[The range of material on I Was Made to Love Her] is very limited, making it difficult to listen to the album as a whole.

Stevie's … style is essentially a variation on the kind of thing he did on "Uptight," a fine record. On that cut he added to the standard components of a Motown single a very personal lyric, and then sang the whole thing in a driving style from beginning to end. Stevie doesn't go in for dynamics, rhythm changes, or crescendoes, but prefers to sing frenetically for the duration of a piece.

The "Uptight" style continues to be the basis for all of Stevie's recordings, and the title song of his new album, I Was Made to Love Her, is a beautiful example of what Stevie can do using this approach. By far the best cut on the album, it contains a personal, down home...