Stevie Wonder

While Innervisions and Talking Book garner fawning fan attention (because they are freakin' brilliant), one of early-'70s Stevie's most gorgeous works slips by unheralded. Fulfillingness' is at turns poignant, scathing and soulful, personal and political, buoyant with gospel overtones, slathered with Motown horns and funky organ, tragic with adult ennui. Just check the emotional span between "It Ain't No Use" -- with the refrain "bye-bye, bye-bye" -- and "Please Don't Go," possibly the most amorous four minutes ever put to wax.

The cover of Fulfillingness' First Finale depicts a staircase of keyboards rising -- from the
Motor Town Review and "Fingertips" through gold records, Grammies and an auto accident
-- to the sky. It's remarkably apt, for the careers of few performers in popular music have
been such uninterrupted ascents. Nothing, not even a brush with death, has interrupted
Wonder's progress toward ever higher ground, and FFF is a new plateau. As its ti... More >

What made Wonder's last two albums so gorgeous was the carefree indecorum of the ballads, which broke the rules with supremely indulgent self-confidence and only became more beautiful as a result. But this time the slow ones are less carefree than aimless. Only "They Won't Go When I Go" gets lost altogether, and most reveal substantial charms in the end, but we really shouldn't have to look so hard for them. The two great cuts, meanwhile, get across mostly on momentum--"You Haven't Done Nothin'," about "the nightmare/That's becomin' real life," and "Boogie On Reggae Woman," about boogieing on. (Grade - A-)