Lonette McKee | Words and Music
Lonette McKee
Words and Music
(Pine Bloom Productions/Warner Bros. – 1978)
A Record Reflection by A. Scott Galloway
Once upon a time when you saw a beautiful woman on an album cover posing in front of a piano, she was a model strategically placed there to seal your purchase deal. However, in 1978 when Lonette McKee released Words and Music, the café au lait lady serving your eye a luscious flash of thigh - elegantly draped before a white baby grand – was, indeed, “The Artist.” Not a marketing VP’s half-singin’ penny candy dime piece. Lonette McKee was a bona-fide singer AND co-producer of her album, composing all of its seamlessly flowing songs. She was also an actress that, two years earlier, made a stunning debut as “Sister” in the ghetto fabulous music biz fable, “Sparkle.” This rendered Ms. McKee a non-carbonated multi-hyphenate - tragically ahead of her time. Imagine her doing what Alicia Keys does today in both music and film. Still, when submerged in her song craft, Lonette possessed a serenely introspective bent for embodying the sweet-n-sour subtext of amour.
Listening to Lonette McKee’s Words and Music Lp is like stepping into a warm whirlpool where soothing grooves and naked sentimentality luxuriate. Like the album cover foreshadows, everything within is first class. The exquisite everything-in-its-place musicianship of Los Angeles’ A-team elite including Patrice Rushen, Lee Ritenour, Abraham Laboriel, Harvey Mason and Michael Boddicker, along with the seasoned stewardship of co-producer/orchestrator Johnny Pate roll out a plush carpet of blue-woven soul, but the centerpiece is always “the girl at her piano.” Because she wrote every word, Lonette doesn’t just sing these songs as embody each selection’s turbulent emotions with intimate knowing and theatre-savvy sensitivity.
The album opens with “Sometimes,” a misty watercolor diary entry reflecting the push and pull of romantic notions…unfolding like heart-on-sleeve poetry. “Sometimes I want to crawl right into your soul / Sometimes I only want to be left alone…”
“Maybe There Are Reasons” is the most popular piece of the project for its haunting, rolling melody, and the reflective confessions of a woman torn between love and exciting new directions in her life. Patrice Rushen’s Fender Rhodes work here echoes McKee’s sentiments with sublime empathy. The late Carl Anderson interpreted this from a man’s p.o.v. on Munich-born guitarist Nils’ 1998 Gerald McCauley-produced CD, Blue Planet.
“Blues” is a bedrock yet feminine sample of such, graced with the sweet weepin’ guitar work of Dennis Budimir and the cool walkin’ bass of Abe Laboriel. Here McKee muses on being taken for granted…all the while dreaming of “a man’s hands.” The rise and fall dynamics of the music mirror the throes of her longing… This is the one song Lonette switches places with Rushen to take a turn at the Rhodes – gettin’ her Ray Charles on!
“Colors (Of the Love of My Life)” picks up the pace with a hand-clappin’ horn-fortified declaration of exhilaration as McKee stakes her claim on a taken man she has dubbed “my sweet, hot stuff you’re the love of my life!” This song never fails to bring a smile.
“Train Tracks” closes Side 1 with a melancholy goodbye song. “Train tracks in the morning due to take me far away / Pain wracks every thought of you, you know I could not stay…” The reprise of a distant train whistle at the end evokes a bittersweet feeling.
“Delayed Reaction” opens Side 2 with an extended groove that finds Lonette gettin’ down with her Detroit homeboy Ray Parker Jr. on guitar, Scott Edwards on bass and James Gadson on drums, plus features some funky trombone from Garnett Brown.
“At Least I Had You One Time” is Lonette’s “If Only For One Night” – a provocative and evocative fever dream of the sensual memories that play on repeat in one’s mind within the wee hours. “The fire deep inside me / When you lay beside me / Can’t be a dream I conjured in my head / All the things you gave me / Oh, the way you made me / Yearn…to have you in my bed.” Here Johnny Pate ladles in strings to shadow the sketch of a guitar solo sensitively woven by Lee Ritenour.
“Come to Me Softly” is an eerie movie-for-the-ears love song that introduces us to a lonely outside woman who has fallen for forbidden fruit. “…because you did not stay it will only make me want you more…”
“I Wanna Be With You” brings the mellow magic carpet ride to a sassy close as Lonette gamely attempts to coax a shy man out of his shell. “I guess I’m just overly anxious / And it won’t kill you to get a little outrageous!” The horns return for an encore, co-signing her every desire as Lonette shakes things up with a lil’ shimmy out the door.
It was downright criminal that Lonette McKee’s Words and Music went all but ignored except for a taste of Quiet Storm radio support before finding its way to used record store bins. However, it was in those very bins that many discovered a diamond, snatched it and made it a cherished part of their collections.
33 years later, Ms. McKee has dusted off her personal set of the master tapes she walked away from the session with, making 8 of the 9 songs available for the long-overdue first time on CD under the new title Acoustic Tracks (Words and Music). If my loving words have done their job, you will run, not walk, your fingers over your computer keyboard to http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/lonettemckee2 and cop yourself a copy. The artist’s Website is lonettemckee.com
For a deeper look at Words and Music and what Lonette McKee is up to today, click the following link for my interview with the lady in honor of her month-long April 2011 residency at New York’s swanky Algonquin Hotel inside The Oak Room Supper Club.
A. Scott Galloway
The Urban Music Scene
Posted by Administration at 4/2/2011 5:05 PM 
Categories: Rhythm and Blues, Videos
Tags: 70s Music Music Videos
Categories: Rhythm and Blues, Videos
Tags: 70s Music Music Videos
I remember seeing this LP in cut-out bins as a kid. I was about 11 when this album came out. I always thought Lonette was beautiful and of course, I had seen some of her movies but nothing made me put the $2 down to buy the LP. I blame that on youthful ignorance. After reading Scott's review, I downloaded some of the tracks from itunes. I especially like "Sometimes" and "Maybe There Are Reasons."
Her voice is totally different from what i would have expected. Although, there's a faint Freda Payne sweetness on some of her notes, it's really a full and rich voice closer to Oleta Adams in fulness not similarity. I'm really enjoying these songs and since there are so many bad songs on the market now, this is like new music for me. So, I'm sort of glad that I didn't discover this earlier because I have a far greater appreciation for it now.
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Bill,
YOU are precisely the music lover who this music is now perfect for. I LOVE how you nailed that her voice is not what you'd expect from such a "pretty" woman. She has range, depth and power, and it was freshly honed just before she made this, her sophomore album (stay tuned for my follow-up interview). I'm happy that you are discovering this lil' gem during a time of serious drought in the industry. Lonette duly answered your S.O.S. Please buy ALL the song downloads of this CD...and next time you see the vinyl, grab it - `cuz I truly hope my review makes the value go up. It's worth so much more than most of us paid for it... Enjoy.
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Thanks for post. It抯 really informative stuff. I really like to read.Hope to learn a lot and have a nice experience here! my best regards guys!
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Thank you. We strive to be informative and entertaining here on musical works worthy of your time, attention and hard-earned money. I do hope you will seek out Ms. McKee's album and the remainder of her catalog recordings.
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