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Reach Out I'll Be There

"Reach Out I'll Be There"
Four-tops-reach-out-1966.jpg
Single by the Four Tops
from the album Reach Out
B-side "Until You Love Someone"
Released August 18, 1966
Format 7" single
Recorded Hitsville U.S.A. (Studio A); 1966
Genre Soul
Length 3:01
Label Motown
Writer(s) Holland–Dozier–Holland
Producer(s) Brian Holland, Lamont Dozier
the Four Tops singles chronology
"Loving You Is Sweeter Than Ever"
(1966)
"Reach Out I'll Be There"
(1966)
"Standing in the Shadows of Love"
(1966)

"Reach Out I'll Be There" (also formatted as "Reach Out (I'll Be There)") is a 1966 song recorded by the Four Tops for the Motown label. Written and produced by Motown's main production team, Holland–Dozier–Holland, the song is one of the best known Motown tunes of the 1960s, and is today considered The Tops' signature song.

It was the number one song on the Rhythm & Blues charts for two weeks, and on the Billboard Hot 100 for two weeks, from October 15–22, 1966. It replaced "Cherish" by The Association, and was itself replaced by "96 Tears" by Question Mark & the Mysterians. The track also reached number one in the UK Singles Chart, becoming Motown's second UK chart-topper after The Supremes' 1964 release "Baby Love". It replaced Jim Reeves' "Distant Drums" at number one in October 1966, and stayed there for three weeks before being replaced by The Beach Boys' "Good Vibrations" in November.

Rolling Stone later ranked this version number 206 on its list of "The 500 Greatest Songs of All Time". Billboard ranked the record as the number four song for 1966. This version is also currently ranked as the 56th best song of all time (as well as the number four song of 1966) in an aggregation of critics' lists at Acclaimed Music.

Lead singer Levi Stubbs delivers many of the lines in the song in a tone that some consider straddles the line between singing and shouting, as he did in 1965's "I Can't Help Myself (Sugar Pie Honey Bunch)". AllMusic critic Ed Hogan praises Stubb's vocal, as well as the song's "rock-solid groove" and "dramatic, semi-operatic tension and release." Critic Martin Charles Strong calls the song "a soul symphony of epic proportions that remains [the Four Tops'] signature tune."


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