Day 231: Luther Vandross - Never Too Much

I wanted to go for an artist today who I don’t know enough about. I know absolutely nothing about Luther Vandross, aside from the song “Never Too Much”, which has to be up there as one of the best songs of all time. Expectations were high, let’s see if he lives up to them.

Album cover courtesy of Epic Records

Luther Vandross was a singer, songwriter and producer from New York who’s known to be up there as one of the all-time greats. Before starting his solo career, he was a very successful session musician, providing background vocals for many industry legends. He worked on Young Americans with Bowie and toured with him, as well as backing artists like Diana Ross, Chaka Khan, Ringo Starr, Roxy Music and Roberta Flack.

Roberta Flack was instrumental in encouraging him to stop being a backing singer and pursue a solo career. Luther Vandross said she fired him because she thought he was getting too comfortable being in the background and it was time for him to make his own record. She later said, “Luther Vandross likes to say that I fired him, but I never really fired him. What I did was to encourage him to believe in his own ability to produce his first album.”

Released in 1981, Never Too Much was his debut solo album, and it was an immediate success, earning him two Grammy nominations and a number one spot on the US Top R&B/Hip-Hop Albums chart. It was written, composed and arranged mostly by himself, although the closing song “A House Is Not a Home” wasn’t written by him, as it’s a cover of a song written for a film of the same name.

It seems very hard to conceive that he’d be reaching the dizzying heights of the opening track throughout the whole album, but there’s not a single point where the album drops off. The lush instrumentation with his velvety smooth voice is such a pleasure, especially on the only ballad of the album, “A House Is Not a Home”. The more upbeat songs are the better ones, though, and I can’t imagine a day that wouldn’t get better hearing something like “Never Too Much” or “She’s a Super Lady”.

I’m adding this to my growing list of records to buy if I see them somewhere. I’m giving Never Too Much a 9/10, I see myself playing this in the future. Also, “Never Too Much” is one of those songs that are at a level where if there ever was an alien invasion and we’d have to explain to them what music is, I’d definitely put that on the playlist.