Lamont Dozier: Motown music creates love

Lamont Dozier believes the enduring power of the music of Motown is that it brings people together.
The 77-year-old musician was responsible, along with his songwriting partners Brian and his Eddie Holland, for creating some of the record label’s biggest ever hits such as ‘Baby Love’ and ‘Stop! in the Name of Love’ for The Supremes, ‘Nowhere to Run’ by Martha and the Vandellas, and ‘It’s the Same Old Song’ and ‘Reach Out I’ll Be There’ by The Four Tops among many more.
Motown was founded in 1959 by Berry Gordy Jr. and Lamont believes the songs that dominated the charts in the 60s played a part in healing some of the racial divisions in America throughout that decade and they still have that ability to create love now.
In an interview with the new issue of Mojo magazine, he said: "What Motown mostly did was bring people together. Because those were really troubling times in the 60s and people were at odds with each other. Music, it’s a cure for a lot of the ills and the prejudices and all that stuff. Can it happen today? Well it’s changed, it’s a whole new thing now. But the music is always there, lurking in the background, and music always has that healing thing. When everything seems lost you can put on a melody or a song. Doctor Music, I call it."
The Holland-Dozier-Holland songwriting trio penned numerous songs which told the stories of heartbreak and lost love for women and Dozier admits he always considered himself an "advocate for the woman’s plight in their love life".
Dozier learnt about ladies’ problems with me from working in his grandmother’s beauty parlour and overhearing the conversations of the customers.
He said: "We were writing for a lot of girls because bought the records more so than guys did in those days. And I was good with the story ideas, because I was always the one listening for what girls had to say about what they were going through. I always considered myself an advocate for the woman’s plight in their love life. A lot of the ideas for those songs came from listening to women at my grandmother’s beauty shop. They’d come in and they would ask her for advice about unrequited love, and I’m sweeping up the hair in the place, learning how women were being mistreated by their boyfriends and husbands."