Stevie Wonder was 17 when he made I Was Made to Love Her, and the album does exactly what its title track did not: it plays it safe. Released in 1967, the record is a quick cash-in on the massive success of the title single, padded with covers and stylistic imitations of the soul stars who had already defined the sound. It is not a statement. It is a product, and it moves like one — 31 minutes, 12 tracks, no wasted motion, and almost no risk.
The Hit That Earned the Album
The title track, I Was Made to Love Her, is the reason this record exists, and it remains its only true peak. The song is built on a bassline that locks in like a handshake and a vocal that sounds older than Wonder’s age by a decade. It is joyful, locked-in, and impossible to sit still through. Everything else on the album is measured against it, and almost everything else comes up short.
Working Through the Covers
The rest of the record is a tour of other people’s hits, delivered with skill but little invention. Send Me Some Lovin’ and Everybody Needs Somebody (I Need You) are competent soul workouts, but they are exercises, not discoveries.
Respect takes a familiar arrangement and gives it a lighter, poppier spin. My Girl is the most straightforward cover here, a run at a classic that adds nothing and loses the original’s ache. Baby Don’t You Do It and Can I Get a Witness lean into the assembly-line soul sound, and they land as decent imitations rather than contributions to it.
The Slow Numbers
The ballads are where Wonder’s vocal maturity shows, even if the material does not. I’d Cry is a sincere, slightly overwrought plea that works mostly because of the conviction in his voice. A Fool for You is the best of the slow cuts — a confession that lets Wonder stretch his phrasing and prove he can carry a torch, not just a groove. Please, Please, Please is the most direct imitation on the record, and it is the one that tips from homage into mimicry. It is not bad. It is just not him.
Odd Ones Out
I Pity the Fool and Every Time I See You I Go Wild are the strangest tracks here, and the most interesting for it. The first is a swaggering, horn-heavy stomp; the second is a frantic, almost chaotic cut that sounds like a band chasing a hook. Neither is a classic, but both show a young singer willing to try on different masks, even if he has not yet found his own face.
What the Record Actually Shows
The album was rushed out to capitalize on the success of the title song, and it shows. Other than the hit, it is all filler — but not uninteresting filler. At 17, Wonder was becoming both a remarkable mimic and an original talent on his own. You can hear the mimic in the covers and the imitations. You can hear the original talent in the moments where he stops copying and starts pushing. Those moments are brief, but they are real, and they point directly at what came next.
Verdict
I Was Made to Love Her is not a great album. It is a good single surrounded by a competent, forgettable collection of covers and stylistic exercises. As a snapshot of a developing artist, it has value; as a listening experience, it is mostly a waiting game for the title track to come back around. But the title track is worth the wait, and the flashes of genuine originality make the filler forgivable.
“At 17, Wonder was becoming both a remarkable mimic, and an original talent on his own.”
The record does not deserve a place in Wonder’s first rank. It does deserve a listen, if only to hear the moment before the breakthrough. It is the sound of a kid who could already do everything asked of him, and was just starting to figure out what he wanted to ask of himself.
That is not nothing.
- Artist: Stevie Wonder
- Album: I Was Made to Love Her
- Released: 1967
- Tracks: 12
- Total running time: 31 minutes
- I Was Made to Love Her2:35
- Send Me Some Lovin’2:30
- I’d Cry2:34
- Everybody Needs Somebody (I Need You)2:34
- Respect2:18
- My Girl2:53
- Baby Don’t You Do It2:10
- A Fool for You2:59
- Can I Get a Witness2:39
- I Pity the Fool2:57
- Please, Please, Please2:36
- Every Time I See You I Go Wild2:52
