Talking Book

File:Stevie wonder july 22 1972 Billboard.png

Much of the material on Talking Book was recorded at the same time as that on Music of My Mind.{{cite book |last1=Haskins |first1=Jim |last2=Benson |first2=Kathleen |name-list-style=amp |date=1978 |title=The Stevie Wonder Scrapbook |location=New York |publisher=Grosser & Dunlop |isbn=0448144646 |page=89}} As the album saw Wonder enjoying more artistic freedom from Motown and relying less on Motown's head Berry Gordy for musical direction and expression, it is often seen as the beginning of his transition from a youthful prodigy into an independent and experimental artist. Speaking of the album in 2000, Wonder said: "It wasn't so much that I wanted to say anything except where I wanted to just express various many things that I felt—the political point of view that I have, the social point of view that I have, the passions, emotion and love that I felt, compassion, the fun of love that I felt, the whole thing in the beginning with a joyful love and then the pain of love."{{cite episode |last=Williams |first=Deborah |date=December 30, 2000 |title=The Story Of Stevie Wonder's 'Talking Book' |url=https://text.npr.org/s.php/1116295 |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221027214108/https://text.npr.org/1116295 |archive-date=October 27, 2022 |series=All Things Considered |network=NPR |access-date=December 31, 2019}}

The sound of the album is sharply defined by Wonder's keyboard work, especially synthesizers. While the synthesizers give a funky edge to tracks like "Maybe Your Baby", the Hohner Clavinet embellishments on "Big Brother" evoke a six-string acoustic guitar, and the note-bending harmonica work on several tracks touches on some folk and blues influences. Wonder's use of the Clavinet Model C on "Superstition" is widely regarded as one of the definitive tracks featuring the instrument. Wonder played the majority of the instruments on the album himself, but he received some support from such guest musicians as Jeff Beck, Ray Parker Jr., David Sanborn, and Buzz Feiten.

Robert Margouleff and Malcolm Cecil collaborated with Wonder on four of his "classic" albums: Music of My Mind, Talking Book, Innervisions and Fulfillingness' First Finale, as well as several albums by the Isley Brothers and others. Their unusual production technique of using multiple layers of instruments like the Clavinet, Fender Rhodes electric piano, and Arp and Moog synthesizers, rather than the more-typical string orchestra, helped to give Talking Book and these other three albums their distinctive sound.{{cn|date=March 2022}}

The album's cover photo, taken by Robert Margouleff in Los Angeles, features Wonder with his hair in cornrows, wearing jewelry, and dressed in African-style robes, in a "quasi-Biblical desert landscape". The inner photo of the gatefold sleeve shows Wonder in silhouette against a dramatic landscape sunrise.{{cite web |url=http://www.thers500.com/albums/90-stevie-wonder-talking-book-1972 |title=#90: Stevie Wonder, "Talking Book" (1972) |date=September 17, 2018 |access-date=November 8, 2018}}

The packaging of original pressings of the album incorporated both the album's title and Wonder's name embossed in braille (as well as being printed in English), along with a message that was only embossed in braille until the 2000 release of the album.{{cn|date=September 2024}} The message reads:{{cite book |last=Davis |first=Sharon |date=2006 |title=Stevie Wonder: Rhythms of Wonder |location=London |publisher=Robson Books |isbn=1861059655 |page=89}}

{{Quote|text=Here is my music. It is all I have to tell you how I feel. Know that your love keeps my love strong.|sign=Stevie}}

Margouleff later recalled that it had been difficult to get Wonder to choose which songs to put on the album, because there were so many. Associate producer Malcolm Cecil said, "Steve, you know, this is an album. It's not a talking book... Oh, I think you should call this album Talking Book" and Wonder agreed.{{efn|"Talking books, which were vinyl recordings of books for blind people, were recorded at half normal album speed, at 16 2/3 rpm, and which therefore ran twice as long}}

{{Album reviews

|title=Retrospective professional reviews

|rev1 = AllMusic

|rev1score = {{Rating|5|5}}[{{AllMusic|class=album|id=r22214|pure_url=yes}} AllMusic review]

|rev2 = The Austin Chronicle

|rev2Score = {{Rating|4|5}}{{cite news|last=Moser|first=Margaret|date=May 19, 2000|url=https://www.austinchronicle.com/music/2000-05-19/77259/|title=Review: Music of My Mind, Talking Book, Innervisions, Fulfillingness' First Finale|newspaper=The Austin Chronicle|access-date=September 26, 2015}}

|rev3 = Christgau's Record Guide

|rev3Score = A{{cite book|last=Christgau|first=Robert|author-link=Robert Christgau|year=1981|title=Christgau's Record Guide: Rock Albums of the Seventies|publisher=Ticknor & Fields|isbn=089919026X|chapter=Consumer Guide '70s: W|chapter-url=https://www.robertchristgau.com/get_chap.php?k=W&bk=70|access-date=March 9, 2019|via=robertchristgau.com|title-link=Christgau's Record Guide: Rock Albums of the Seventies}}

|rev4 = Encyclopedia of Popular Music

|rev4Score = {{Rating|5|5}}{{cite book |editor1-last=Larkin |editor1-first=Colin |title=The Encyclopedia of Popular Music |date=2007 |publisher=Omnibus |page=1522 |edition=5th concise |ol=11913831M}}

|rev5 = The Great Rock Discography

|rev5Score = 9/10{{cite book |last1=Strong |first1=Martin C. |title=The Great Rock Discography |date=2004 |publisher=Canongate |location=New York |page=1688 |ol=18807297M |edition=7th}}

|rev6 = Los Angeles Times

|rev6Score = {{Rating|3.5|4}}{{cite news|last=Hilburn|first=Robert|author-link=Robert Hilburn|date=April 1, 2000|url=https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-2000-apr-01-ca-14758-story.html|title=Motown Releases Remind Us of Stevie Wonder's Impact|newspaper=Los Angeles Times|access-date=September 25, 2015}}

|rev7 = MusicHound Rock

|rev7Score = 5/5{{cite book |editor1-last=Graff |editor1-first=Gary |title=MusicHound Rock: The Essential Album Guide |date=1996 |publisher=Visible Ink |location=Detroit |page=741 |ol=8145585M}}

|rev8 = The New Rolling Stone Album Guide

|rev8score = {{Rating|5|5}}{{cite book|last=Considine|first=J. D.|author-link=J. D. Considine|year=2004|pages=[https://archive.org/details/newrollingstonea00brac/page/885 885–87]|chapter=Stevie Wonder|chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=t9eocwUfoSoC&pg=PA885|editor1-last=Brackett|editor1-first=Nathan|editor2-last=Hoard|editor2-first=Christian|title=The New Rolling Stone Album Guide|publisher=Simon & Schuster|isbn=0743201698|access-date=September 25, 2015|title-link=The New Rolling Stone Album Guide}}

|rev9 = Pitchfork

|rev9Score = 10/10{{Cite web|url=https://pitchfork.com/reviews/albums/stevie-wonder-talking-book/ |last=Cooper|first=Carol|date=February 27, 2022|title=Stevie Wonder: Talking Book Album Review {{!}} Pitchfork|work=Pitchfork|access-date=March 27, 2022}}

|rev10 = Q

|rev10score = {{Rating|5|5}}{{cite journal|journal=Q|location=London|page=123|date=August 2000|title=none}}

}}

Released after Wonder toured with the Rolling Stones in 1972, Talking Book became a major hit, peaking at number three on the Billboard Pop Albums chart in February 1973,{{cite web |url=https://www.superseventies.com/albumsbymonth73.htm |title=1973 Albums - Month By Month |publisher=Super Seventies Rocksite! |access-date=May 5, 2014 }}{{dead link|date=December 2017 |bot=InternetArchiveBot |fix-attempted=yes}} and became the first album by Wonder to reach the top of the Top R&B Albums chart, where it remained for three weeks.{{cite web |url=https://allmusic.com/album/talking-book-r22214/charts-awards |title=Talking Book - Stevie Wonder |website=AllMusic |date=October 27, 1972 |access-date=January 12, 2012}} The popular appeal of the recording helped destroy the myth that R&B artists were incapable of creating music that could be appreciated by rock audiences, and marked a unique period for R&B artists (especially Motown artists).{{citation needed|date=September 2015}} Wonder won three awards for Talking Book at the 1974 Grammys: Best Male Pop Vocal Performance for "You Are the Sunshine of My Life", and both Best Male R&B Vocal Performance and Best R&B Song for "Superstition". Incidentally, at the same ceremony, Wonder's next album, Innervisions, won Album of the Year, and Talking Book{{'}}s associate producers, Malcolm Cecil and Robert Margouleff, won the Best Engineered Album, Non-Classical award for their work on that album.{{cite web|url=https://www.grammy.com/news/stevie-wonder-innervisions-50th-anniversary-reflection-lionel-richie-producer-robert-margouleff|title='Innervisions' At 50: Revisiting Stevie Wonder's Trailblazing, GRAMMY-Winning Album|first=Rob|last=LeDonne|author-link=Rob LeDonne|website=Grammy Awards|date=August 3, 2023|access-date=May 13, 2024}}

Reviewing the album for Rolling Stone at the time of its release, Vince Aletti called Talking Book "ambitious" and "richly-textured", writing that "even at its dreamiest, the music has a glowing vibrancy" and makes for an altogether "exceptional, exciting album, the work of a now quite matured genius".Aletti, Vince (January 4, 1973). [https://www.rollingstone.com/music/albumreviews/talking-book-19730104 Talking Book by Stevie Wonder | Rolling Stone Music | Music Reviews]. Rolling Stone. Wenner Media. Retrieved on April 19, 2011. Writing a few years later in The Village Voice about Wonder's Songs in the Key of Life (1976), Robert Christgau said that "Talking Book is closer to a perfect album", as "a more complex and satisfying delight—a delight that combines the freewheeling energy of Dylan and the Stones with the softer accessibility of a Carole King—is provided by an artist with the ambition to ride his own considerable momentum and the talent to do more than just hang on while doing so."{{cite news|last=Christgau|first=Robert|author-link=Robert Christgau|date=November 8, 1976|url=https://www.robertchristgau.com/xg/rock/wonder-76.php|title=Stevie Wonder Is a Masterpiece|newspaper=The Village Voice|access-date=December 18, 2020|via=robertchristgau.com}} In Christgau's Record Guide: Rock Albums of the Seventies (1981), Christgau said the album found Wonder taking artistic control and breaking through, continuing his "wild multi-voice experiments" and writing better ballads without losing "his endearing natural bathos"; Christgau also highlighted "Superstition" as a translation of Wonder's "way of knowledge into hard-headed, hard-rocking political analysis". J. D. Considine, in The New Rolling Stone Album Guide (2004), called the album "a pop tour de force".

Talking Book has appeared in professional rankings of the greatest albums of all time. It was voted number 322 in the third edition of Colin Larkin's All Time Top 1000 Albums (2000).{{cite book|title=All Time Top 1000 Albums|editor=Colin Larkin|editor-link=Colin Larkin|publisher=Virgin Books|date=2006|edition=3rd|isbn=0-7535-0493-6|page=131|title-link=All Time Top 1000 Albums}} In 2003, Rolling Stone ranked it number 90 on the magazine's list of the 500 greatest albums of all time;{{CN|date=December 2023}} it maintained that ranking on the 2012 version of the list,{{cite web| url=https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-lists/500-greatest-albums-of-all-time-156826/stevie-wonder-talking-book-151736/|year=2012| title=500 Greatest Albums of All Time Rolling Stone's definitive list of the 500 greatest albums of all time| website=Rolling Stone| access-date= September 19, 2019}} and was number 59 on the 2020 edition.{{Cite magazine|url=https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-lists/best-albums-of-all-time-1062063/stevie-wonder-talking-book-2-1063174/|title=Talking Book ranked 59th greatest album by Rolling Stone magazine|magazine=Rolling Stone|date=September 22, 2020 |access-date=October 10, 2020}}

It was the first album purchased by former US president Barack Obama.{{cite book |last1=Obama |first1=Barack |author-link1=Barack Obama |last2=Springsteen |first2=Bruce |author-link2=Bruce Springsteen |name-list-style=amp |date=2021 |title=Renegades: Born in the USA |location=London |publisher=Viking |isbn=978-0241561249 |page=76}}

{{tracklisting

|headline=Side one

|all_writing=Stevie Wonder, unless otherwise noted

|title1=You Are the Sunshine of My Life

|length1=2:58

|title2=Maybe Your Baby

|length2=6:45

|title3=You and I (We Can Conquer the World)

|length3=4:39

|title4=Tuesday Heartbreak

|length4=3:09

|title5=You've Got It Bad Girl

|length5=4:55

|writer5= {{flatlist|

• Wonder
• Yvonne Wright

}}

|total_length=22:13

}}

{{tracklisting

|headline=Side two

|title1=Superstition

|length1=4:26

|title2=Big Brother

|length2=3:35

|title3=Blame It on the Sun

|length3=3:28

|writer3= {{flatlist|*Wonder

• Syreeta Wright}}

|title4=Lookin' for Another Pure Love

|length4=4:45

|writer4= {{flatlist|*Wonder

• Syreeta Wright}}

|title5=I Believe (When I Fall in Love It Will Be Forever)

|length5=4:48

|writer5= {{flatlist|*Wonder

• Yvonne Wright}}

|total_length=21:16

}}

"You Are the Sunshine of My Life"

• {{small|Stevie Wonder – lead vocal, background vocal, Fender Rhodes, drums}}
• {{small|Jim Gilstrap – first lead vocal, background vocal}}
• {{small|Lani Groves – second lead vocal, background vocal}}
• {{small|Gloria Barley – background vocal}}
• {{small|Scott Edwards – electric bass}}
• {{small|Daniel Ben Zebulon – congas}}
• {{small|Uncredited - horn section}}

"Maybe Your Baby"

• {{small|Stevie Wonder – lead vocal, background vocal, Hohner Clavinet, drums, Moog bass}}
• {{small|Ray Parker Jr. – electric guitar}}

"You and I (We Can Conquer the World)"

• {{small|Stevie Wonder – lead vocal, piano, T.O.N.T.O. synthesizer, Moog bass}}

"Tuesday Heartbreak"

• {{small|Stevie Wonder – lead vocal, background vocal, Fender Rhodes, Hohner Clavinet, drums, Moog bass}}
• {{small|Deniece Williams – background vocal}}
• {{small|Shirley Brewer – background vocal}}
• {{small|David Sanborn – alto saxophone}}

"You've Got It Bad Girl"

• {{small|Stevie Wonder – lead vocal, background vocal, Fender Rhodes, drums, Moog bass, T.O.N.T.O. synthesizer}}
• {{small|Jim Gilstrap – background vocal}}
• {{small|Lani Groves – background vocal}}
• {{small|Daniel Ben Zebulon – congas}}

"Superstition"

• {{small|Stevie Wonder – lead vocal, Hohner Clavinet, drums, Moog bass}}
• {{small|Trevor Lawrence – tenor saxophone}}
• {{small|Steve Madaio – trumpet}}

"Big Brother"

• {{small|Stevie Wonder – lead vocals, Hohner Clavinet, drums/percussion, harmonica, Moog bass}}

"Blame It on the Sun"

• {{small|Stevie Wonder – lead vocal, background vocal, piano, harpsichord, drums, Moog bass, T.O.N.T.O. synthesizer}}
• {{small|Jim Gilstrap – background vocal}}
• {{small|Lani Groves – background vocal}}

"Lookin' for Another Pure Love"

• {{small|Stevie Wonder – lead vocal, background vocal, Fender Rhodes, drums, Moog bass}}
• {{small|Debra Wilson – background vocal}}
• {{small|Shirley Brewer – background vocal}}
• {{small|Loris Harvin (Delores Harvin) – background vocal}}
• {{small|Jeff Beck – electric guitar}}
• {{small|Buzz Feiten (Howard "Buzz" Feiten) – electric guitar}}

"I Believe (When I Fall in Love It Will Be Forever)"

• {{small|Stevie Wonder – lead vocal, background vocal, piano, Hohner Clavinet, drums, Moog bass}}

• Malcolm Cecil – associate producer, engineering, Moog programming{{cite magazine|url=https://www.newstatesman.com/blogs/culture/2012/10/praise-clavinet|title=In praise of the clavinet|first=George|last=Chesterton|date=October 5, 2012 |magazine=New Statesman|access-date=May 12, 2021}}
• Robert Margouleff – associate producer, engineering, Moog programming, photography
• Austin Godsey – engineer, recording
• Joan Decola – recording
• George Marino – mastering

{{col-begin}}

{{col-2}}

{{col-2}}

{{col-end}}

{{certification Table Top}}

{{certification Table Entry|region=Canada|title=Talking Book|artist=Stevie Wonder|type=album|relyear=1973|certyear=1978|award=Gold|access-date=July 14, 2022}}

{{certification Table Entry|region=United Kingdom|title=Talking Book|artist=Stevie Wonder|type=album|relyear=1973|certyear=1974|award=Gold|id=6464-3788-2|access-date=July 14, 2022}}

{{Certification Table Bottom|nosales=true}}

• List of Billboard number-one R&B albums of 1973

{{Reflist}}

{{noteslist}}

• [http://www.discogs.com/Stevie-Wonder-Talking-Book/master/87446 Talking Book] at Discogs

{{Stevie Wonder}}

{{Authority control}}

Category:1972 albums

Category:Albums recorded at Electric Lady Studios

Category:Albums produced by Stevie Wonder

Category:Stevie Wonder albums

Category:Tamla Records albums

Category:Albums produced by Malcolm Cecil

Category:Progressive soul albums

Category:Jazz fusion albums by American artists.