The O'Jays: Survival : Music Reviews : Rolling Stone

Album Reviews

Producers Kenny Gamble and Leon Huff believe there's a demand for economic protest songs and are trying to meet it. They've mixed a few into the middle of the new O'Jays album and one, "Rich Get Richer" is startling. I admit I'm more surprised than most rock critics that William Paley ever let the following out of Columbia Records:

There's only 16 families that control the whole world,
I read that in a book, y'all
People like the Mellons, the Gettys, the Du Ponts, the Rockefellers,
Howard Hughes ...

Interestingly enough, the producers packaged this thought inside of a conventional Philadelphia International song. The band rocks as steady as ever and the bassist contributes one of the truly great R&B lines of recent years.

The O'Jays sing with their usual winning sincerity. Their voices are no match for Harold Melvin and the Blue Notes but they project a decency and sensitivity that most R&B singers can't match.