Episode #20 | 9.25.18

Marvin Gaye: Father, Father, There’s too Many of Us Dying

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In this episode

Marvin Gaye was born into a God-fearing home to a sweet, wholesome mother and crossdressing, philandering, pentecostal preacher who ruled his children with an iron fist. Despite his tense upbringing, Marvin Gaye found his calling - music - and used it as his ticket out of his repressive home life. He chased away his shame and followed his muse to the top of the charts; through a sea of cocaine and sex, becoming one of the biggest and most gifted entertainers of all time before sinking into addiction and depression and ultimately winding up back at home with his parents. A move that would prove to be more devastating than any of his volatile sexual relationships and more deadly than any drug he’d ever taken.

Sources

NY Post: Marvin Gaye’s Wife Reveals How He Tortured Her

Divided Soul: The Life of Marvin Gaye by David Ritz

The Final 24 - Marvin Gaye

Detroit Free Press: How Marvin Gaye Tried Out for the Lions

Disgraceland is a podcast about musicians getting away with murder and behaving very badly. It melds music history, true crime and transgressive fiction. Disgraceland is not journalism. Disgraceland is entertainment. Entertainment inspired by true events. However, certain scenes, characters and names are sometimes fictionalized for dramatic purposes.

Music

Score by Jake Brennan.

Mixed and Engineered by Sean Cahalin.

Disgraceland theme song, "Crenshaw Space Boogie" written and produced by Jake Brennan. Performed by Jake Brennan, Bryce Kanzer, Jay Cannava and Evan Kenney. Mixed and engineered by Adam Taylor.

This episode featured the song, "Marvin Berry" by the Disgraceland Players. Written and produced by Jake Brennan, Adam Taylor and Tony Goddess and recorded at Bang A Gong Studios.

*illustration by Avi Spivak @avispivak