Loving Taylor

After a career of 50 years, there comes a time when you need to assemble and present, to yourself and others, a musical roadmap of the places you traveled. I worked hard and practiced a lot, but above all else, I was held by a loving, generous universe.

James Taylor stopped pushing himself into new musical and lyrical territories in the late '70s, so it doesn't come as a great surprise that Hourglass, his first studio album in six years, doesn't offer anything new – it's a collection of pleasant, melodic, simple songs about love, family, and social activism. That's not necessarily a bad thing, since Taylor has a gift for such material, and on Hourglass, he sounds as good as ever. The music, in many ways, has greater depth than previous records, since it features cameos from such heavy hitters as Stevie Wonder, Yo-Yo Ma, Shawn Colvin, Michael Brecker, Mark O'Connor, and Branford Marsalis. There are a few songs that fall a little flat, failing to make much of an impression one way or the other, but on the whole, Hourglass is a nice addition to his catalog.

On this trio album, Samantha Fish, Cassie Taylor, and Dani Wilde begin with the Rolling Stones' "Bitch" and end with the Steve Miller Band's "Jet Airliner," each taking a verse. The rest of the album is devoted to original compositions written by one or the other of the performers in a variety of blues styles, and the instrumentation also varies, though Taylor (daughter of Otis Taylor, with whom she played extensively), as the bassist, appears on almost every track. The exception is also the only solo track, Wilde's folk-blues number "Reason to Stay," on which she plays Dobro. Wilde also takes much of the lead guitar work, with Fish getting lead work on her own "Come on Home" and "Wait a Minute," as well as Taylor's "Move On." The switch-offs make for a good balance, and it's not surprising that this triumvirate has toured together in Europe. The album should help make their names better known, but that also might reduce their impetus to stay together.

Johnnie Taylor set the tone for his recording career at Stax with Wanted: One Soul Singer, a consistently gritty collection of blues and raw, hard-hitting Memphis soul. In addition to his appealing medium-sized hits "Just the One I've Been Lookin' For" and "I Had a Dream," Wanted boasts pleasant surprises ranging from the addictive "Toe-Hold" to gutsy versions of Merle Travis' "Sixteen Tons" and the standard "Blues in the Night." Adding lyrics to Herbie Hancock's "Watermelon Man," Taylor removes the song's jazz elements and turns it into pure Southern R&B. When Wanted was released, Taylor (who has occasionally been confused with bluesman Little Johnny Taylor) had yet to become the soul-radio fixture that "Who's Making Love" would make him, but these solid performances show that he was definitely on the right track.

Johnnie Taylor's biggest hit album also proved his undoing. Stax had collapsed, and he ended up on Columbia's roster. The disco boom was beginning, and Taylor had the perfect single. "Disco Lady" was vocally quite similar to his earlier material, but its lyrics embraced the hedonism and dance-your-troubles-away ethic of the era.

Joanne Shaw Taylor has announced that her new studio album will be released early next year. The follow-up to 2016’s Wild is titled Reckless Heart and it’s set to arrive on March 15 via Silvertone/Sony Music.