Alex Henderson

Keith Barrow
Physical Attraction (Expanded Edition)

The history of R&B is full of skillful vocalists who, for whatever reason, fell through the cracks commercially—and in the late 1970s and early 1980s, one such vocalist was the late Keith Barrow. Boasting an appealing falsetto along the lines of the Temptations’ Eddie Kendricks, the Chi-Lites’ Eugene Record and the Stylistics’ Russell Thompkins, Jr., Barrow was the essence of northern sweet soul. And his soulful instincts served him well on 1978’s Physical Attraction.

Born in the Windy City on September 27, 1954, Barrow was the son of the Rev. Willie Barrow (a female civil rights activist who was an organizer for Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. in the 1960s) and grew up performing gospel. As a teenager, he led a Chicago-based gospel group called the Soul Shakers but later shifted his focus to secular music. In 1976, the Chicagoan’s song “It’s Something About Love” appeared on Mystic Dragons, the fourth album by Philadelphia soul stars Blue Magic—and Barrow’s self-titled debut album, which Columbia/CBS Records (now Columbia/Sony Music) released in 1977, was produced by guitarist Bobby Eli at Philly’s legendary Sigma Sound Studios. Then, in 1978, Detroit native Michael Stokes (known for his work with Bill Withers, Enchantment and others) produced Barrow’s second Columbia album, Physical Attraction, in Detroit and Miami.

Barrow didn’t do any songwriting on Physical Attraction: much of the writing was handled by Stokes and vocalist/songwriter Ronn Matlock, another Detroit native. And Physical Attraction contains an appealing blend of romantic ballads and uptempo material. Barrow’s quiet storm side asserts itself on silky ballads and slow jams that include “If It’s Love That You’re Looking For,” “Garden of Love,” “Free to Be Me” and “You Know You Want to Be Loved,” but he is at his most danceable on energetic disco-soul workouts such as “Turn Me Up,” “Joyful Music” and the title song. FunkyTownGrooves’ expanded 2014 edition of Physical Attraction contains four bonus tracks: the 7” single version of “You Know You Want to Be Loved,” the 12” single version of the title song and two 11-minute club versions of “Turn Me Up” (one instrumental, one with vocals).

Although Physical Attraction didn’t contain any chartbusters, “You Know You Want to Be Loved” reached #26 on Billboard’s R&B singles chart and is the song Barrow is best remembered for. “Turn Me Up” was a minor hit on the radio and stalled at #79 R&B in Billboard, but the song was played extensively in dance clubs—and that included an extended dance remix by Rafael Charres, who hosted a popular disco program on New York City’s WBLS-FM at the time and was also a busy club deejay. Charres, in a January 2014 interview, asserted that Barrow could have been a major star with the right promotion.

“Keith Barrow, to me, was one of the most underrated artists that CBS had in the ‘70s,” stresses Charres, who is now 64. “He had a very nice falsetto voice that reminded me of Eddie Kendricks, who was a very close friend of mine before he passed away. I played the hell out of ‘Turn Me Up’ on my program on WBLS. Keith was extremely underrated, but I think that was no fault of his own—he got lost in the sauce at CBS. That part of the ‘70s was extremely competitive. You had people like Loleatta Holloway, the Salsoul Orchestra and First Choice. Keith went up against a lot of competition.”

Charres (who has been working on a book titled In the Mix, due out later this year) believes that Kenny Gamble & Leon Huff’s Philadelphia International Records (which was distributed by Epic/CBS in the 1970s) would have been a better fit for Barrow than Columbia. “Philly International was the hottest label for R&B in the ‘70s, and CBS Records put their money behind the Philly sound—which was a wise move,” Charres explains. “But instead of putting Keith on the Columbia label, CBS should have put him on Philly International. Why not put an artist like Keith Barrow on the same label as the O’Jays, MFSB, Harold Melvin & the Blue Notes and Teddy Pendergrass? I’m a New York boy, and I can tell you that the best music of the 1970s came out of Philadelphia. Bar none. Imagine Keith hooking up with Gamble & Huff. Imagine Keith with the marketing tools that Philly International had for R&B. If CBS had put him on Philly International, history would have been totally different for Keith.”

Matlock (whose Stokes-produced album, Love City, was released by Cotillion/Atlantic Records in 1979) shares Charres’ view that Barrow was among the unsung heroes of classic soul. Matlock and Stokes collaborated on a variety of projects in the 1970s, working with everyone from Enchantment to gospel singer Shirley Caesar—and in January 2014, Matlock (who was interviewed separately from Charres) fondly remembered working with Barrow and Stokes on Physical Attraction 36 years ago.

“Getting Michael and Keith and I together was a marriage made in heaven,” Matlock asserts. “Michael is an incredible producer. I can’t say enough good things about Michael Stokes when it comes to his talent as a producer. And I really admired Keith’s voice. I thought his voice was velvety and smooth, and like Eddie Kendricks, he made it sound effortless. Like a lot of people, Keith sort of emulated Eddie with that high falsetto. But the Physical Attraction album was not marketed correctly, and it could have done more.”

Barrow parted company with Columbia/CBS after Physical Attraction and resurfaced on Capitol Records in 1980 with his third and final album, Just As I Am. Matlock and Stokes talked to Barrow about the possibility of working with him again, but sadly, that never came about: Barrow was only 29 when he died of AIDS-related causes on October 22, 1983.

“When Michael Stokes and I found out that Keith had died, it was a shock to us,” Matlock recalls. “We didn’t know he’d been sick. Keith was the first person I knew personally who died of AIDS.”

Barrow never achieved the commercial recognition he deserved. But that doesn’t make his work any less rewarding, and the Chicagoan’s talents are very much in evidence on Physical Attraction.

—Alex Henderson, January 2014

Alex Henderson’s work has appeared in Billboard, Spin, Creem, Salon.com, The L.A. Weekly, AlterNet, JazzTimes, Jazziz, 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, Jazz Inside Magazine and many other well-known publications. Henderson (alexvhenderson.com) also contributed several thousand CD reviews to The All Music Guide’s popular website and series of music reference books.