Consumer Guide Album

Teena Marie: Irons in the Fire [Gordy, 1980]
The self-production sounds more like license than liberation to me--she was better off with Richard Rudolph telling her what not to do. Maybe she could sing the telephone book and make me like it, but compared to the telephone book, "You make love like springtime and I can't control my passion/You make love like springtime even when love's not in fashion" lacks serendipity--especially after five minutes, with seasonal changes for variety and a jazzy 3:20 reprise for excess measure. C+