Reply #7: Smokey had (has) a phenomenal voice

[geniph]

and is an outstanding songwriter (how many people know he also wrote the Four Tops' hit, My Girl?), and I dearly love all these tunes (most particularly I Second That Emotion), but don't forget to give a shout-out to the uncredited and unparalleled studio musicians who created the Motown sound for Smokey and others - the Funk Brothers. (I saw them in concert a couple months ago, and the surviving members still KICK ASS.)

The only singer I've ever heard do justice to a Smokey cover was John Lennon, whose singing abilities were often underappreciated.