Some songs come into this world, delight us for a breathtaking moment and fall back into sweet oblivion in as little time as it took them to appear. Others take on a life of their own, gain new meaning against the backdrop of a changing zeitgeist and reinvent themselves repeatedly over decades. Marvin Gaye is a particular master of (co-)composing the latter, as exemplified by the Motown signature song “Dancing in the Street”.

Released in 1965 by Martha Reeves, the song was originally simply inspired by people cooling themselves off during a hot summer in the streets of Detroit by opening fire hydrants. However, it was soon picked up as a civil rights anthem by young black demonstrators demanding equality. But it’s metamorphosis would not stop there, many different famous versions would be recorded over the years:

Shortly after the initial release the British “The Kinks” were recording their own version, branded as being far too boring by critics. A year later The Mamas & The Papas followed suit and they would end up finishing their famous (and last) live performance at the Monterey Pop Festival in 1967 with the song. Grateful Dead, Little Richard, Van Halen – the list of artists covering the song is long and contains many famous names. Since we’re so far focusing on Music Videos we’re going with the 1985 version by David Bowie and Mick Jagger here.

As part of the big “Live Aid” famine release cause of that year the two English rock stars originally planned to sing the song together – live, from two separate stadiums: Wembley in London and John F. Kennedy in Philadelphia. Unfortunately while both of these two were certainly great musical artists, they happened to be slightly less brilliant data transmission engineers and when they realised that one of them would have to be not-quite-so-live due to the two seconds delay of the (at the time quite revolutionary) satellite transmission involved neither of the two was prepared to give in and be “that guy”, so it did not happen.

They ended up recording the song in Abbey Road studio and – certainly helped by the popularity of the Live Aid movement – it would become the most successful of the many recorded versions of this song, reaching top spot in the charts of many countries.