*When Zeola Gaye heard October London’s single “Make Me Wanna” for the first time, the artist sounded so much like her late brother Marvin Gaye that it freaked her out. And not in a good way.
“It was unbelievable, and it made me feel a certain way inside,” Gaye tells EURWEB.com founder Lee Bailey in the latest episode of our For The Record podcast.
London’s stylistic proximity to Marvin Gaye had Snoop Dogg so shook that he featured the Indiana native on his 2016 album “Coolaid,” his 2017 LP “Neva Left” and eventually signed him to Death Row Records, which just put out his album, “The Rebirth of Marvin.” Zeola takes issue with both the album release and its title.
“I mean why? You can’t rebirth Marvin. My mother’s not here to do that. Marvin has already been born and he’s gone,” she says. “Rebirth somebody else. Leave Marvin alone. Can’t he rest in peace, for heaven’s sake?”
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The album’s first single, “Make Me Wanna,” is an uncanny channeling of Marvin that Zeola feels takes away from her brother’s ultimate one-of-one status.
“Everybody in the world who loved Marvin, when they heard his voice on anything, they knew that was Marvin Gaye,” his youngest sister says. “You didn’t have to guess, ‘Oh I wonder who’s singing that song?’ You knew it was Marvin, and I think it should say that way.”
Zeola believes that London is a talented singer, but says his Marvin-soaked vocals on the current single and several others give her the unsettling feeling that her brother has been snatched from the grave. “It’s like he’s here, and I don’t want that feeling,” she says. “I don’t need that feeling. I don’t need to hear October sounding like Marvin and Marvin is not here if that makes sense.”
“I’d rather sit and play Marvin in my living room and think about the good times, and think about how happy he makes me feel,” she adds. “I don’t wanna hear someone else singing and sounding exactly like him. That’s more haunting to me than feeling comfortable and calming inside.”
Hear Zeola Gaye’s full interview in the latest episode of our podcast For the Record:
