20. Could It Be I'm Falling In Love

Spinners (Atlantic, 1973);
composed by Melvin and Mervin Steals

Could it be my favoritest song of all time? Steady, now. I feel at a loss about this song, occasionally, because I constantly forget that Thom Bell did not write this like he wrote “Betcha By Golly, Wow” for the Stylistics, but he sure produced and arranged it, and that is the most sensuous of rubs. The rich orchestrations of Kenny Gamble and Leon Huff’s production style characterized what was labelled “Philly Soul” in the ‘70s; Thom Bell was always a seeming adjunct, but sort of the way Billy Strayhorn was to Duke Ellington. Bell had plenty of hits and each of his productions always sounded just a little beyond whatever the Gamble & Huff norm might be said to be. They were almost baroque in the way Burt Bacharach’s were – the break on this song has a harpsichord solo, interpolating the sharply articulated string and horn parts – but the words set this music, not the reverse, and the combination sets an unusually anticipatory as well as seductive mood. Since the Steals brothers’ lyrics do not poop out after the first chorus like Linda Creed’s did, you really do wonder why Bobby Smith does feel so . . . funny.

Note: 25 secular essays about 25 songs, each one exactly 200 words long, appearing one per day (on average) during Advent (or the moral equivalent).