Ego Tripping Out
| "Ego Tripping Out" | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Single by Marvin Gaye | ||||
| from the album Love Man (cancelled)/In Our Lifetime1 | ||||
| B-side | 'Ego Tripping Out" (Instrumental) | |||
| Released | September 17, 1979 | |||
| Format |
7" single 12" single | |||
| Recorded | 1979, Marvin's Room, Los Angeles, California | |||
| Genre | Funk | |||
| Length | 5:13 | |||
| Label | Tamla | |||
| Writer(s) | Marvin Gaye | |||
| Producer(s) | Marvin Gaye | |||
| Marvin Gaye singles chronology | ||||
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"Ego Tripping Out" is a 1979 funk-styled dance record released by American soul singer Marvin Gaye, released as a single on the Tamla (Motown) label.
The song, written, composed, arranged and produced by Gaye himself, was a self-mockery of the singer's image and lifestyle. Providing a semi-rap at the beginning of the song where he sang "I got the baddest cool/could never be the fool/the ladies wait to get down with me", he later talks about the downside of being in the spotlight as he sang about his crippling drug abuse: "cause the toot and the smoke won't fulfill the need".
The song, while not making it to the Billboard Hot 100, still made the R&B charts, peaking at #17. It would be Marvin's last Top 40 Billboard single at least on the R&B singles chart until 1981's "Praise".
Personnel
- All vocals by Marvin Gaye
- Instrumentation by assorted musicians:
- Guitars by Gordon Banks
- Drums, piano, keyboard and synthesizers by Marvin Gaye
- Saxophones by assorted musicians
- Bass by Frank Blair
- 1 Single was later included in a 1994 re-release of In Our Lifetime and a 2007 re-release deluxe edition featured different alternate mixes for the sessions of In Our Lifetime as well as the original Love Man single of it.
