“The Tracks Of My Tears” by Smokey Robinson & The Miracles

Smokey Robinson & the Miracles put "The Tracks of My Tears" out in 1965 on Tamla, Motown's subsidiary, and it's the jewel of their Going to a Go-Go album. It was strictly an in-house job: Robinson wrote it with fellow Miracles Pete Moore and Marv Tarplin, then produced it himself, and the result is soul music at its most tender and graceful, all ache and poise.

The honors piled up over the years. It was a million-seller and entered the Grammy Hall of Fame, the RIAA and the National Endowment for the Arts placed it at 127 on their Songs of the Century list, and Rolling Stone ranked it 50th among the 500 Greatest Songs of All Time before naming the Miracles' recording the greatest Motown song ever in 2021.

Written with AI assistance from RockLists chart data, MusicBrainz and Wikipedia.