Thursday, October 27, marks the 50th anniversary of the release of Stevie Wonder‘s classic 15th studio album, Talking Book.
The 10-track collection peaked at #3 on the Billboard Pop Albums chart, making it Wonder’s highest-charting album up to that time. The album features two of Stevie’s most enduring songs, “You Are the Sunshine of My Life” and “Superstition,” which both reached #1 on the Billboard Hot 100.
Talking Book marked a continuation of Wonder’s experimentation with synthesizers in collaboration with electronic music pioneers Malcolm Cecil and Robert Margouleff that he began on his previous album, 1972’s Music of My Mind.
Among the noteworthy guest artists who contributed to the album were guitarist Jeff Beck and Ray Parker Jr., singer Deniece Williams and sax player David Sanborn.
Wonder took home three Grammy Awards for Talking Book at the 1974 Grammys ceremony — Best Male Pop Vocal Performance for “You Are the Sunshine of My Life,” and Best Male R&B Vocal Performance and Best R&B Song for “Superstition.” Cecil and Margouleff, meanwhile, won the Best Engineered Album, Non-Classical, prize for their work on the record.
Talking Book was ranked #59 on Rolling Stone‘s 2020 list of “The 500 Greatest Albums of All Time.”
Here’s the album’s full track list:
Side One
“You Are the Sunshine of My Life”
“Maybe Your Baby”
“You and I (We Can Conquer the World)”
“Tuesday Heartbreak”
“You’ve Got It Bad Girl”
Side Two
“Superstition”
“Big Brother”
“Blame It on the Sun”
“Lookin’ for Another Pure Love”
“I Believe (When I Fall In Love It Will Be Forever)”
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