Almighty Fire is the twenty-fourth studio album by American singer Aretha Franklin, released on April 13, 1978, by Atlantic Records. By the time of the album's release, Franklin was going through a commercial slump.
Franklin was reunited with Curtis Mayfield – who produced the album and composed all the tracks –after their earlier success together with the Sparkle soundtrack.
The title single reached at No. 12 on the Billboard R&B Singles Chart and the follow-up single, "More Than Just a Joy", peaked at No. 51. The album earned a Grammy nomination for Best R&B Vocal Performance, Female at the 1979 Grammy Awards.
Critical reception
The New York Times panned Mayfield's work as "tuneless, fussily arranged songs", but praised Franklin and Turman's "I'm Your Speed" for the space it creates for her to "breathe real fire into the music."
Rolling Stone praised "I'm Your Speed" at length, calling it the album's "one moment of pop music transcendence." It called "No Matter Who You Love" as a standout, but considered the album's arrangements "unglamorous and cheesy," and chastised the music Mayfield brought to the table as "stifling," while comparing it to the excitement of the previous Franklin-Mayfield pairing, 1976's Sparkle.
Track listing All tracks composed by Curtis Mayfield, except where noted.
Side one "Almighty Fire (Woman of the Future)" – 4:36 "Lady, Lady" – 2:45 "More Than Just a Joy" – 3:03 "Keep On Loving You" – 3:12 "I Needed You Baby" – 4:38
Side two "Close to You" – 4:22 "No Matter Who You Love" – 4:01 "This You Can Believe" – 4:46 "I'm Your Speed" (Aretha Franklin, Glynn Turman) – 3:40
Personnel Aretha Franklin – vocals Rich Tufo – keyboards, arrangements Curtis Mayfield – lead guitars Gary Thompson – rhythm guitars Joseph "Lucky" Scott – bass guitar Donnell Hagan – drums Henry Gibson – congas Lenard Druss – horns contractor Sol Bobrov – strings contractor Mattie Butler – backing vocals Ricky Linton – backing vocals Denise Heard – backing vocals The Jones Girls – backing vocals Alfonso Surrett – backing vocals
Production Curtis Mayfield – producer Roger Anfinsen – recording engineer, remixing Fred Breitberg – recording engineer Dennis King – mastering at Atlantic Studios (New York City, New York) Aretha Franklin – album cover concept
References
External links Almighty Fire (Woman of the Future)