Innervisions

Infobox Album | Name = Innervisions
Type = Album
Artist = Stevie Wonder


Released = August 3 1973
Recorded = The Record Plant
(Los Angeles, California)
Media Sound Studios
(New York, New York)
Genre = Soul, funk
Length = 44:12
Label = Tamla
Producer = Stevie Wonder
Robert Margouleff
Malcolm Cecil
Reviews =
*Allmusic Rating|5|5 [http://www.allmusic.com/cg/amg.dll?p=amg&sql=10:3x1tk60x9krd link]
*Robert Christgau (A) [http://www.robertchristgau.com/get_artist.php?id=1328&name=Stevie+Wonder link]
*The Daily Vault (A) [http://www.dailyvault.com/toc.php5?review=5394 link]
*"Rolling Stone" (favorable) [http://www.rollingstone.com/artists/steviewonder/albums/album/303883/review/6211616/innervisions 1974] [http://www.rollingstone.com/news/story/6598113/23_innervisions 2003]
*"RS Album Guide" Rating|5|5 [http://www.rocklistmusic.co.uk/rs5star_ed1.htm link]
*Slant Rating|5|5 [http://www.slantmagazine.com/music/music_review.asp?ID=364 link]
Last album = "Talking Book"
(1972)
This album = "Innervisions"
(1973)
Next album = "Fulfillingness' First Finale"
(1974)

"Innervisions" is an album by Stevie Wonder, released on Tamla/Motown on August 3 1973 (see 1973 in music). It was the third of five consecutive albums widely hailed as his "classic period", along with "Music of My Mind", "Talking Book", "Fulfillingness' First Finale", and "Songs in the Key of Life". The nine tracks that make up "Innervisions" encompass a wide range of themes and issues: from drug references in "Too High" and "Don't You Worry 'bout a Thing"; social anger in "Higher Ground" and "Living for the City"; to love in the ballads "All in Love is Fair" and "Golden Lady." The album's closer, "He's Misstra Know It All," is a scathing attack on then-US President Richard Nixon, similar to his song "You Haven't Done Nothin'".

As with many of Stevie Wonder's albums the lyrics, composition and production are almost entirely his own work, with the synthesizer used prominently throughout the album.

"Innervisions" won Grammy Awards for Album of the Year and Best Engineered Non-Classical Recording in 1974, while "Living for the City" won the Grammy for Best R&B Song.

"Innervisions" is considered by many fans, critics, and colleagues to be Stevie Wonder's magnum opus and one of the greatest albums in pop music history.cite web |url=http://www.acclaimedmusic.net/Current/A272.htm|title=Acclaimed Music - Innervisions|publisher=Acclaimed Music|accessdate=2007-11-11] In 2001, VH1 named it the 31st greatest album of all time. RS500|23

Track listing

All songs written, produced and arranged by Stevie Wonder

ide One

#"Too High" – 4:37
#"Visions" – 5:22
#"Living for the City" – 7:22
#"Golden Lady" – 5:00

ide Two

#"Higher Ground" – 3:42
#"Jesus Children of America" – 4:10
#"All in Love Is Fair" – 3:42
#"Don't You Worry 'bout a Thing" – 4:44
#"He's Misstra Know It All" – 5:35

Charts

=Living for the City"
**"The City" by Wu-Tang Clan from the album "Wu-Tang Forever"

References

External links

*There are extensive musicological analyses of Living for the City, Golden Lady, and Higher Ground in Tim Hughes' 2003 University of Washington PhD dissertation, "Groove and Flow: Six Analytical Essays On The Music Of Stevie Wonder", available at this link: http://homepage.mac.com/timothyhughes/.Public/GrooveAndFlow.pdf