Smokey: Life After Motown, Part 2

TALES OF FLIGHT AND DISCRIMINATION, OF FRIENDS AND CHRISTMAS

Three years after the release of his second album of the 21st century, Smokey Robinson evidently still had time on his mind. (That first album and others of his post-Motown productivity were documented here.)

Time Flies When You’re Having Fun touched down in August 2009, an 11-track (plus one) compact disc of mostly new material, smartly packaged with a gatefold sleeve, even. It marked the second sighting of Robinson’s own Robso label, and as with the first, Food for the Spirit, he produced everything himself. The musicians included his veteran arranger, Sonny Burke, and such stalwarts as Ray Parker Jr. and David T. Walker.

“Also,” Robinson told Rolling Stone at the time, “I recorded it live. When I say ‘live,’ I mean live in the studio, the old-fashioned way, when you have the musicians in there playing while you’re singing. We had a ball – I have a lot of great musicians on there. Guys that I have known forever and ever. When you have everybody in the studio at the same time, it’s like doing a concert. Everybody gets a chance to feed off each other, everybody gets a chance to feel each other. You just don’t get that recording everybody separately.”

What further fuelled Time Flies was the participation of guest stars Joss Stone, India.Arie (a Motown artist at the time) and Carlos Santana, each of whom performed with Robinson on different tracks. The Stone duet, “You’re The One For Me,” had been previously sung live by the pair on American Idol.

Present in spirit was Norah Jones, whose signature hit, “Don’t Know Why,” was one of the album’s three songs not authored by the man himself. Another of those was a bonus – the album’s 12th track – not listed on the sleeve: Robinson’s mellow rendition of the Jackson 5’s first hit, “I Want You Back.”

This was “a supremely sultry and grown-up reading” of the song, according to BBC critic Lloyd Bradley. “Not so much a cover version as a reinvention,” he wrote, “giving the lyric a whole new sense of purpose.” Billboard, meanwhile, noted that the singer was in “remarkably fine voice as he flexes his signature falsetto over supple, unhurried live-band arrangements long on tasty licks and laid-back grooves.” The trade magazine further blessed the album with a Top 10 debut on its R&B charts that September, and a one-week showing for a single, “Love Bath,” the following summer.

Another outing for Time Flies When You’re Having Fun came in 2010 via a deal with America’s Cracker Barrel restaurant chain. First, Robinson hooked up with direct marketing giant Time Life and its roots-and-R&B imprint, Saguaro Road Records. Then, he told Fox News, “Time Life brought me the opportunity to work with Cracker Barrel, but I had to give them an exclusive CD. So I took six songs from the Time Flies CD, and I [had] recorded about five of my concerts this year, so I took six live cuts of my vintage songs and put them in.”

The result was Now And Then, a 12-track CD released towards the end of 2010 and sold exclusively through the chain’s 500+ locations. Its music sales programme had previously consisted of releases by country names like Ricky Scaggs, Charlie Daniels and George Jones; Robinson was the first black artist to be involved.

What also made this notable was that Cracker Barrel had, in 2004, been prosecuted by the U.S. Department of Justice for racial discrimination, accused of seating black customers separately from whites and giving them inferior service. “It’s time to change the imagery of Cracker Barrel,” Robinson told Reuters about his involvement with the restaurant chain. “I’m very happy to be the one breaking that ground with them. It’s progress.”

By then, he had stepped onto other new ground himself, having launched his own frozen-food business in 2004, then cut a greeting cards deal with Georgia’s Carithers Flowers. (Later still, he would attach his name to wines, skin-care products and timepieces.)

A TOP 20 ACHIEVER

In 2014, Robinson rested the Robso brand and signed up with Verve Records for the release of Smokey & Friends, an album (on the Decca label) featuring some of his most-covered copyrights, performed as duets with John Legend, Mary J. Blige, James Taylor, Sheryl Crow, Elton John and others. “I can’t take credit for the songs or the record,” he elaborated to Britain’s Clash magazine. “Randy Jackson of American Idol fame is the producer of the record, and the idea to do this was actually conceived by my managers. They thought it would be good for me to re-record some of my popular songs with other artists.”

Jackson made contact to identify each act’s Robinson favourite. “It did not have to be one that I had sung, but just one that I had written,” the star said, adding, “Randy let them do their version and then produce it in their manner. All I had to do – for the first time in many, many, many, many years – was just go into the studio and sing.”

Smokey & Friends was a Top 20 achiever on the Billboard album charts in September 2014, and, according to the Los Angeles Times, “a would-be museum piece with some real air in it.” The newspaper’s critic, Mikael Wood, went on, “Here, he harmonises beautifully with Mary J. Blige in ‘Being With You’ and floats so effortlessly through ‘Quiet Storm’ that John Legend comes off like a desperate overachiever.” The Boston Globe’s Yvonne Abraham observed, “Smokey and his buddies certainly sound like they’re having a good time revisiting Hitsville.” She singled out “My Girl” for featuring “a blend of different vocal textures as Miguel, Aloe Blacc and JC Chasez of ’N Sync offer warm harmonies.”

Robinson’s commercial instincts continued with his last album. This was a 2017 tie-up with Amazon for Christmas Everyday, a ten-tune selection of seasonal songs, ranging from classics such as “White Christmas” and “O Holy Night” (featuring Take 6) to originals like Robinson’s own “You’re My Present” (featuring the Dap Kings) and the title track.

Producer of the sessions was Adam Anders, best known as musical director for the popular Glee TV series. “I was approached by Amazon to record this project,” Robinson told NBC News. “Amazon hired Adam Anders, and we had a great time working together, it was fun. Adam heard ‘Christmas Everyday’ that I recorded with the Miracles, and he thought it was a great song, and he wanted to re-record it. We did it, and it came out so great that we decided to use it for the album title.”

ROBINSON MAKES IT BETTER

Presumably because of Robinson’s exclusive Amazon deal, Christmas Everyday made no showing on the annual Billboard “holiday” charts in 2017, but the reviews were favourable. “The iconic soul singer’s smooth set is as warm and inviting as a fireside mug of hot cocoa,” suggested Entertainment Weekly. “Robinson’s rhythms will help you forget your blues,” advised Associated Press critic Pablo Gorondi, who also noted that “Santa Claus Is Coming To Town” included “its seldom-sung jazzy introduction and a fun solo by Trombone Shorty.”

The time lapse between Christmas Everyday and Gasms doesn’t mean that Robinson has not been recording since 2017. Indeed, he was featured on a gold-certified single, “Make It Better,” by rapper/writer/producer Anderson .Paak. The connection was orchestrated by Dr. Dre, the result was included on .Paak’s fourth album, Ventura, and the track was a major streaming hit in 2019.

“It was fun,” Robinson told Revolt TV. “Actually, Dre called me and he said, ‘Man, I got a young artist that I want you to come and write a song with.’ And Dre’s my friend, my brother, so I went and I met Anderson and he had started that song. He gave it to me and I took it home, and finished it up, and we recorded it. It was fun working with him.”

Another union has been that of Robinson with Rita Wilson, whose current album, Now & Forever: Duets, includes their version of Donny Hathaway & Roberta Flack’s “Where Is The Love.” (Wilson recently performed at the MusiCares charity-fundraising event in Los Angeles honouring Robinson and Berry Gordy.)

“I’m still in, man,” the ex-Motown maestro asserted just last month. “I’m still in the record business and I still write songs.” Of his forthcoming project, he said, “All the songs on the album have a connotation to them. Most people, when you say ‘gasms,’ they think about orgasms. But ‘gasms’ is any good feeling that you get. It’s probably a controversial title, but I wanted it to be that way.”

Fifty years ago this summer, Robinson and Motown were in the process of preparing the release of his first solo LP, Smokey, and its lead single, “Sweet Harmony.” To have titled that album with what he’s picked for his latest would have caused more than controversy – and his mentor would surely have advised against it.

Whether or not he ran the choice of Gasms past Berry Gordy is a moot point. Robinson intends to continue living life – and music – his way. “I’m very, very blessed,” he declared in one of his media interviews to promote the album, out on April 28. “God got his hands on me. And I thank God for every day of my life. For me to be my age that I am right now, and feel like I’m 40, I can’t beat that, man.”

Time flies when you’re having fun, right, Smoke?

West Grand Blog will take a short Easter break. See you on the other side, with luck.

Music notes: Robinson’s solo output over the past 32 years lends itself to a new WGB playlist, and so here that is. The (subjective) choices are in chronological order, opening with the title song from his first post-Motown album and closing with a couple of tracks from Gasms, the new one out on April 28. Almost all of Robinson’s 21st century albums are available on streaming platforms, although one exception is 2004’s Food For The Spirit. Also, the edition of Time Flies When You’re Having Fun which is digitally available seems to exclude “I Want You Back,” unfortunately. Meanwhile, Christmas Everyday can be downloaded as an MP3 from Amazon, and presumably it’s also available on that firm’s own-branded streaming service.