Best known for his romantic and borderline saccharine songs, Barry Manilow was a whipping boy for the critics through much of the 1970s even as he sold millions of albums and gained a huge audience base. Though he didn't always write the songs, even when recording work by other artists Manilow still cultivated a lush and melodic musical style that was popular during the pre-rock era. His style evolved during the early-1980s from tame, string-laden, AM-radio pop to a more classic, jazzy sound that was heavily influenced by swing and 1930s and 1940s Broadway show tunes (many of which he later covered).

Unabashedly embracing a sentimental style that appealed primarily to white middle-class women of the working and homemaking sort, it is unsurprising that this Brooklyn born and raised songwriter was frequently denounced by the male-dominated rock and rock critic worlds. Because forms...