If "Light Soul" was a category, it would be perfect for this record from
Samantha Sang. "Emotion" was the big platinum hit from January of 1978, but there is much more to this artist and this album than a popular title track. There are three Bee Gees compositions here, "The Love Of A Woman," "Charade" and "Emotion."
The Bee Gees would put a version of "Charade" on their boxed set, but it appears here first. She covers the Lai/Evans/Wells tune "When Love Is Gone," and that title gets the same production help from producers
Barry Gibb, Albhy Galuten and Karl Richardson that brought "Emotion" so high up the charts. In between there is a version of
Bruce Roberts and Carole Bayer Sager's "I Don't Wanna Go" - a song that
The Moments included in their repertoire - and containing that same ethereal vocal as what
The Bee Gees producers gave her. Producer Nick DeCaro, who recorded the bulk of the album, took few chances here copying pretty much the amazing sound that worked so well for
Yvonne Elliman,
Dionne Warwick, Kenny Rogers with
Dolly Parton and others touched by the Bee Gee's 70's and 80's magic. The interesting thing is that these productions don't have the depth that Galuten, Richardson and Gibb gave to the songs they created - the alleged 96 tracks (sure sounds like it!), but Sang is more than competent, and the album is highly listenable. Denny Randell and Sandy Linzer wrote for Barbara Harris and The Toys, so opening this album with their "You Keep Me Dancing seems to answer the Bee Gees admonition that "You Should Be Dancing. Samantha Sang's unique voice does wonders with material that The Toys,
The Moments and
Dionne Warwick all could have covered easily. A wonderful version of
The Delfonics "La La La - I Love You, that brilliant Thom Bell/William Hart tune, shows the direction of this "light soul" album. Eric Carmen's "Change Of Heart" hit 10 months after this in October of 1978, and
Samantha Sang provided back up vocals on his hit version, but what Sang does with it here is dramatically different, and exciting. Amazingly sad that a record this good did not generate more hits, or more attention for a valid singer. ~ Joe Viglione