Album · Marvin Gaye
What’s Going On by Marvin Gaye
What’s Going On is an album by Marvin Gaye, released in 1971. 3 songs from it have charted on rock radio countdowns, with 40 countdown appearances in total. The biggest is “What's Going On”, on 22 lists with a best position of #2.
What's Going On came out on Tamla on May 21, 1971, and it's Marvin Gaye stepping out from behind the Motown hit factory to make a statement all his own. It was the first of his albums to credit him as producer and the first to name the Funk Brothers, Motown's house musicians, and the sessions stretched across Hitsville U.S.A., Golden World and United Sound in Detroit and The Sound Factory in West Hollywood.
The songs flow one into the next like a single long meditation, seen through the eyes of a Vietnam veteran who comes home and finds hatred, suffering and injustice waiting for him. Drugs, poverty and the war all get their due, and "Mercy Mercy Me (The Ecology)" frets about the planet before most people had thought to. The title track, "Mercy Mercy Me" and "Inner City Blues (Make Me Wanna Holler)" all went top ten, and the album won over critics and buyers alike right from the start.
Written with AI assistance from RockLists chart data, MusicBrainz and Wikipedia.
Songs from What’s Going On on radio countdowns
| # | Song | Strength | Lists | Best | #1s | Years |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | What's Going On | 22 | #2 | – | 2001–2026 | |
| 2 | Mercy Mercy Me (The Ecology) | 12 | #192 | – | 1991–2026 | |
| 3 | Inner City Blues (Make Me Wanna Holler) | 6 | #176 | – | 2007–2026 |
Only songs that appear on at least one countdown are listed. Release data from MusicBrainz.