Originally Posted by
Bokiluis
I always felt that had "Baby It's Me" been recorded by one of the popular white female artists of that time like Olivia Neton-John, Helen Reddy, etc., perhaps the album would have fared even better. The music critics seem to forget that The Supremes and Diana's solo career was driven by pop/soul music. Because of Diana's ethnicity, too often she is classified as "soul/R&B". Pitted against Aretha, Gladys or even Patti Labelle, Diana's music doesn't compete fairly. She is a unique creation in that she sings "pop" music as effectively as any white female singer. Until Whitney came along, Diana practically stood alone in singing pop music with soul flourishes. It seemed that Top 40 radio didn't always know what to do with Diana's music, because as a black artist, her music did not fit into the soul genre comfortably either.
Additionally, instead of looking at the pop or R&B charts, maybe it was the Adult Contemporary format that drove "Baby It's Me" album sales. She had two Top 10 A/C hits in "Gettin' Ready for Love" [[#8), "You Got It" [[#9) and Top 15 for "Top of the World". "Your Love is Good for Me" was also a Top 15 Dance hit as that genre was still developing in 1977. Though the initial tour dates for "Tour '78-'79" featured "Gettin' Ready for Love" and a couple of other "Baby It's Me" songs, the full blown tour would eventually showcase songs from "The Boss" instead. [[Besides the Universal Ampitheater date with the pink shoe and I believe the first time she popped out of the screen, I don't know how many shows she did that featured "Baby It's Me" material over "Ross '78" or "The Boss"). So I question if "Baby It's Me" ever benefited from extensive tour promotion the way "The Boss" eventually did.
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