Rant #2,590: Up The Ladder To The Roof

 

Baby boomers suffered another major death of one of our heroes yesterday, and this one hit particularly hard.
 
Mary Wilson died yesterday at age 76, and if you don’t know who Mary Wilson was, well, I kind of feel sorry for you, but please read on.
 
Mary Wilson was the leader and co-founder of the Supremes, probably the greatest and most successful girl group of all time, and during their reign, which lasted from the early 1960s through the mid-1970s, well, there were a lot of pretenders to their throne, but no other girl group really came even close to the level that they reached.
 
Beginning with nothing in the Detroit projects, the once-four girl group was pared down to three, led by Wilson, Florence Ballard and Diane Ross, who later changed her name to Diana to make herself a little more exotic.
 
They were signed by the fledgling Motown level, struggled to be heard with several flop singles, but once they hit their stride in late 1963 with “When the Lovelight Starts Shining Through His Eyes,” they could not be stopped.
 
That song only reached number 23 on the chart, but their very next single, “Where Did Our Love Go,” pushed them into the music heights that they held on to for years, reaching number one, their first of 11 chart toppers.

 
I believe that at the beginning of the act, Ballard was the lead singer, with Ross and Wilson also doing a lot of lead singing too.
 
But Berry Gordy, the head of Motown, felt that Ross had more charisma as the lead singer, so she ended up being out front, with Ballard and Wilson becoming, in essence, her backup singers.
 
Between 1964 and 1969, with Ross as lead singer, the trio—which later featured Cindy Birdsong replacing Ballard, who fell into drug and alcohol abuse and died at an early age—amassed 21 top 20 hits on the Hot 100, and they were ubiquitous as Motown’s top act, appealing to young and old and black and white.

 
They appeared on “The Ed Sullivan Show” numerous times, and they were on just about every variety show worth its salt during the 1960s. They had their own TV specials—often paired with label mates the Temptations and the Four Tops—and the trio also appeared as actors on a few shows, including “Tarzan.”
 
They were as popular as the Beatles at one point in time, but things were brewing in the background that led to major changes for the Supremes as the 1960s ended and the 1970s were ready to dawn.
 
There was friction in the background of the group. Ballard provided much of it, with her behavior changing due to drug abuse. When she was forced out of the act and Birdsong was brought in, it evidently did not alleviate the tension that was in the group, because Ross was being groomed for something bigger than being the lead singer of the Supremes.
 
With Gordy pulling the strings—and due to some accounts, pulling a bit more as he was having an affair with Ross—the Supremes’ lead singer was being groomed as an all-purpose performer, with a solo career beckoning.

 
Her name was now put out front of the Supremes, and “Diana Ross and the Supremes” became the band moniker, with Wilson and Birdsong as support singers and little else … if even that.
 
In fact, many of the later Supremes’ hits only featured one Supreme on the song, as Ross was the lead singer, but neither Wilson nor Birdsong were on backup.
 
This riled Wilson in particular, and there was a lot of animosity there, as Wilson was co-founder of the act but was being treated as not even a second banana to Ross.
 
The animosity was so real—and long lasting—that Wilson never called Ross “Diana,” sticking with her real name, Diane, and this animosity continued for decades after the Supremes had dissolved.
 
Anyway, one of the songs that Wilson and Birdsong were not a part of was the act’s last number one hit, “Someday We’ll Be Together,” and Ross left for a solo career.
 
However, Wilson was not deterred, and helped keep the act alive and on the charts. With Jean Terrell as lead singer, the act continued to have many chart singles, including “Up the Ladder to the Roof” and “Stoned Love,” with both reading the top 10 on the charts.

 
From early 1970 to late 1976, the Supremes—back to the old name—had 14 charted singles, with Wilson always at the helm. The personnel changed numerous times during that period, but Wilson was always there to carry the flame until the Supremes finally ended their run in 1977
 
Wilson continued to record on her own, appear in numerous club dates, and carry on the Supremes legacy without using the name.
 
When Ross decided to bring back the “Supremes” as her backing act during a tour in the early 2000s, she desperately wanted Wilson and Birdsong back, but reports were that their pay would not have equaled the effort, and Ross ended up using “last gasp” Supremes and backup singers.
 
Wilson continued to be active in recent times, and reportedly had new material that she was seeking to release soon, but she died the other day. The reason for her death has not yet been released, but it was sudden, as she was working until her last days.
 
Wilson, Ross, Ballard and later, Birdsong, et the standard for modern girl groups, picking up from acts like the Andrews Sisters and taking that success to the next level in the rock era.
 
They cut across all racial and ethnic barriers, and they really defined the term “glam” during their height of fame.
 
Wilson may have been in the background with Ross out front, but Wilson as the act’s heartbeat, without a doubt.
 
She will be missed.