When The Lovelight Starts Shining Through His Eyes

This song is notable for being The Supremes first Top 40 hit and their first to be written by the team of Eddie Holland, Lamont Dozier and Brian Holland. The Supremes had been recording for Motown since 1961, and despite a promotion push from the label, couldn't break through. Teaming them with Holland-Dozier-Holland was the game changer - the trio had written hits for Martha & the Vandellas ("(Love Is Like a) Heat Wave) and Mary Wells ("You Lost the Sweetest Boy") and were well suited for The Supremes, who could deliver their songs about young love and heartbreak. The next single the trio wrote for the group - "Run, Run, Run" - took them in the wrong direction, peaking at #93. When H-D-H peddled another song to the group, "Where Did Our Love Go," they wanted nothing to do with it. But because they were lowest on the Motown food chain, The Supremes had to record it. That song went to #1, as did their next four singles, all written and produced by Holland-Dozier-Holland.

The song is about a girl who gives a guy the cold shoulder, but gives in when she sees that lovelight shining through his eyes. Diana Ross, 19 at the time, got very good at selling these kind of songs with a coy vocal delivery.

At the end of the second verse, a group of male vocalists growls, "AhhHH!" That was done by The Four Tops (who were new to Motown) along with the song's writers, Holland-Dozier-Holland.