| Where I'm Coming From | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
 | ||||
| Studio album by | ||||
| Released | April 9, 1971 | |||
| Recorded | July 1970–February 1971 | |||
| Studio | Hitsville U.S.A., Detroit, Michigan | |||
| Genre | Soul,pop,funk | |||
| Length | 34:46 | |||
| Label | Tamla | |||
| Producer | Stevie Wonder | |||
| Stevie Wonder chronology | ||||
| ||||
| Singles from Where I'm Coming From | ||||
| ||||
Where I'm Coming From is the thirteenth studio album byStevie Wonder. The album was released byMotown Records on April 9, 1971, and peaked on theBillboard Pop Albums at No. 62, and on theBillboardR&B Albums Chart at No. 7. All nine songs were written by Wonder and Motown singer-songwriterSyreeta Wright, Wonder's first wife. It was the last album produced under his first contract with Motown Records. Including live albums, this is Wonder's fifteenth album overall, and thirteenth studio album.[2]
Motown's founderBerry Gordy had maintained tight control over his company's productions, but as the artists' careers progressed, they began to feel the need for the allowance ofsocial consciousness and artistic freedom in their recordings. Stevie Wonder was one of the Motown artists, along withMarvin Gaye, who wanted to expand with new styles and musicaltechniques, some of which became more apparent in the earlier albumFor Once In My Life.
Although Wonder had begun producing his own recordings, Motown still retained control over the content of his albums. Tensions increased as Wonder approached his twenty-first birthday; his contract had a clause which allowed Wonder to void it upon becoming a legal adult. When the president of Motown approached Wonder about renegotiating his contract, Wonder refused and asked for his contract to be voided.
Anticipating this event, Wonder took advantage of the fact that Motown would be forced to accept whatever he gave to them, and was able to produceWhere I'm Coming From without any outside interference from the company. In particular, the song "I Wanna Talk To You"—which portrayed aracially-charged dialog between a black man and an old southern white man (Wonder portrayed both characters)--is also a covert reference to his breakaway from Gordy and Motown (particularly apparent in the ad-libbed line"I'm gonna take my share...!").
Where I'm Coming From, which departed drastically from the Motown Sound employed in previous Stevie Wonder albums, yielded the U.S. number-eight hit single, "If You Really Love Me." The soft ballad "Never Dreamed You'd Leave In Summer" (a predecessor to the later recording "Superwoman (Where Were You When I Needed You?)") was also successful. Much of the rest of the album wassocial commentary and war-themed songs.
The album foreshadows Wonder's "classic period" albums with itsproduction approach and range of material.[3] Wonder further developed the use of theHohnerclavinet that was to be fully explored on the classic period albums.[4][5][6] Like Wonder's earlier albums, several tracks onWhere I'm Coming From use Motown studio musiciansthe Funk Brothers, and also make use ofstring orchestras. This is also the first Stevie Wonder album to feature Wonder playing synth bass on the majority of its tracks – the two exceptions being "Think Of Me As Your Soldier" and "Take Up A Course In Happiness," which feature electric bass.
| Review scores | |
|---|---|
| Source | Rating |
| AllMusic |   [7] |
| Christgau's Record Guide | B+[8] |
| PopMatters | (favorable)[9] |
| Rolling Stone | (unfavorable)[10] |
| Rolling Stone |  [11] |
| Virgin Encyclopedia | [12] |
| Yahoo! Music | (favorable)[13] |
Released at around the same time as Marvin Gaye'sWhat's Going On album, with similar ambitions and themes, they have been compared; in a contemporary review byVince Aletti inRolling Stone, Gaye's album was seen as successful, while Wonder's album was seen as failing due to "self-indulgent and cluttered" production, "undistinguished" and "pretentious" lyrics, and an overall lack of unity and flow.[2]
All songs written byStevie Wonder andSyreeta Wright.
Arranged byDavid Van DePitte, Jerry Long,Paul Riser and Stevie Wonder. One version of the original record label listed the final song as "Sunshine In Their Eyes/Everything Is Happenin'".[14]
