CoronaVinyl Day 148 ('60s Debut): Please Mr. Postman by The Marvelettes

For an explanation of CoronaVinyl, click here.

For the rest of the week's CoronaVinyl selections, we'll be taking a look at debut albums from the '60s through the '90s.  For the '60s, I'm going with The Marvelettes' 1961 debut album, Please Mr. Postman.

The Marvelettes were one of Motown's first successful groups, as "Please Mr. Postman" was the label's first #1 song on the Billboard Hot 100.  This was still in the very early days of Motown, so they hadn't yet found that "Motown Sound" that pushed the label into the stratosphere a few years later with The Miracles, The Supremes, The Four Tops, and The Temptations, among others.  This album has more of a classic girl group sound, and frankly, I like that.  That said, "Please Mr. Postman" was co-written by Brian Holland, who would become one of the three pieces of the legendary Motown songwriting team of Hollan-Dozier-Holland, and other songs on the album were co-written by Smokey Robinson and Berry Gordy, among others.

Anywho, The Marvelettes were not a one-hit wonder, as they had eight more Top 40 hits after "Please Mr. Postman," including two other Top 10s, between 1961 and 1968.  Sadly, by the end of the '60s, their popularity had declined and there were various personal issues that the group members were dealing with, and they disbanded.

Favorite song from Side 1:  "Please Mr. Postman"

How could I choose any other song?  This is a classic, and if it was good enough for The Beatles to cover, it's good enough for me.  Gladys Horton's vocals are fantastic, and I have always loved the alliterative line "deliver de letter, de sooner de better."  

Favorite song from Side 2:  "Way Over There"
This one is co-written by Gordy and Robinson, and it sounds like an early Miracles' song.  Because it was.  Horton again provides some nice soulful vocals.