Having a Party  (Audio CD) 
by The Pointer Sisters

Anita, Bonnie, Jean and Ruth Pointer formed their eponymous band in Oakland, California in the Seventies and proceeded to draw quite successfully upon a remarkably wide variety of musical influences, from Tin Pan Alley to funk to country. The Pointer Sisters were clearly a band in transition at this point. First of all, their contract with Blue Thumb had come to a close, and sister Bonnie was planning an exit for a solo career. The record starts off with an energetic cover of the Sam Cooke hit from which they took the albums name. Stevie Wonder contributes a song, Sugar Bring Your Sweet Stuff Home To Me, that sounds as though it could have come from his Fulfillingness First Finale / Innervisions period. Ray Parker Jr, legendary Funk Brother James Jamerson, Wah Wah Watson and Stevie Wonder all guested on the disc as backup musicians, and Sonny Burke, long associated with Frank Sinatra, contributed arrangements. Despite all this firepower, the album failed to yield a pop hit, as nearly all their previous records had. It might have been that they hadnt fully embraced the disco sound that was sweeping the radio in 1977 (though they would, and with great success). In any event, this is one of the unfairly-overlooked releases in the Pointers catalogue, and its reissue is long overdue.