Emotion (Barbra Streisand album)

Emotion was Barbra's first pop album since Guilty 's 1980 release. After the Memories compilation and the Yentl soundtrack, the label’s insistence on recording a pop album that could replicate Guilty’s success brought Barbara to the studio. Unlike Guilty , which was produced only by Barry Gibb , Emotion was produced by nine people.

The title track “Emotion” was recorded last for the album. The song was produced by Richard Perry, who worked with Barbra on Stoney End and Barbra Joan Streisand . A duet with Kim Carns , “Make No Mistake, He's Mine,” was recorded on June 21, 1984 at Bill Schnee Studios . Karnes said: “Before we met, Barbara was already performing cover versions of my two songs —-“ Love Comes From Unexpected Places “and“ Stay Away “. One day I got a call from John Peters, who was her manager at the time, and offered to write and sing a duet with Barbara. Despite the fact that I was terribly flattered, I said: 'I will think about it. I’ll try to come up with something. ” When I hung up, I thought: “This is so strange, our duet will never work, because our voices are so different. I can't do it. ' I sat down at the piano and spent about an hour or two working on the song. And you know, the song was born easily. I was so afraid of not having time to make it that I was even afraid to move away from the piano ” ^[3] . The song was re-recorded by Ronnie Milsap and Kenny Rogers with the title “Make No Mistake, She's Mine” and was a success on country radio.

Maurice White produced five songs for the album —- “Time Machine”, “When I Dream”, “Heart Don't Change My Mind”, “When the Lovin 'Goes Out of the Love” and “How Do You Keep the Music Playing ? " The last two were not included in the album. White later admitted that he was dissatisfied with the work on the album. He long and unsuccessfully insisted on releasing his songs as singles, believing that they could become big hits. In addition, he was unhappy that Barbara made a number of changes to his songs shortly before the release of the album without informing him of it ^[4] .

Barbra co-wrote the song “You're A Step in the Right Direction”. This was her first experience writing lyrics since 1979, when she worked on the song “Wet”. John Mellencamp wrote music for this song. He said that Barbra asked him to record an entire album with her, however, in view of their busyness, they did only one song together.

The song “Here We Are At Last” was written by Barbara with her boyfriend Richard Baskin. The song was originally supposed to be the soundtrack of the film The Main Event of 1979, but it was decided to use a more dance song suitable for the film. The song was also used in one of the scenes of another Streisand movie, Goofy .

The photo for the album was taken by Greg Gorman.

The album debuted on the Billboard 200 chart from 59th place on October 27, 1984, peaking at 19th place two weeks later and remaining on the chart for 28 weeks. On December 18, 1984, it was certified as platinum.

The first single from the album, “Left in the Dark,” was released in September 1984. As part of the single's promotional campaign, Barbra shot a video that was the first of her career to receive a rotation on MTV . The video was shot in three days in Los Angeles, directed by Jonathan Kaplan . One of the roles in the video was played by Chris Kristofferson , Streisand’s partner in the movie “A Star Was Born ” ^[5] . The single was not successful, reaching number 50 on the Billboard Hot 100 , remaining on the chart for 12 weeks ^[6] . The second single, “Make No Mistake, He's Mine,” was released in November. The song climbed to 51st on the Billboard Hot 100 and remained in the hundred 10 weeks ^[7] . The final single from the album was the title track, released in February 1985. A video was shot for the song with the participation of Roger Daltry and Mikhail Baryshnikov . The video was inspired by the film Conformist by Bernardo Bertolucci . The clip was shot by Richard Baskin in October 1984 in London. In order to promote the song, in addition to the clip, a short film was released about his filming —- The Making of Barbra Streisand's Emotion . A seven-minute video was shown in cinemas before the start of a full-length film ^[8] . Despite the big promotional campaign, the single failed, reaching only 79th in the US chart and staying in the top 100 for only 2 weeks.

1. Emotion (Peter Bliss) - 4:58
2. Make No Mistake, He's Mine (Kim Carnes) - 4:10
   • Duet performed by Streisand and Kim Carns
3. Time Machine ( Maurice White , Martin George Page , Brian Fairweather) - 4:56
4. Best I Could (Bobby Whiteside, Richard Parker) - 4:21
5. Left in the Dark (Jim Steinman) - 7:13
6. Heart Don't Change My Mind ( Diane Warren , Robbie Buchanan ) - 4:56
7. When I Dream ( Kathy Wakefield , Richard Baskin ) - 4:31
8. You're a Step in the Right Direction (B. Streisand, John Mellencamp ) - 3:54
9. Clear Sailing (Peter McIan, Anne Black Montgomery) - 3:56
10. Here We Are at Last (Streisand, R. Baskin]]) - 3:19

• The Barbra Streisand Official Site - Emotion
• Barbra Streisand Archives: Records / Emotion