"My Cherie Amour" and "Yester-Me, Yester-You, Yesterday," are more haunting ballads than soul tunes. The funky, grinding backgrounds of [Stevie Wonder's] early records have been replaced by a silky, sophisticated bank of swelling strings and brass….

Hearing the old cuts of Stevie Wonder's high-jiving and scatting days, like "Uptight Everything's Alright" and "Be Cool, Be Calm and Keep Yourself Together," makes the changes in his current style apparent. You can turn on the radio today and hear white rock singers doing the same things, less gracefully, that Stevie was doing eight years ago. Now he is moving out, beyond blackness and beyond soul, ranging wider for what he likes and wants to sing.

S. K. Oberbeck, "Big Stevie," in Newsweek (copyright 1970 by Newsweek, Inc.; all rights reserved; reprinted by permission), January 12, 1970, p. 65.