The song, which depicts a relationship in the beginning stages of breakup ("You persuaded me to love you/And I did/But instead of tenderness/I found heartache instead"), features several spoken sections from lead singer Diana Ross, who delivers her dialogue in a dramatic, emotive voice. Matching the song's drama influences is an instrumental track, featuring a prominent harpsichord and strings, which recalls both a Hollywoodfilm score and The Left Banke's recently popularized "Baroque rock."[2]
Primarily recorded in Los Angeles, California, thousands of miles away from Motown's regular Hitsville U.S.A. recording studio, "Love Is Here and Now You're Gone" was the #1 song on the U.S. Billboard Hot 100 for one week, from March 5 to March 11, 1967, becoming the group's ninth number-one single. The single was also the group's sixth number one on the R&B charts.[3] The girl group performed the hit record on NBC's The Andy Williams Show on Sunday, January 22, 1967,[4] going to number one seven weeks later. Lyricist Eddie Holland names "Love is Here" as his favorite Supremes song.
Cash Box said the single is a "bright, rhythmic, pulsating Motown-sound excursion" in which the Supremes are "at the top of their form."[5]
Chronology(The band's name history: The Primettes 1959–1961 / The Supremes 1961–1967 / Diana Ross & The Supremes 1967–1970 / The Supremes 1970 / Diana Ross & The Supremes 1970 / The Supremes 1970–)