[It] was inevitable that Laura, when she was ready, would return. Such a talent as hers, one surmised, could not remain dormant for any considerable length of time, and here, four years after "Gonna Take A Miracle", is Laura Nyro's sixth album, "Smile".

Her songs have always been concerned with her own experiences, and only occasionally (as on "Save The Country" and "Christmas In My Soul" particularly) taken in external, political events. "Smile" proves to be no exception…. [She] focuses here with great clarity upon the recent events in her life. "Stormy Love", one of the most immediately attractive songs …, deals specifically with the disintegration of her marriage. "Midnite Blue", with a similarly evocative melody and imagery, is a song to a new lover, full of optimism and joy. Her treatment of these themes is marked by a restraint not always apparent on her earlier albums. There is...