(August 14, 2026) – The Supremes broke a historic five-song No. 1 streak in 1965 with a tune called “Nothing but Heartaches.” It peaked at No. 11.
Which is ironic, because “nothing but heartaches” could just as easily describe nearly every one of the twelve songs they did take to No. 1.
Six decades later, their dozen chart-toppers are still enough to place them among the most prolific No. 1 acts in Hot 100 history. Yet when you look at those twelve records as a body of work, Holland-Dozier-Holland and the other Motown writers essentially gave Diana Ross one disastrous boyfriend after another… or maybe the same one over and over again.
A quick chronological examination of all twelve No. 1 songs tells this compelling story of eternal heartbreak and despair.
From “Where Did Our Love Go” to “Back In My Arms Again”
“Where Did Our Love Go” kicked off their No. 1 campaign in 1964 by putting their dilemma squarely in the title. Ross and company asked the very pointed musical question to a wayward lover who was literally about to leave her. In it, Diana begs him, “please don’t leave me.”
That was quickly followed by “Baby Love,” where the desperation continued. It was essentially “Where Did Our Love Go – Part 2,” except, for the first time we hear that Diana was actually happy once (“not happy like I used to be”). We also hear the lengths she’ll go through to keep this man (‘til it’s hurtin’ me, ‘til it’s hurtin’ me).
Next came “Come See About Me,” melodically the most cheerful of their first three No. 1s and one where Ms. Ross actually believes there’s a chance that she’ll get this man back. In pleading her case, she lets on just how much she sacrificed (in vain) for this guy: “I’ve given up my friends just for you; my friends have gone and you have too.” But it’s on this third No. 1 that we began to see how deep Diana’s romantic desperation runs when she laments “sometimes I’m up, sometimes I’m down. My life’s so uncertain when you’re not around,” while also admitting to her ex-boo: “no more peace shall I find, until you come back and be mine.”
Perhaps sensing the desperation, the lover has seemingly returned to our tragic heroine by the fourth No. 1 — 1965’s “Stop! In the Name of Love” — but he’s still philandering about town. Diana confronts him (“Baby, baby I’m aware of where you go, each time you leave my door”), but tries to appeal to what little sense of morality he may have remaining (“this time before you run to her, leaving me alone and hurt — think it over, haven’t I been good to you? Haven’t I been sweet to you?”).
But what Diana endured in humiliation, she apparently made up for in newfound happiness by the follow-up single, “Back in My Arms Again,” where she finally has her man “right by my side.” Or does she?
That’s the tune where Diana’s happiness is being challenged by her girlfriends’ cautionary advice who believe she should breakaway from this guy and “the heartaches he’ll bring one day” — advice she’s apparently heeded in the past and lost him to “many long and sleepless nights.” She even gets personal wanting to avoid being like Mary (“how can she tell me what to do when she lost her love so true?) and Flo (“she don’t know because the boy she loves is a Romeo”). Ouch!
One Streak Ends…
When Motown tried to go for six in a row, they brought back the despair with “Nothing but Heartaches,” the spot-on summation of the trio’s first five No. 1s. Perhaps too spot-on. When the song stalled at No. 11 in the summer of ‘65, it prompted Berry Gordy’s famous directive that Motown would release only No. 1-caliber records on the Supremes from that point on (as if that were so easy and predictable).
The response was “I Hear a Symphony,” a change in direction and, ironically, a record where love and bad decisions aren’t ruining Diana’s life. Holland-Dozier-Holland had finally given her true happiness instead of heartbreak. Well almost.
Apparently, the happiness was so overwhelming that it led to heartbreak, or as Diana musically put it, the tears she cried not for herself but “for those who’ve never felt the joy we’ve felt.” So even at arguably the emotional high point of the entire Supremes catalog, Holland-Dozier-Holland couldn’t let Diana get through three minutes without tears? 😂
For one glorious record, the clouds part. Diana has found love in “I Hear a Symphony.” She hears violins. She’s ecstatic. She’s so happy she’s crying for other people. Indeed happiness itself was emotionally hazardous for the Supremes.
And Motown knew the public would tolerate them being happy. They just wouldn’t tolerate it very long.
So for the next several hits, heartache returned and was front and center. “My World is Empty Without You,” “Love Is Like an Itching In My Heart” — top ten hits that fell short of No. 1 but kept the Supremes sighing and crying all the way to the charts.
…And Another Begins.
The Supremes’ No. 1 hit streak resumed in late 1966 with four straight chart toppers — all with their own takes on heartbreak.
“You Can’t Hurry Love” found an impatient Diana seeking sage advice from her mother (“you just have to wait… love don’t come easy, it’s a game of give and take”).
“You Keep Me Hangin’ On” saw her frustration reach a boiling point (she finally had the sense to try and get rid of this man): “Get out my life and let me make a brand new start, because you don’t really love me.”
“Love Is Here and Now You’re Gone” revealed that the “brand new start” Diana sought in the prior No. 1 could be fleeting (“You persuaded me to love you, and I did, but instead of tenderness I found heartache…”).
And in “The Happening,” love (and life) was some hard-to-explain catastrophe (“One day you’re up, then you turn around… you find your world is tumbling down”). All of this because of a tender love you didn’t “take care of.” Except it seemed that that’s all Diana had been trying to do for the previous nine No. 1 singles.
For as happy as “The Happening” sounded, it was merely a cautionary tale from Diana to anyone listening after all the heartaches she’d experienced in her past. She had indeed become the couples therapist that she herself so desperately needed a dozen hits ago.
But nothing perhaps was more cautionary than the tale she’d weave in the group’s next No. 1 — 1968’s “Love Child” — where Diana displayed perhaps the ultimate romantic restraint, refusing to sleep with the man she loved for fear of bringing another “love child” into the same poverty and social stigma she’d experienced herself. The stigma alone was enough to end the relationship, although Diana declares forlornly at the end, “but I’ll always love you.”
And then finally came “Someday We’ll Be Together,” their last No. 1 and the last No. 1 song of the 1960s. The title said it all — just as their first No. 1 song’s had. In it, Diana laments: “Long time ago, I made a big mistake. I said goodbye…and ever since that day, all I wanna do is cry.” But still she held onto the promise that someday she would find happy times again — that is, if she ever had them.
For six chart-topping years with Diana Ross, the Supremes were presented as extraordinarily glamorous, sophisticated, impeccably dressed women. But the women inhabiting their songs were remarkably vulnerable. Men left them, cheated on them, ignored them, strung them along, came back, disappeared again and generally wreaked havoc.
They looked unattainable. Their songs made them relatable (“It happened to me, and it can happen to you,” Diana warned in “The Happening”).
After twelve trips to No. 1, the Supremes still hadn’t quite figured love out. But at least on that final chart-topper, they remained optimistic. Someday, apparently, they’d get it together.
Twelve No. 1 hits. Millions of records sold. International superstardom. Still, nothing but heartaches and not a relationship therapist anywhere in Hitsville.
DJRob
DJRob (he/him) — the Supremes’ No. 1 fan — is a freelance music blogger from the East Coast who covers R&B, hip-hop, disco, pop, rock and country genres – plus lots of music news and current stuff! You can follow him on Bluesky at @djrobblog.bsky.social, X (formerly Twitter) at @djrobblog, on Facebook or on Meta’s Threads.
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Like so many little boys in the 60s (and older boys, for that matter . . .) I completely fell under the spell of the Supremes. There albums and 45s spun non-stop on the turntables in our house and throughout our neighborhood. “Back In My Arms” my favorite then and now. From the ages of 5 to 9 I remember thinking Diana, Flo and Mary just needed to dump and STOP forgiving and going back to those loser guys who treated them so badly and come find love and happiness with a skinny little white boy out in the southwest! We have not idea how love works at that age . . . but then, do we ever really know regardless how old we are? I love how you intertwine every one of of these truly great hits and paint a picture about the fateful romantic life of the queens of Motown. Such good stuff!
Thanks, Robert! It dawned on me recently that every one of their biggest hits touched on the same subject and the majority of them even included the word “heartache” in their titles. I know it was more a H-D-H thing than a Supremes thing (they wrote like that for most of their Motown and later artists), but it just hit hardest with the Supremes!
I meant lyrics, not titles.