1 Look Around (2:45)
2 Do Yourself a Favor (6:10)
3 Think of Me as Your Soldier (3:37)
4 Something Out of the Blue (2:59)
5 If You Really Love Me (3:00)
6 I Wanna Talk to You (5:18)
7 Take up a Course in Happiness (3:11)
8 Never Dreamed You'd Leave in Summer (2:53)
9 Sunshine in Their Eyes

One month before he turned 21, Stevie Wonder released Where I'm Coming From, the most distinctive record of his young career, and one that looked forward -- in its breadth of material as well as its futuristic production aesthetic -- to his many successes later in the '70s. There's a fabulous song here for nearly every type of fan; the soothing love ballad ("Think of Me as Your Soldier"), a gritty, apocalyptic funk extravanganza ("Do Yourself a Favor"), a kinetic, refreshing nod to the pop charts (the Top Ten hit "If You Really Love Me"), and an agonizing piece of heartache soul ("Never Dreamed You'd Leave in Summer" (slightly reworked for "Superwoman" on his next album Music of My Mind). Still, there are a few echoes of his occasionally pedestrian '60s work, and a pair of songs on the flipside sound especially anachronistic. The first is a piece of inspirational fluff called "Take up a Course in Happiness" with an odd arrangement pitched halfway between Sammy Davis, Jr. and Sgt. Pepper's, the second a jokey pick-up number named "I Wanna Talk to You" (complete with leering old-man vocals). Those two however, are the exceptions; the rules are uniformly excellent. The set closers "Never Dreamed You'd Leave in Summer" and "Sunshine in Their Eyes" are bravura performances, Stevie summoning his purest register to convey heartbreak and hopefulness, respectively, in equal measure. For all the great material included, there was little chance of these songs hanging together as a proper album, and Berry Gordy's misgivings about releasing a record like this on a Motown label were, temporarily, well-placed. Still, Where I'm Coming From was a frequently astonishing album from Motown's new genius of the recording studio. ~ John Bush, All Music Guide

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Oh my god, Stevie is untouchable...
What more can I say... Truly genius, extraordinary...
A lot of people don't know this album, and think that Music of My Mind was his first self-produced album, but they're wrong...
This was his VERY first self-produced album. And what a hell of album...
I don't understand why people sleeped on this one in 1971 ...
Maybe because Marvin released the same year his masterpiece What's goin on...
I don't know, but this album has so many great tunes... From Sunshine In Their Eyes to If You Really Love Me, it's unbelievable how talented when he was...

And he was only 20 years old !!!!

He was already able to compete with the best artist of his time...

A true forgotten masterpiece...

I love it
I love it
I love it

Stevie's most underrated album.

I especially love If You Really Love Me and the last track Sunshine In Their Eyes.

I prefer it to Music Of My Mind - in fact I hate it when people cite MOMM as the start of the string of classic Stevie albums.
[Edited 8/30/05 5:30am]

krayzie said:

I love this song.

"Think Of Me As Your Soldier", is sooooo underated.
Maybe my favorite ballad by Stevie.

I like "Sunshine In Their Eyes" alot. This album IS forgotten somehow...

DEFINITELY underrated. I think it's only a half step less magnificent than music of my mind. Sunshine in their eyes is like Stevie's Hey Jude.

I never even seen it

novamonkey said:

agree....

I wish it would be re-released. My copy isn't even in stereo. 'Look Around' is one of my fav Stevie tracks but I can't listen to it with earphones because it only plays in my right ear

i dig all stevies albums...but he was kinda getting his GOLDEN sound together still...it was right on the cusp...

His vocals in 'Never Dreamed You'd Leave In Summer'....
Nobody can touch that.

paisleypark4 said:

I know what you mean. They always have the other 70s albums.


I came across this album which I had never seen before and saw that it was only a year before Music Of My Mind and bought it. I haven't seen it in a store since then either.

BT11 said:

I can't believe I've never heard of this album. I remember this song though.