"We got it together, didn't we?" Barry White asks in that husky bedroom voice of his at the beginning of this newest album. "We've definitely got our thing together, don't we baby? Isn't it nice? I mean, really, when you really sit and think about it, isn't it really, really nice?" Well, no, really. White's lush compositions have become dance and make-out standards — here, he has turned out five more in what is now an overly familiar mold. Another original, "Oh Love, Well We Finally Made It," was produced previously by White for Love. Unlimited. The formula: shimmering pools of violins whipped to a light chop, into which White sinks his leaden vocals, half-spoken, half-sung, always as if from the next pillow. Sometimes it works— as in the title song and "I Love You More than Anything," both effective mixes of the tender and the tough—but the sameness gets oppressive and "I Can't Believe You Love Me," carried to 10:23, is downright numbing. White may be a master of the new black mood music, but he's Xeroxing himself down to a faint, smudgy shadow. (RS 172)

VINCE ALETTI