Levi Stubbs

The soulful baritone who helped define the Motown sound

Levi Stubbs

1936–2008

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Levi Stubbs, whose yearning, soulful baritone as lead singer of the Four Tops was perhaps the most distinctive voice of Motown’s golden era, led the group to international fame with its tumultuous 1966 recording of “Reach Out (I’ll Be There).” With its incessant rhythm, symphonic arrangement, and Stubbs’ unforgettable plea, the song provided Motown with one of its first No. 1 hits on both sides of the Atlantic. It also provided the quartet with a musical recipe for success that lasted for more than a decade.

Born Levi Stubbles in Detroit, Stubbs formed a singing duo with a friend, Abdul “Duke” Fakir, in high school, said the London Independent. In 1953, they met Lawrence Payton and Renaldo “Obie” Benson, and recast themselves as the Four Aims. Performing on the jazz and R&B circuit, they worked with such artists as Count Basie and Jackie Wilson. After signing with Chess Records, Levi changed his name to Stubbs and the group adopted a new name, the Four Tops, “to avoid confusion with the Ames Brothers.”

Moving to New York in the mid-1950s, said The New York Times, the four were sharing a studio apartment when Jack Paar invited them onto The Tonight Show. Berry Gordy Jr., founder of the Motown label, saw their jazz rendition of “In the Still of the Night,” signed the group and assigned a songwriting team “to shape their sound.” The Four Tops released “Baby, I Need Your Loving” a year later, followed by two No. 1 hits—“I Can’t Help Myself,” in 1965, and “Reach Out,” in 1966. Written in the tenor range, the songs pushed Stubbs’ “voice higher and made it sound urgent and pleading.”

Stubbs initially disliked “Reach Out” and wanted another Top to sing the lead, said the London Guardian. Yet it was only his voice that could capture the necessary “masculinity in crisis” of the lyrics. The Four Tops continued to tour the cabaret circuit both in the U.S. and around the world in the 1970s and ’80s, often with the Temptations. Though Stubbs declined several movie roles, he did supply the voice of the man-eating plant in the 1986 version of Little Shop of Horrors. In that role, Stubbs said, “the plant starts out sorta sweet and kind, then gets sly and devious and mean. I thought about it some. In the music business, you have quite a few people like that, so I put those people in my mind.”

The Four Tops were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1990. Stubbs, who stopped performing in 2000 after a series of illnesses, including a stroke and cancer, died at home in his sleep.