Starting Over on a New Label

Review Score: (8/10)
I happen to think the album that preceded this, Steady Nerves, was one of his all-time best. I only learned recently that following Steady Nerves he signed to Atlantic, but no album was released. Thus, this RCA debut arrived three years later. It's a lot more acoustic than earlier efforts, certainly a more mature, lower-key performance that is almost Dylanesque. While this new direction was no doubt a welcome facet in Parker's artistic maturation, it may have made RCA label heads wonder if they got what they had signed -- after all, this was a different sound. It set the pace for the albums that followed, which were increasingly well-produced and very folksy-acoustic, none achieving the commercial success of his earlier efforts with the Rumour and the Shot. Still, the grandeur of such songs as "Success," "Get Started (Start a Fire)," "Don't Let it Break You Down" and "Girl Isn't Ready" makes this a keeper. One wonders if including "Ordinary Girl" on the original release might have resulted in a more commercially successful hit that could have helped propel the album up the charts.

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