Alex Henderson

Gladys Knight & the Pips
The One and Only [Expanded Edition]

When Gladys Knight & the Pips signed with Buddah Records in 1973, the label managed to make them even more popular than they had been during their seven years at Motown Records. It was quite an accomplishment: Gladys Knight (b. May 28, 1944), Merald “Bubba” Knight (b. September 4, 1942), William Guest (b. July 2, 1941) and the late Edward Patten (b. August 27, 1939, d. February 25, 2005) had plenty of major hits at Motown, but at Buddah, they reached the peak of their popularity and enjoyed four gold albums in a row (Imagination in 1973, the “Claudine” soundtrack and I Feel a Song in 1974 and 2^nd Anniversary in 1975). Several of their Buddah singles became #1 R&B hits in Billboard, including “I Feel a Song (In My Heart),” “I’ve Got to Use My Imagination,” “Best Thing That Ever Happened to Me” and their signature song “Midnight Train to Georgia” (which was also a #1 pop hit in Billboard and became their biggest hit ever). Buddah promised Gladys Knight & the Pips a much more aggressive promotional campaign than they had been receiving at Motown, and the company made good on that promise.

But in the late 1970s, there was trouble in paradise. A legal dispute between Buddah and the group developed, forcing Gladys Knight and her three Pips to record separately. She recorded two solo albums during that period (1978’s Miss Gladys Knight for Buddah and 1979’s Gladys Knight for Columbia), while the Pips recorded two albums for Casablanca Records (1977’s At Last….The Pips and 1978’s Callin’). Gladys Knight & the Pips’ 1978 release The One and Only turned out to be their last album for Buddah, and they reemerged on Columbia Records in 1980 with About Love (which was written and produced by Ashford & Simpson and contained the #3 R&B hit “Landlord”).

The One and Only wasn’t the smash that some of Gladys Knight & the Pips’ previous Buddah albums had been. While Imagination, Claudine and I Feel a Song all soared to #1 on Billboard’s R&B albums chart and 2^nd Anniversary made it to #4 on that chart, The One and Only stalled at #30 R&B. However, the album contained two singles that became moderate hits in the United States: British songwriter Tony Macaulay’s infectious “It’s a Better Than Good Time” (a #16 R&B hit in Billboard) and the Michael Masser/Pam Sawyer ballad “Sorry Doesn’t Always Make It Right” (which reached #24 R&B in Billboard). A third single, the vibrant “Come Back and Finish What You Started,” didn’t chart in the U.S. but was a #15 hit in the UK. Written by the late Van McCoy (who made disco history with his 1975 smash “The Hustle”) and Joe Cobb, “Come Back and Finish What You Started” has a strong Motown influence and is not unlike something Gladys Knight & the Pips would have recorded eight or nine years earlier.

“Come Back and Finish What You Started” isn’t the only McCoy song on this album: McCoy also wrote the energetic “Be Yourself.” And given Gladys Knight & the Pips’ long history of recording his material, it made perfect sense for Buddah to include some McCoy songs on this album. McCoy wrote one of the group’s early pre-Motown hits: 1964’s “Giving Up,” which was covered by the Ad-Libs in 1969 and the late Donny Hathaway in 1971 (although Knight’s version remains the most famous). And in 1977, McCoy did a lot of writing, producing and arranging on Gladys Knight & the Pips’ Buddah album Still Together (which contained the #10 R&B hit “Baby, Don’t Change Your Mind,” a McCoy song). McCoy, sadly, was only 39 when a heart attack claimed his life in 1979.

Ballads were always a high priority for Gladys Knight, who was only seven when, in 1952, she performed the Nat King Cole hit “Too Young” on “Ted Mack’s Original Amateur Hour” (a 1950s equivalent of “American Idol”). And there are plenty of romantic ballads on The One and Only, including the title track, “Butterfly,” the melancholy “What If I Should Ever Need You” and Barry Manilow’s “All the Time.” But while “All the Time” is a Manilow song, the lavish orchestral arrangement on this album is very much in the Philadelphia soul vein.  

The funky, exuberant “Saved by the Grace of Your Love,” however, is definitely not a ballad. Nor is “It’s a Better Than Good Time,” which received a fair amount of exposure in dance clubs. Gladys Knight & the Pips weren’t known for recording a lot of disco, but “It’s a Better Than Good Time” is clearly aimed at the disco-soul audience. Back in the late 1970s, there were different schools of disco. The European school of disco was exemplified by artists like Love and Kisses, Silver Convention, Cerrone and the Munich Machine, while Gloria Gaynor, Sylvester, Moment of Truth, Linda Clifford, the Trammps and the late Loleatta Holloway were among the artists who favored a soul-drenched approach to disco—and “It’s a Better Than Good Time” is very much an example of disco-soul rather Euro-disco. In 1978, “It’s a Better Than Good Time” also appeared on Knight’s first solo album, Miss Gladys Knight.

In addition to the 10 selections from Buddah’s original 1978 LP, FunkyTownGrooves’ expanded edition of The One and Only offers seven bonus tracks—which include two mixes of “It’s a Better Than Good Time” (a full extended mix and a 7” single version) and a 12” single version of “Saved by the Grace of Your Love.” Also offered as bonus tracks are “It’s Up to You (Do What You Do)”—which was the b-side of “Come Back and Finish What You Started” in the UK—a 7” single version of the rarity “I’m Still Caught Up with You” (which Buddah released as a 12” single in the UK in 1979) and the demo “Stringman.”

Among Gladys Knight & the Pips’ fans, it is common knowledge that they recorded some of their biggest hits at Buddah. And in 1978, their Buddah period came to an enjoyable end with The One and Only.

—Alex Henderson, September 2013

Alex Henderson’s work has appeared in Billboard, Spin, Creem, The L.A. Weekly, JazzTimes, Jazziz, Salon.com, AlterNet, Cash Box, HITS, CD Review, Skin Two, Black Beat, The Pasadena Weekly, Black Radio Exclusive (BRE), Music Connection, Latin Style, The New York City Jazz Record and many other well-known publications. Henderson (alexvhenderson.com) has also contributed several thousand CD reviews to The All Music Guide’s popular website and series of music reference books.