| Reddy | |
| Type: | album |
| Artist: | Helen Reddy |
| Cover: | Reddy-Reddy.jpg |
| Released: | 1979 |
| Recorded: | 1979 |
| Studio: | Conway (Hollywood, California) |
| Genre: | Vocal Pop/Rock[1] |
| Length: | 33:52 |
| Label: | Capitol |
| Producer: | Frank Day |
| Prev Title: | Live In London |
| Prev Year: | 1978 |
| Next Title: | Take What You Find |
| Next Year: | 1980 |
Reddy is the eleventh studio album release by Australian-American pop singer Helen Reddy. Between 1971 and 1978, Reddy had ten studio albums released by Capitol Records, the label also having issued her Greatest Hits album and a concert album: Live in London, the latter issued in December 1978 - which same month Reddy filed suit claiming Capitol Records had shortchanged her $1,793,000, the suit being an apparent bid to win release from the label.[2] However Reddy, issued in June 1979, would be released by Capitol Records, Reddy's tenure with the label extending to include her twelfth studio album: Take What You Find, issued in 1980.
Reddy was noted by Billboard magazine for what set it apart from its predecessors: "It's the three disco tracks on the first side of this album that will probably draw the most attention, but more interesting from the point of view of Reddy's artistic growth are covers of soul ballads by Gamble & Huff ('Sing My Heart Out') and Eugene Record ('Trying to Get to You') and rock material by the likes of The Doobie Brothers ('Minute by Minute')." That same review from the issue dated June 2 of that year also mentioned the exposure she received from The Helen Reddy Special, which had just aired on ABC on May 22,[3] but, as with her previous two releases, Reddy did not reach Billboards Top LP's & Tapes chart.[4] It was also her last album to chart in Canada's RPM magazine when it peaked at number 97 there in August of that year.[5]
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May 1979 saw the release of the track "Make Love to Me" as both a twelve-inch single featuring the entire seven-minute album cut and as a 3:48 7" single edit: the former was lauded in Billboard's "Disco Mix" column: "Reddy belts out this song with the right combination of orchestration and arrangements that have no need for a break as the tune never lets down in energy level through its 7:02-minute length."[6] The 7" single debuted on the Hot 100 in the May 19 issue of Billboard to rise to a number 60 peak during a ten week tenure:[7] debuting on Billboard's Adult Contemporary chart dated June 9, "Make Love to Me" would there spend five weeks reaching number 41 showings.[8] "Make Love to Me" also provided Reddy with her only hit on Billboards R&B with a seven week tenure from July 28, 1979 and a peak of number 59.[9]
"Make Love to Me" also afforded Reddy her final Canadian hit parade appearance, peaking at number 57 on the RPM singles chart.[10] In Australia the June 1979 release of the Reddy album was accompanied by the single release of the track "Minute by Minute" rather than "Make Love to Me", the original version of the latter by Scottish singer Kelly Marie being still then in the Top 40 of the national Australian hit parade after peaking at number 5 in March. However "Make Love to Me" would be issued as Reddys second Australian single - and second Australian chart shortfall - in August 1979 (which month the Kelly Marie version ended its Australian chart tenure of 41 weeks).
In the US, "Let Me Be Your Woman" - a ballad first recorded by Linda Clifford - would be the second single from Reddy and would reach number 43 Adult Contemporary during a five-week run from November 10, 1979,[8] becoming a Hot 100 shortfall.[7]
Both AllMusic and Billboard suggested that this should have been Reddy's comeback album, the latter noting that her "album sales have tapered off in the past few years, but this LP proves that she is staying on top of trends rather than being content to stay in a cozy but confining MOR rut."[11] AllMusic's Charles Donovan writes retrospectively: "Her Top Ten days were over, but on the strength of this set, they shouldn't have been."[1] Other critics were less enthused: Peter Reilly of Stereo Review dismissed Reddy as "a disco album that goes like clockwork - and is about as interesting. [Reddy's] sound and performances are Precise, Rigid and, above all, Accurate
..'Make Love to Me' ([a potentially] engaging empty headed piece of fluff) is about as feverish and abandoned as John Travolta's agent closing a deal. 'Let Me Be Your Woman' has the properly improperly lustiness of disco passion in its lyrics, but Reddy's performance [implies the] unspoken condition: only if your finish your oatmeal first. The album is engineered so that her adenoinal, girdled voice always rises above it all. Would that the listener could do the same."[12] Christine Hogan of the Sydney Morning Herald similarly branded Reddy "a vocal technician [who] presents material in much the same fashion and with about as much feeling as a computer. [While] she sings well [on 'Reddy] particularly on songs such as..'Minute by Minute' but on 'Make Love to Me' and 'Perfect Love Affair' a hard edge creeps into her voice. She might do better controlling herself a little less".[13]Side 1
Side 2
In 2009 EMI Music Special Markets released Rarities from the Capitol Vaults, a 12-track CD of mostly what were previously unreleased Reddy recordings.[14] One of the songs included was taken from the recording sessions for Reddy: