Consumer Guide Album

Bill Withers: Making Music [Columbia, 1975]
The slippage is suddenly a landslide. As songs, all of these tracks except "I Love You Dawn" and "The Family Table" are potentially enjoyable. But most of them are so fragile that one surge of the orchestrations Withers used to resist so steadfastly sweeps them into the mawk. Even "Make Love to Your Mind," a seductive lyric about not getting down (right away), goes on for so long you're afraid the man may overplay his hand. C+