Martha Reeves - Free Again [[1978)

[midnightman]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PlBhSWeolDU

Martha's disco effort from '78.

[daviddesper]

Great title song.........rest of the album? Welllllllllll..............

[midnightman]

^ Was it that bad?

[zani57]

I first heard this song when Barbra Streisand sang it as "Non C'est Rien" on her "Color Me Barbra" TV special in 1966. In this segment of the special, Streisand was in the Philadelphia Museum of Art. The song was used as Streisand looked at and then entered into a painting by Modigliani. I tried to embed the video from "Color Me Barbra" but evidently there is a "one video" limit per post, so I chose "Free Again," which is the English-language version that Martha disco-tied. Here is Streisand's "Free Again," which appeared on her album J' m'apple Barbra" as well as her first "Greatest Hits" package --


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PPk5wHb8UPo

[Jaap]

I love the way Gladys Knight combines Free Again with I Will Survive. Perfect medley and really bringing ballad and disco together.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TAIh8lYBNxM

[marv2]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PlBhSWeolDU

Martha's disco effort from '78.

Great song. It received ZERO radioplay. I do remember Mary Wilson and Gladys Knight singing slowed down versions in their acts combined with "I Will Survive" in their concerts back in the 80s.

[luke]

I like it but not When Martha goes soprano

[Buttered Popcorn and so forth]

I like it but not When Martha goes sopranoI know exactly what you're talking about! So many of those disco songs could benefit by being faded out early before she starts ad-lib caterwauling towards the ends of the songs. Haha!

[midnightman]

It worked for this song. *pouting* LOL

[kenneth]

I'm not a big Streisand fan; though I like a lot of her songs, to me a little of her goes a long way. I do like her earliest material the best, and I think "Je M'appelle Barbra" one of her best albums.

What the Reeves version lacks is the irony that Streisand puts into the song. When Streisand sings it, you know she's trying to talk herself into feeling good about being "free again." That irony is lost on the Reeves version. I think a slow first verse [[a la the Ike & Tina version of "Proud Mary") might have worked better. Just exploding into what is essentially the chorus, and then repeating it, to me destroys the real meaning of the song. Not a very imaginative arrangement overall.

[loganjlr]

Generally speaking, this is a fun disco track I could get stoned to. I can understand why some could consider this arrangement tacky, but I've always been a fan of culturally obscure music and oddball creative choices in music.

Although this was released in 1978 and recorded probably earlier, you can hear the deepening of her voice and the development of what would later turn into her famous warble she's retained since the early 1980s when she's attempts to go into her original register. If anyone is wondering how Martha feels about the evolution of her voice, this interview highlights the relationship she's had with those changes [[http://m.startribune.com/c-j-nowhere-to-run-when-you-rub-martha-reeves-the-wrong-way/368109611/).

The writer even mentions that when a fan inquired about Martha's alto capabilities, she was offended that the fan would even suggest she was singing anything else than soprano during the show.

"OK!" Reeves said cheerfully when told I wrote for the newspaper. In an even, no-nonsense tone, she said, "Tell the world I had a stupid question asked of me. Some people just don't know what to say. I think I sing higher than anybody I know. I sing higher than Patti LaBelle and Marian Anderson and Miriam Makeba."

If you only listened to her original Motown tunes and compared them to her post - 1980s performances, I can't even imagine Martha reaching the heights of Patti or the others. Hearing this disco track [[which I did not know was out there) shows me that Martha had a pretty wide control of her upper register, even when it was on the decline. In her age, Martha lacks the restraint and hesitance Dionne Warwick has had vocally in her later years.

[[https://www.theguardian.com/music/2012/jan/24/martha-reeves-and-the-vandellas-live-review)

This next review mentions how Martha's voice truly shines when she sung a verse of Mavis Staples' "I'll Take You There" with her voice resonating in a lower key. I wish I could find a clip online of her singing it.