The Good: Socially conscious lyrics, Musically interesting, Well-performed
The Bad: A few weaker or over-the-top tracks that replay poorly.
The Basics: Despite a few musical experiments that go awry, Songs In The Key Of Life is a powerful and smart album by Stevie Wonder!
Have you ever listened to an album by a musical artist who has a vast career and repertoire and heard one of their albums and been convinced that it simply must be a "best of" album because so many of the songs are recognizable or great? I've had that experience as I continue my exploration of the works of Stevie Wonder with his album Songs In The Key Of Life. After all, a two-disc set with "Sir Duke," "I Wish," "Pastime Paradise," and "Isn't She Lovely," has to be a compilation album, right?
No. Songs In The Key Of Life is actually one of Stevie Wonder's ambitious, albums that simply illustrates a ridiculously high quality and amazing standard for musical creativity. For those who want to hear a full, complete album that shows true musical genius, Songs In The Key Of Life is arguably one of the best. However, just because Wonder experiments musically does not mean he is always successful. The second disc is actually a bit inferior to the first and things that seem like a novelty on the first listen or two - recorded sounds of Wonder's daughter Aisha and the almost militant shouted questions and responses at the end of "Black Man" - soon become trite, boring or just disturbing upon further listens.
With twenty-one songs and over one hundred minutes of music on the two discs - ten tracks at 42:43 and the other eleven comprising the 62:10 second disc - Songs In The Key Of Life is mostly the musical vision of artist Stevie Wonder. He wrote all of the songs on the album (four are cowritten) and provides the lead vocals on each and every one. As well, he provided instrumentals on every song (though the only one he is specifically credited with is harmonica on "If It's Magic." Wonder also produced and arranged the music on the album, so it is quite difficult to argue that this is anything other than the musical vision of artist Stevie Wonder.
And it is a decent vision; Wonder is many things on Songs In The Key Of Life and ambitious would certainly have to be near the top. On this album, Wonder makes socially conscious rhythm and blues and funk that became very popular. Largely, the album is defined by a musical richness involving multiple keyboards and Stevie Wonder's smooth vocals. The songs tend to be longer and range in sound from the funky educational track "Black Man" to the slow ballads like "Joy Inside My Tears" and "Love's In Need Of Love Today." His sound goes almost classic folk with the musing "Village Ghetto Land" and he goes big band jazzy with "Sir Duke!" With the bonus tracks like the optimistic "Saturn," Songs In The Key Of Life explodes with creativity and a huge array of diverse musical sounds.
Thematically, Songs In The Key Of Life has a lot to recommend it. Stevie Wonder explores such issues as urban decay ("Village Ghetto Land"), spirituality ("Have A Talk With God"), interethnic relations ("Black Man") and tearing down the idealism for a strong sense of realism ("Pastime Paradise"). But instead of a stark album solely preoccupies with societal problems, Wonder creates a soulful album that is packed with songs on the nature of love and beauty as well, with memorable songs on the joy of children ("Isn't She Lovely") to the ideal woman ("Ebony Eyes") to flat-out love songs like "Knocks Me Off My Feet." Honestly, this might be Stevie Wonder's best, most consistent non-compilation album.
It all starts with the lyrics and it is hard to argue that Stevie Wonder is not an amazing lyricist. It is tough to take topics like urban decay and make them truly musical and worthwhile, yet Stevie Wonder does that on "Village Ghetto Land." It is hard to dispute the meaningful poetics of "Broken glass is everywhere / It's a bloody scene / Killing plagues the citizens / Unless they own police / Children play with rusted cars / Sores cover their hands / Politicians laugh and drink-drunk to all demands / Families buying dog food now / Starvation roams the streets / Babies die before they're born / Infected by the grief" ("Village Ghetto Land"). Wonder writes smart, thoughtful lines that are powerful and poignant.
The problem is, they are not all completely sensible or replayable. His history lesson "Black Man" is a worthwhile collection of historical tidbits that he has listed out like "Heart surgery / Was first done successfully / By a black man [Dr Daniel Hale Williams] / Friendly man who died / But helped the pilgrims to survive [Squanto] / Was a red man / Farm workers rights / Were lifted to new heights [Caesar Chavez] / By a brown man." They are good, interesting and accurate. The problem is that the song does not hold up all that well outside the educational context and with its long running time, it is hard to listen to over and over again. The themes of diversity and recognition of diversity are both incredibly important. At the same time, it is not all that musical and it replays poorly, especially the question and answer between the teachers and students at the end, which sounds a lot like Chinese rote learning after too many listens to the song. The track has value, but it is a drag on the movement of the entire second disc, just as the musical repetition on the last half of "Another Star" is (yes, there are only so many times we can hear "la la la la la" before we get tired of that, too!).
That said, his humanistic storytelling songs are pretty wonderful. It is easy to argue that part of the reason songs like "I Wish" are considered classics are lines like "Brother says he's tellin' / 'Bout you playin' doctor with that girl / Just don't tell I'll give you / Anything you want in this whole wide world / Mama gives you money for Sunday school / You trade yours for candy after church is through." I still don't get why he reminisces favorably on getting a beating, but it more or less works, so . . . Wonder accurately and adequately captures child life in "I Wish" and it is his sense of nostalgia that is universal for all people that works so well on so many of his tracks.
In fact, it is only some of his musical experiments that sometimes fall a little flat and usually it is the use of samples and recordings at the end songs (like voices at the end of "Saturn") that one tires of quickly. It is still so much to love with tracks that are timeless and so many that are virtually unknown, save to those of us who have heard this album. And for us, they are timeless as well.
The best tracks are "Sir Duke" (disc 1) and "Saturn" (disc 2) and the low points are the utterly unmemorable "Contusion" (disc 1) and the repetitive "Another Star" (disc 2).
For other works by Stevie Wonder, please be sure to visit my reviews of:
The Jazz Soul Of Little Stevie
Eivets Rednow
Music Of My Mind
Talking Book
Stevie Wonder’s Original Musiquarium I
In Square Circle
Conversation Peace
Natural Wonder
The Definitive Collection
A Time To Love
9/10
For other music reviews, please be sure to visit my Music Index Page!
© 2012, 2009 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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