Understanding (album)

Infobox Album |
Name = Understanding [United Artists]
Type = studio
Artist = Bobby Womack

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Released = 1972
Recorded = 1972
Genre = R&B
Length = 35:31
Label = United Artists
Producer = Bobby Womack
Reviews =
* Allmusic Rating|4|5 [http://wm04.allmusic.com/cg/amg.dll?p=amg&sql=10:apfyxqq5ldhe link]
Last album = "Communication (1972 album)" (1972)

This album = "Understanding" (1972)

Next album = "Across 110th Street" Soundtrack (1972)

Understanding is a 1972 R&B album recorded by Bobby Womack. for United Artists Records. It charted #43 on the Billboard US Pup Charts, and #7 on the Billboard R&B Charts. Womack recorded Understanding both in Memphis at American Sound Studio and in Muscle Shoals, Alabama. At Muscle Shoals, he utilized top session players, including drummer Rodger Hawkins, guitarists Jimmy Johnson and Tippy Armstrong, bassist David Hood, and keyboardist Barry Beckett. One of the key songs from the album was “I Can Understand It,” which inexplicably was never issued as a single. Highlighted by Hood’s hypnotic bass and the effective use of female background singers, “I Can Understand It” has become a soul classic and was a major hit for New Birth the following year.

"Woman's Gotta Have It" released, becomes album's major hit

The first single released from Understanding was “Woman’s Gotta Have It,” a warning to a man who was taking his wife for granted, which Womack co-wrote with Darryl Carter and Linda Cooke Womack (Sam’s daughter). Recorded at American Sound, personnel on the track included Mike Leech on bass, Reggie Young on guitar, Hayward Bishop on drums and percussion, Bobby Wood on piano, and Bobby Emmons on organ. With emphasis on Leech’s bassline, “Woman’s Gotta Have It” was Womack’s first Number One R&B hit, topping the charts in the spring of 1972. He followed with a cover of Neil Diamond’s 1969 hit “Sweet Caroline (Good Times Never Seemed So Good).” The song had moderate success on the R&B charts, perhaps on the strength of Womack’s two previous hits. However, black radio deejays played the B-side, “Harry Hippie.”

"Harry Hippie" song as prehumous tribute to brother

When the label flipped the single, “Harry Hippie” became the hit, reaching number eight on the R&B charts early in 1973 and giving the artist his first certified gold single. “Harry Hippie” had special meaning to Womack because the song was an ode to his brother Harry, who was found stabbed to death two years later.

Womack explains, “Harry was the bass player and tenor for the brothers when we were the Valentinos. He lived a very carefree life. As a child he always said he wanted to live on an Indian reservation. We used to joke about it, but when we got older he was the same way. He always thought I wanted the materialistic things and I said, ‘I just want to do my music. My music put me into that comfortable territory.’ He didn’t want the pressure. We used to laugh and joke about the song when I’d sing it. When he was brutally killed in my home, it was by a jealous girlfriend who he’d lived with for five years. She fought a lot, violence. And in our home it was considered to be worth less than a man to fight a woman, so he didn’t fight back and she stabbed him to death.

“At the time I was in Seattle doing a gig and he was going to join me when we got back. Previously I had hired a new bass player because I felt it would help [Harry’s] relationship with his spouse if he weren’t on the road. And that turned out to be very sour. He ended up losing his life behind it. At that time [‘Harry Hippie’] wasn’t a joke anymore; I had lost a brother. I still do that song in his honor today.”

Track listing (With Chart Position)

# "I Can Understand It" (Womack) - 6:36
# "Woman's Gotta Have It" (Womack, Linda Womack, Darryl Carter) - 3:35 (Billboard US Pop #60, R&B #1)
# "And I Love Her" (John Lennon, Paul McCartney) - 2:46
# "Got To Get You Back" (Chris Green, Jerry Lynn Williams) - 2:53
# "Simple Man" (Womack, Joe Hicks) - 5:58
# "Ruby Dean" (Womack, Joe Hicks) - 3:27
# "Thing Called Love" (Joe Hicks) - 3:57
# "Sweet Caroline" (Neil Diamond) - 3:13 (Billboard US Pop #51, R&B #16)
# "Harry Hippie" (Jim Ford - 3:40 (Billboard US Pop #31, R&B #8)