"Trouble Man" is a song composed and written by American

recording artist A musician is someone who composes, conducts, or performs music. According to the United States Employment Service, "musician" is a general term used to designate a person who follows music as a profession. Musicians include songwriters, ...

Marvin Gaye Marvin Pentz Gaye Jr. (; April 2, 1939 – April 1, 1984) was an American Rhythm and blues, R&B and soul singer, songwriter, musician, and record producer. He helped shape the sound of Motown in the 1960s, first as an in-house session player an ...

released on the Motown subsidiary, Tamla, in November

1972 Within the context of Coordinated Universal Time (UTC) it was the longest year ever, as two leap seconds were added during this 366-day year, an event which has not since been repeated. (If its start and end are defined using Solar time, ...

. The song became one of Gaye's

signature song A signature (; from , "to sign") is a depiction of someone's name, nickname, or even a simple "X" or other mark that a person writes on documents as a proof of identity and intent. Signatures are often, but not always, handwritten or styliz ...

s for the remainder of his life and would later be the basis of a

biography A biography, or simply bio, is a detailed description of a person's life. It involves more than just basic facts like education, work, relationships, and death; it portrays a person's experience of these life events. Unlike a profile or curri ...

as a sort of nickname for him. The album version of the song was the only one released as a single in November 1972, where it became a top ten hit on the ''Billboard'' Hot 100 reaching number seven on that chart in January 1973.

Background

The song is the title track and theme for the

blaxploitation In American cinema, Blaxploitation is the film subgenre of action movie derived from the exploitation film genre in the early 1970s, consequent to the combined cultural momentum of the black civil rights movement, the black power movement, ...

film of the same name. The song is about the travails of the movie's lead character, "Mister T", and also relates to issues in Gaye's private life. Gaye described the song as one of the most honest recordings he ever made. He played drums and piano on the record and performs all the vocals himself. Gaye sings most of the song in

falsetto Falsetto ( , ; Italian language, Italian diminutive of , "false") is the vocal register occupying the frequency range just above the modal voice register and overlapping with it by approximately one octave. It is produced by the vibration of the ...

while reaching a

gospel Gospel originally meant the Christianity, Christian message ("the gospel"), but in the second century Anno domino, AD the term (, from which the English word originated as a calque) came to be used also for the books in which the message w ...

-styled growl during the bridges of the song. The performances of the song during Gaye's later concerts became one of his highlights during his 1970s and early 1980s tours. The song was also used as two instrumental "theme songs" on the accompanying album, in which Gaye played

synthesizers A synthesizer (also synthesiser or synth) is an electronic musical instrument that generates audio signals. Synthesizers typically create sounds by generating waveforms through methods including subtractive synthesis, additive synthesis and ...

to accompany

saxophone The saxophone (often referred to colloquially as the sax) is a type of single-reed woodwind instrument with a conical body, usually made of brass. As with all single-reed instruments, sound is produced when a reed on a mouthpiece vibrates to p ...

solos from his musicians. Gaye also recorded a slightly different version of the song primarily for the movie's opening, in which he sang in both tenor and falsetto.

Reception

Cash Box ''Cashbox'', also known as ''Cash Box'', is an American music industry trade magazine, originally published weekly from July 1942 to November 1996. Ten years after its dissolution, it was revived and continues as ''Cashbox Magazine'', an online ...

'' described it as a "fine blend of smooth vocals and intriguing musical ventures."

Chart performance

Popular culture

*It was featured on the

soundtrack A soundtrack is a recorded audio signal accompanying and synchronised to the images of a book, drama, motion picture, radio program, television show, television program, or video game; colloquially, a commercially released soundtrack album of m ...

for the

video game A video game or computer game is an electronic game that involves interaction with a user interface or input device (such as a joystick, game controller, controller, computer keyboard, keyboard, or motion sensing device) to generate visual fe ...

'' Driver: Parallel Lines''. *It was also featured on the soundtrack for the films: '' Four Brothers'', '' Se7en'', '' Captain America: The Winter Soldier'' *The song is also referenced in '' The Falcon and the Winter Soldier''.

Samples

* T.I's album, Trouble Man: Heavy is the Head, is made after this song and on his first track, T.I samples Gaye's voice in the song.

References

1972 singles 1973 singles Marvin Gaye songs Songs written by Marvin Gaye Song recordings produced by Marvin Gaye Tamla Records singles {{1970s-single-stub