Released: 1979
As I’ve written about, Barry White was eager for his contract with 20th Century Fox Records to run out and was pushing out subpar albums to fulfill the obligation. There was I Love To Sing the Songs I Sing and now there’s this.
THIS.
This… thing is the most awful piece of music Barry White ever put out. This is the ultimate mail-in.
On Super Movie Themes: Just A Little Bit Different, White just had the Love Unlimited Orchestra perform popular theme music from successful 1970s movies.
The only one of these songs worth a damn is “Theme From King Kong” because it’s the only one that sounds like an actual Love Unlimited Orchestra production and not blah muzak.
(Okay, “As Time Goes By” also sounds decent, but it’s from the movie Casablanca, so maybe not being a retread of a 70s song allows it to rise above the muck.)
The King Kong theme was actually put out as a single back in 1977—a year after the release of King Kong. It rose to #15 R&B and #7 on the disco charts. Not bad.
Anyways, everything else here is either cringe worthy because it’s such a hokey gimmick (“Theme from Superman”) or an outright catastrophe (“The Way We Were”).
I’d criticize this terribleness further, but why bother when I suspect Barry White was more than happy to deliver this to 20th Century Fox, so he could be released from his contract.
Unfortunately, the Love Unlimited Orchestra wouldn’t release another album until 1981 to make up for this dreadfulness. By that point, they were on White’s CBS subsidiary label Unlimited Gold.
Spoiler: those albums weren’t that good, but at least they weren’t this bad… well.. most of them anyways…
ALBUM GRADE: F
Song Scores
Theme From Superman: 4/10
Theme From King Kong: 7/10
Night Fever: 3/10
Grease: 0/10
Intermission: 4/10
Theme From Shaft: 3/10
Theme From A Summer Place: 2/10
The Way We Were 0/10
As Time Goes By: 6/10
People of Tomorrow Are the Children of Today: 2/10