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A solid bit of heavy funk – and one of the last strong-selling soundtracks of the blacksploitation era!

An overlooked late 70s set from Rose Royce – not as hitmaking some of their other albums, but actually pretty darn great – thanks to some rock-solid production from Norman Whitfield! The album's a perfect illustration of the way that Whitfield expanded his earlier funky sound with the group – pushing more complicated elements into the bassy groove first forged at Motown – including percussion from Jack Ashford, guitar from Wah Wah Watson, and clavinet and Rhodes from Walter Downing. The funkier tunes are actually the best Rose Royce numbers this time around – and titles include "Lock It Down", "Pazazz", "What You Waiting For", "Shine Your Light", "I Wonder Where You Are Tonight", and "You Can't Run From Yourself".

Rose Royce in perfect hit mode – blending older styles of harmony soul and rolling funk with some of the late 70s better advances in production. Norman Whitfield's really pushing himself here, and if he only did one thing on this planet, we'd give him a big award for his wonderful work on "Love Don't Live Here Anymore" – clearly the album (and possibly the band's) standout cut, and a masterpiece of spacey soul that still shocks us today with its greatness. Other tracks include "I'm In Love", "That's What's Wrong With Me", "Let Me Be The First To Know", and "First Come, First Serve".

Rose Royce are certainly plenty strong at this point in their career – working with a tight modern soul groove on Epic Records – away from their previous placement on the Whitfield label, even though Norman Whitfield's still very actively handling production here! The album does a great job of bringing out some of the group's warmer elements, and also refits their rhythms a bit for the 80s generation – using some jazzier flourishes on the keyboards, which class things up nicely, and push their sound a bit towards some of the best Columbia/Epic soul acts of the time. Keyboards dominate a bit more than before, but in a good way – and titles include "Best Love", "Sometimesy Lady", "Still In Love", "You Blew It", "Talk To Me", "Fire In The Funk" and "Somehow We Made It Through The Rain".