It’s late. Not a Tuesday-night-late, but the kind of deep, velvety late when the streetlights outside bleed orange through the blinds and the city noise has finally, mercifully, receded. It’s the perfect hour for the kind of soul music that feels less like a performance and more like a whispered confession. This is when ‘Something About You Baby,’ by The Four Tops, steps out of the ether. It doesn’t rush the moment. It waits for the silence to deepen, then it begins its subtle, irresistible work.
The year is 1965. The Four Tops, a quartet honed by a decade of roadwork, finally find their commercial footing in the explosive Motown machine. They were not new kids. They were seasoned veterans who had toured the Midwest and East Coast, their sound a blend of sophisticated harmony and raw energy. The transition to Motown, and their pairing with the songwriting and production triumvirate Holland–Dozier–Holland (H–D–H), transformed them from a successful live act into an unstoppable chart force. ‘Something About You Baby,’ which features on the legendary album Second Album, arrived in the wake of the colossal ‘I Can’t Help Myself (Sugar Pie Honey Bunch).’ Where the latter was a joyous, breathless sprint, this follow-up was a measured, captivating stroll—a testament to H-D-H’s ability to calibrate a hit to a mood, not just a tempo.
The brilliance of H–D–H was their understanding of contrast: pairing a desperate lyric with a relentlessly cheerful beat, or in this case, a simmering, almost melancholy arrangement with a message of overwhelming, inexpressible attraction. This piece of music is anchored by The Funk Brothers, Motown’s peerless, largely anonymous session band. The track doesn’t hit you with a wall of sound; it builds a world around you.
The opening is immediately immersive. A clean, distinct bass line, presumably James Jamerson’s, establishes a walking rhythm that is both fluid and slightly syncopated, providing the track’s engine. Over this, a clean, trebly guitar riff—sharp, staccato, and repeated—acts as a counter-melody, a bright, metallic glint against the warm low end. The drums, likely Benny Benjamin on a slightly muffled, perfectly tuned kit, keep time with an almost military precision, but the rhythm remains lithe, never rigid.
What truly elevates the arrangement is the interplay between the rhythm section and the orchestral colors. The piano, an essential element in the Motown sound, is used sparingly but strategically. The Funk Brothers’ resident pianists often created a dense, chordal cushion, but here the piano is allowed moments of sparkling isolation. It drops in bright, high-register accents that feel like sunlight flashing on a wet street. The string arrangement, characteristic of Motown’s expanding studio palette under arrangers like Paul Riser, is lush but not overbearing. They don’t saw for drama; they simply sustain, adding a harmonic halo around Levi Stubbs’ voice. It is a masterful display of restraint. For those truly invested in the texture of classic recordings, listening on premium audio equipment reveals how expertly the rhythm tracks and the soaring strings were layered on the limited tracks of the studio tape machine.
And then there is the voice.
Levi Stubbs was the antithesis of the smooth, polished crooner. His voice was a magnificent instrument of controlled grit, a taut wire of emotion. On ‘Something About You Baby,’ he embodies the feeling of being utterly consumed by a love you can’t articulate. His delivery is conversational at first, almost hushed, detailing the symptoms of his fixation: “When I see you, baby, my heart starts beatin’ fast.” But as the song progresses, his famous urgency comes to the fore. He holds back on the verse, letting the melody and the groove carry the weight, saving his power for the climax.
The micro-story of this song is the commute home after a long shift. You’re exhausted, maybe a little lonely, and then this track comes on the radio, cutting through the static. Stubbs’ voice, raspy and earnest, makes you feel seen. It’s not the grand, sweeping declaration of ‘Reach Out I’ll Be There,’ but the internal monologue of a person wrestling with a feeling too big for words.
“The way Stubbs’ voice breaks on the word ‘something’ is not a flaw in his technique; it is the sound of emotional overload.”
His phrasing is brilliant. He pushes ahead of the beat, pulling it slightly faster in moments of passion, then falls back, languidly stretching a vowel to emphasize a point. When he finally cries out, “Oh, the something, the something, the something about you, baby,” it’s not a shout of pain, but a declaration of surrender to an inexplicable force. He never identifies the ‘something.’ He doesn’t need to. It’s the undefinable magic that is the core of attraction, and by leaving it abstract, H–D–H ensured the lyric could mean everything to everyone.
Contrast is key to the song’s lasting power. The Tops’ signature background harmonies—Renaldo “Obie” Benson, Abdul “Duke” Fakir, and Lawrence Payton—provide a cool, smooth bedrock. They are the collective conscience, echoing Stubbs’ distress (“Ohhh… Oh, yeah…”). They are the glamour, while Stubbs is the grit. Their tight, polished counterpoint is the calm center to Stubbs’ whirlwind.
Think about the first time you truly grasped the concept of emotional complexity in music, the way a song can feel both joyful and profoundly sad simultaneously. This track is that lesson set to music. It’s an arrangement of almost Baroque complexity, yet it lands with the directness of a telegram. The layers of tambourine, vibraphone, and those perfectly placed string swells create a sonic shimmer that defines the mid-sixties Motown sound. It’s the sound of American popular music reaching an apex of studio sophistication and raw human feeling.
This album cut, plucked as a single, was another triumph for the group, continuing their ascent to the very top tier of American recording artists. It solidified their role as the voice of soulful complexity within the Motown roster—distinct from the youthful exuberance of The Supremes or the gritty earthiness of Martha and the Vandellas. The Four Tops brought a maturity and a desperate romanticism that spoke to a slightly older, perhaps more world-weary audience.
I once spent an afternoon digging through old recordings, tracing the melodic lines of The Funk Brothers on a slow-groove Motown track. The precision required to blend all those elements—the driving bass, the chanking guitar, the perfectly placed hi-hat—is astonishing. It’s a level of musical artistry that stands as a kind of masterclass. Anyone considering guitar lessons could do worse than to study the subtle, supportive role of the rhythm guitar here, which serves the song rather than demanding attention. This level of supportive playing is what makes classic Motown so rich.
‘Something About You Baby’ isn’t just a hit record from 1965; it’s a blueprint for emotional depth in pop music. It teaches us that the greatest songs aren’t always about shouting the answer, but about beautifully, powerfully articulating the question. It’s about the exquisite, frustrating feeling of recognizing perfect love and realizing you’ll never find the adequate words for it. That ambiguity is its enduring strength, and why, when the lights are low and the world is quiet, we keep coming back to listen.
🎧 Listening Recommendations (Songs with Adjacent Moods/Arrangements)
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The Temptations – “My Girl” (1964): Shares the same H–D–H era smooth, mid-tempo groove and supportive, soaring Funk Brothers arrangement, but with a more overtly joyous, confident mood.
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Smokey Robinson & The Miracles – “Ooo Baby Baby” (1965): Similar restrained, delicate arrangement featuring a subtle piano and lush strings, focusing on an internal, almost fragile expression of love/loss.
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The Isley Brothers – “This Old Heart of Mine (Is Weak for You)” (1966): Another Motown track with Levi Stubbs’ kind of vocal intensity, backed by the classic H–D–H blend of propulsive rhythm and orchestral sweep.
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Marvin Gaye – “Ain’t That Peculiar” (1965): Exemplifies The Funk Brothers’ kinetic yet smooth rhythm section on a mid-tempo Motown classic, with a similarly conversational and escalating vocal performance.
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Four Tops – “Loving You Is Sweeter Than Ever” (1966): A deep cut from the same creative period, showcasing a gentler, more harmonically rich side of the group, still framed by subtle arrangements.