Medialoper

Certain Songs #2502: Stevie Wonder – “Higher Ground”

December 7, 2022 by Jim Connelly Leave a Comment

Album: Innervisions
Year: 1973

. . .

The lead single from what has turned out to be my favorite Stevie Wonder album, Innervisions, is all wrapped up in one of the weirder chapters in Stevie Wonder’s life: it was the last song he recorded before he was involved in an automobile accident that left him in a coma for four days, and apparently what revived him was hearing “Higher Ground.” Naturally, with stories like this, there are differing accounts: one has the rhythm track being played for him; another has it that a guy named Ira Tucker — either his publicist or a gospel singer (maybe both!) — sang it to him.

Certain Songs #2501: Stevie Wonder – “I Believe (When I Fall in Love It Will Be Forever)”

December 6, 2022 by Jim Connelly Leave a Comment

Album: Talking Book
Year: 1972

. . .

You’ll probably have noticed that none of the Stevie Wonder songs I’ve written about so far have been ballads. And of course, those of you who have been reading this blog for quite some time are probably well aware of my propensity for fast ones over slow ones.

Which is one of the reasons why I’m skipping the massive ballad that opened up Talking Book (and provided Stevie his second #1 hit single in a row), “You Are The Sunshine of My Life,” a song where I can hear what the rest of the world loves about it while being totally immune to its charms.

Certain Songs #2500: Stevie Wonder – “Superstition”

December 5, 2022 by Jim Connelly Leave a Comment

Album: Talking Book
Year: 1972

. . .

Poor Jeff Beck. He’d made a deal with Stevie Wonder that he would play guitar on Wonder’s next album and Wonder would write him a song. The problem is, that song was “Superstition,” which, once Stevie recorded it — without Beck, hilariously enough, because the clavinet riff that dominated the song rocked so hard it precluded the need for guitars — Motown knew it was going to be a big hit, the first return on their brand-new massive investment in the now-fully-adult Wonder. So, tough luck Jeff Beck, who was understandably pissed, as was his record label.

Certain Songs #2499: Stevie Wonder – “Love Having You Around”

December 2, 2022 by Jim Connelly Leave a Comment

Album: Music of My Mind
Year: 1972

. . .

If there is any kind of thing as the “great lost Stevie Wonder album,” it would probably be Music of My Mind, the first of his two 1972 albums. Music of My Mind was also the first album where Stevie Wonder played nearly all of the instruments, as well as the first album where he focused on using synthesizers, having been turned onto them by the Tonto’s Expanding Head Band album, Zero Time.

And so, because he was Stevie Wonder, he invited the two guys from that band, Malcolm Cecil and Robert Margouleff, to come into the studio with him and help produce his next album, and bring their synth, TONTO — which stood for “The Original New Timbral Orchestra” — because he had some music in his mind that he thought TONTO would help bring out.

Certain Songs #2498: Stevie Wonder – “If You Really Love Me”

December 1, 2022 by Jim Connelly Leave a Comment

Album: Where I’m Coming From
Year: 1971

. . .

As he approached his 21st birthday, Stevie Wonder played a game of chicken with Motown. You see, his original contract had a clause in it that allowed him to void it when he turned 21, and Stevie took that option, which gave him even more control over his music than he’d previously enjoyed.

And so he came up with Where I’m Coming From, an awkwardly-titled transitional album that was the first time Stevie did a full album of all original-songs, in this case all co-writes with Syreeta Wright, and some reaching upwards of six minutes in length, a first for his studio albums.

Certain Songs #2497: Stevie Wonder – “Signed, Sealed, Delivered I’m Yours”

November 30, 2022 by Jim Connelly Leave a Comment

Album: Signed Sealed & Delivered
Year: 1970

. . .

As he approached his 21st birthday, Stevie Wonder was getting restless, aching to have more control over his music. And as it turned out, the first instance of that control, the awesome “Signed, Sealed, Delivered I’m Yours,” certainly helped him make that case.

No only was Stevie a co-writer (along with his mom — who apparently came up with the title — future wife Syreeta Wright, and a friend of his, Lee Garrett), “Signed, Sealed, Delivered I’m Yours” was also his first producer credit, as well. Oh, and he also played the drums. The future wasn’t here yet, but it was definitely peeking around the corner.

Certain Songs #2496: Stevie Wonder – “I Was Made To Love Her”

November 29, 2022 by Jim Connelly Leave a Comment

Album: I Was Made To Love Her
Year: 1967

. . .

Unlike “Uptight (Everything’s Alright),” which was an uptempo rush from the start, Stevie’s next great single, “I Was Made To Love Her,” was slower, more measured, and funkier on every level.

Once again written & produced by Sylvia Moy, Hank Cosby and of course Stevie — who got his mother a partial songwriting credit because why not — “I Was Made to Love Her” featured a sitarish guitar hook from Eddie Willis which led into a short harmonica solo from Stevie before he got down to business with a bit of misdirection about his life story.

Certain Songs #2495: Stevie Wonder – “Uptight (Everything’s Alright)”

November 28, 2022 by Jim Connelly Leave a Comment

Album: Up-Tight
Year: 1965

. . .

It was clear that Motown had no idea what to do with Stevie Wonder for the first few years of his career. Sure they got an early #1 single by weaponizing the thing they hated about him — his disinclination to leave any stage he was on — but after the fluke of “Fingertips Pt. 2”, just one misstep after another. And whether or not the tribute album to Ray Charles — you see, he was also blind and Black! — or Stevie at the Beach, an album of surf music, was more misguided is not for me to ever figure out.

Certain Songs #2494: Stevie Nicks – “Edge of Seventeen”

November 25, 2022 by Jim Connelly Leave a Comment

Album: Bella Donna
Year: 1981

. . .

This is probably my favorite Stevie Nicks song all up, and that includes Fleetwood Mac heavy hitters like “Landslide,” “Gold Dust Woman” and even the hallowed “Dreams.” “Edge of Seventeen” takes all of the spacey, trancey aspects of her music and rolls them into a single ball of hooky weirdness.

We talked a bit yesterday about Stevie Nicks’s friendship with Tom Petty, and that’s kinda sorta the springboard for “Edge of Seventeen,” as Nicks had befriended Petty’s then wife, Jane, and at some point Jane told Stevie that she and Tom met at the “the age of seventeen,” which Nicks heard as “the edge of seventeen,” and there we go.

Certain Songs #2493: Stevie Nicks and Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers – “Stop Draggin’ My Heart Around”

November 24, 2022 by Jim Connelly Leave a Comment

Album: Bella Donna
Year: 1981

. . .

I’m pretty sure everybody knows the story of this song, but just in case, it goes like this: Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers were recording Hard Promises with producer Jimmy Iovine — who had helmed their breakthrough Damn The Torpedoes — and “Stop Draggin’ My Heart Around” was one of the songs they recorded but decided on to put on the album.

By this time, Stevie Nicks and Tom Petty were already really close friends — a friendship that started in the late 1970s and lasted until Petty’s death (which still fucking sucks, by the way) — and in fact, Petty wrote “Insider” for her album, but it ended up on Hard Promises. Meanwhile, the story goes that Nicks wanted Petty to produce her solo debut, but he recommended Iovine, and Nicks and Iovine hit it off so well that they were living together after a couple of weeks. Cocaine is a helluva drug.