesale price (less all taxes and packaging) of any single or album released. It was the same rate as Marvin Gaye, and also The Supremes, got. Marvin, as a solo artist, did not have to split his percentage, though. The Supremes had to divide it three ways. And this amount had to be split five ways among the Jackson brothers. In other words, Michael would receive one-fifth of 6 per cent of 90 per cent of the wholesale price – or a little under one-half of a penny for any single and $0.0216, about two cents, per album released (based on an assumed wholesale price of $0,375 a single and $2.00 an album).
Also, as per the terms of the contract, Motown was obligated to pay the cost of arrangements, copying and accompaniment and all other costs related to each recording session, whether the song was released or not – but these expenses and others would have to be recouped by the company from the royalties generated by sales of the records that were released. This arrangement would lead to many complaints by Motown artists, and it would be a big problem for The Jackson 5. But Joseph never imagined that the group would record so many songs that would not be issued – and they did, perhaps as many as a hundred! Later, it would be virtually impossible for the group to make any money on the ones that were released, because the boys would still have to pay for all the ones that weren't.
Also, if Michael or any of his brothers were to leave the group, he would have no right ever to say that he was a member of The Jackson 5, ‘and shall have no further right to use the group name for any purpose whatsoever’. Joseph may not have realized it, but this could be a big problem. For instance, when Florence Ballard was fired from The Supremes in 1967, she was not able to promote herself as having been a member of the group. Her press biography for ABC, when she signed to that label as a solo artist in 1968, could state only that she was ‘a member of a popular female singing group’.
Also Motown could, at any time, replace any member of the group with any person the company chose. In other words, if Tito acted up, for instance, he could be bounced from the act and replaced by someone else selected by Motown, and not by Joseph.
An even more limiting clause – number sixteen – stated that ‘Motown owns all rights, title and interest in the names Jackson 5 and Jackson Five.’ In other words, they may have gone to the company as The Jackson Five, but they sure weren't going to be leaving that way. When The Supremes wanted to leave the label in 1972, they were welcome to go – but they'd have to change the group's name to something else. They stayed.
The contract with Motown could have also stated that Joseph would be obligated to hand Randy and Janet over to the company to raise as Gordy saw fit, and he might have agreed to it. The important thing was that the boys were with Motown, on any terms.
Thus, on 26 July 1968, in tiny, barely legible handwriting, Michael signed the deal: ‘Michael Joseph Jackson’. *
‘Hollywood Livin'’
On 27 September 1968, Motown Records booked The Jackson 5 to appear in a benefit concert at Gilroy Stadium in Gary, Indiana, the purpose of which was to defray the costs of Richard Hatcher's mayoral campaign. On the bill that day were Motown recording artists Gladys Knight and the Pips, Shorty Long, and Bobby Taylor and the Vancouvers. The Jackson 5 opened the show. In years to come, the official Motown story would be that this was where Diana Ross saw the boys for the first time, ‘discovered’ them, and brought them to Gordy's attention. In truth, The Jackson 5 were already signed to the label. Moreover, Diana Ross was nowhere near Gary at the time. She was in Los Angeles, rehearsing with The Supremes.
Around Christmastime, Berry Gordy hosted a party at the Detroit estate he had purchased in 1967 for a million dollars. (Though he had moved to the West Coast, he still maintained his Michigan residence.) The Jackson 5 were asked to perform at the party for the Motown artists and other friends of Gordy's. This was a big deal.
Gordy's three-storey mansion boasted a ballroom with marble floors and columns, an Olympic-sized swimming pool, a billiard room, a two-lane bowling alley, a private theatre linked to the main house by a tunnel, and a pub whose furnishings were imported from England. All of the rooms were decorated with gold leaf, frescoed ceilings and elaborate crystal chandeliers. Expensive oil portraits of Gordy's friends and family decorated the entryway.
If the Jacksons had ever seen a home like this before, it was only in movies where the occupants usually were royalty – white royalty. ‘Black people actually live like this?’ Joseph recalled asking himself as he wandered throughout the mansion, shaking his head. ‘I just can't believe that this kind of thing is possible.’ When Gordy happened to overhear the comment, he put his hand on Joseph's shoulder and whispered something in his ear that made Joseph smile. The two men shook hands in agreement and Gordy led Joseph into the living room.
‘So tell me, man, what do you think about this?’ Gordy asked, stopping before an enormous painting of Gordy dressed as Napoleon Bonaparte. It had been commissioned by his sister, Esther.
‘Jesus. What can I say?’ Joseph asked.
‘That's you? Man, it's too much to believe.’
‘Well, do you like it?’ Gordy pressed.
‘I, uh…You, uh…’ All Joseph could do was stammer. Just at that moment, his son Michael came running up to him. ‘Hey, who's that funny-lookin' guy in the picture?’ he asked.
Joseph cringed and shot his son a look. Gordy smiled.
‘I'll never forget that night,’ Michael would say. ‘There were maids and butlers, and everyone was real polite. There were Motown stars everywhere. Smokey Robinson was there. That's when I met him for the first time. The Temptations were there, and we were singing some of their songs, so we were real nervous. And I looked out into the audience, and there was Diana Ross. That's when I almost lost it.’
After the boys' performance, Berry introduced them to Diana for the first time. Diana looked regal in a white, draped silk gown and her hair pulled back in a chignon.
‘I just want to tell you how much I enjoyed you guys,’ she said as she shook their hands. ‘Mr Gordy tells me that we're going to be working together.’
‘We are?’ Michael asked.
‘Yes, we are,’ Diana said. Her smile was almost as overwhelming as the diamonds she wore at her ears and around her neck. ‘Whatever I can do to assist you,’ she said, ‘that's what I'm going to do.’
‘Well, Miss Ross, we really appreciate it,’ Joseph Jackson managed to say. Usually a smooth talker, Joseph was not having an easy time that night.
Diana's smile was warm and sincere. She turned to Michael. ‘And you, you're just so cute.’ When she pinched his cheek, Michael blushed.
Immediately after signing to the label, the Jacksons began to record at the Motown studios under the direction of producer Bobby Taylor, the man who had really discovered them in Chicago. For the next few months, they would spend their weeks in Gary attending school and their weekends – and many of their weeks as well – in Detroit, sleeping on the floor of Taylor's apartment. They recorded fifteen songs, most of which would surface later on their albums. Taylor would say later that he was not paid for those sessions. ‘Sure, I would have liked the recognition for having discovered The Jackson 5,’ he said. ‘But recognition don't pay the bills.’
Michael Jackson Page 6