Stevie Wonder LANDMARK: Talking Book by: Dean Van Nguyen Wed:07-Nov-07 Label: Motown Year: 1972 WB rating 89 out of 100

On the second of what would be a run of five indispensible albums from Stevie Wonder Talking Book may be his quintessential record. He would go on to record his political statement with the close to perfect Innervisions and score a huge crossover hit in the ambitious Songs In The Key of Life which sold and sold, but Talking Book is Wonder at his most playful and eclectic. It has been called his rock record which probably sells something that isn’t there. Sure there’s the odd nice touch like the elastic bass on the extended jam ‘Maybe Your Baby’ and the harmonic solo on ‘Big Brother’, but at this stage in his career Wonder wasn’t content to stick to one genre of music. He was on autopilot, effortlessly writing great pop songs. He would never write a more sincere, tender love ballad than the powerful ‘You and I (We Can Conquer The World)’ or a purer pop melody than ‘I Believe (When I Fall In Love It Will Be Forever)’. It was remarkable growth from the man considering it was one year on from the release of Where I’m Coming From, the first album Wonder had complete creative control over.

Talking Book plays like a road map to the next few years of Wonder’s career. It’s an incredibly assured record, the one where ‘Little Stevie’ Wonder was left behind forever. Hit single ‘Superstition’ laid the template for Wonder’s pure funk workout that became one of his trademarks and led to tracks like ‘I Wish’ and ‘Higher Ground’. Guitarist Jeff Beck lends a slow hand with a sensual guitar solo on ‘Lookin’ For Another Pure Love’. ‘Big Brother’ itself uses some very ‘Piggies’ like electric guitar swirls. It was also Wonder writing about more political subjects that would explore in more depth later in his career like the stunning social commentary of Innervisions.

But it’s the ballads that ring loudest, in particular ‘You and I (We Can Conquer The World)’. Perhaps it’s telling that Wonder would never attempt to deliver a vocal with a kind of power he achieved here. Like he knew that it was a performance he should never touch. Elsewhere opener ‘You Are The Sunshine Of My Life’ is a typically gentle and pretty Wonder ballad, a free flowing melody with a gentle percussion. In contrast ‘You’ve Got it Bad’ is propelled by synthesisers and a offbeat “stop-start” melody.

The term “Genius” gets tossed about quite frequently with Wonder. For anyone looking for evidence Talking Book serves as ‘Exhibit A’, the album where he showed an almost superhuman understanding of the pop melody. It’s a stunning, cohesive declaration of who Wonder was at the time, managing to pack into 10 tracks what Songs In The Key of Life attempted to in 21. Heights even a genius rarely reached again.