Alex Henderson

Millie Jackson
An Imitation of Love

When Jive Records released Millie Jackson’s An Imitation of Love in 1986, Millie Jackson knew that the R&B landscape had changed considerably since the 1960s and 1970s. The Georgia-born singer had made a name for herself performing bluesy, gutsy rugged southern soul of the 1960s/1970s variety, drawing on influences that included Etta James, Koko Taylor, Tina Turner, Aretha Franklin and Carla Thomas, among others. And that type of R&B still had an audience in 1986, but it was an audience that one found on the blues circuit or in the A&R departments of small independent labels like Malaco Records and Alligator Records—not at commercial urban contemporary radio stations. So Jackson, who turned 42 in 1986, decided to record an album that balanced classic soul considerations and urban contemporary considerations; that approach paid off handsomely, resulting in the most successful album she recorded during the 1980s.

An Imitation of Love climbed to #16 on Billboard’s R&B albums chart and contained two major hits: “Love Is a Dangerous Game” (a #6 R&B hit in Billboard) and “Hot Wild Unrestricted Crazy Love” (which reached #9 on Billboard’s R&B singles chart).  The album contained some minor hits as well: “It’s a Thang” (a #79 R&B hit in Billboard) and the title track, which stalled at #58 R&B. Working with producers who included Timmy Allen and Wayne Braithwaite, Jackson demonstrated that she could be relevant to the urban contemporary scene of 1986 and still be faithful to her soul roots.  Tracks like “Need to Be Myself” and “Love Is a Dangerous Game” have a sleeker, glossier production style than the Millie Jackson of the 1970s, but vocally, she doesn’t sacrifice any grit.

The ballad “I Fell in Love” is easily the album’s most adult contemporary offering; if any song on An Imitation of Love could have been a big adult contemporary hit with the right promotion and exposure, it’s “I Feel in Love.” But on the other hand, Jackson takes Prince’s “I Wanna Be Your Lover” and makes it more bluesy and less pop-minded. “I Wanna Be Your Love” was a smash hit for Prince in 1979, spending two weeks at #1 on Billboard’s R&B singles chart and making it to #11 on the pop singles chart—and in 1986, Prince was even bigger than he had been in 1979. So it made perfect sense for Jackson to include a Prince cover on An Imitation of Love. Jackson’s remake of “I Wanna Be Your Love” wasn’t the blockbuster that Chaka Khan’s 1984 remake of Prince’s “I Feel for You” was, but it’s a memorable remake nonetheless.

FunkyTownGrooves’ expanded CD edition of An Imitation of Love contains all eight of the tracks from the original 1986 LP as well as six bonus tracks, which include extended versions of “It’s a Thang” and “I Wanna Be Your Lover.”  The bonus material also includes two versions of “Hot Wild Unrestricted Crazy Love” (an extended vocal version and an instrumental version) and two versions of “Love Is a Dangerous Game” (an extended vocal version and a 7” single version).

The Millie Jackson story began on July 15, 1944, when she was born in Thomson, Georgia. Jackson, however, spent much of her upbringing in New York City and nearby Newark, New Jersey—and it was around 1964 that she started performing live in and around the Big Apple. But

Jackson’s recording career didn’t begin until 1969, when she signed with MGM Records and recorded her debut single, “A Little Bit of Something.”

Jackson switched to Spring Records in 1972 (the year her self-titled debut LP came out) and stayed with that label until it folded in 1984. And it was at Spring that Jackson enjoyed her greatest commercial success, recording major hits that included “Ask Me What You Want” and “My Man, a Sweet Man” in 1972, “It Hurts So Good” in 1973 and “All the Way Lover” in 1977. Three of her Spring albums went gold in the United States for sales exceeding 500,000 copies (1974’s Caught Up, 1977’s Feelin’ Bitchy and 1978’s Get It Out’cha System). It wasn’t until after Spring went out of business that Jackson signed with Jive Records.

Jackson became identified with the southern soul sound during the 1970s, when she was often compared to southern singers like Denise LaSalle, Irma Thomas, Ann Peebles and Betty Wright. But Jackson never claimed to be a southern soul purist; she performed northern soul as well, and along the way, she has experimented with everything from disco to hip-hop (1980’s goofy, irreverent “I Had to Say It” was an early example of an R&B singer making a hip-hop parody recording) to country. In fact, one of her biggest hits was “If You’re Not Back in Love by Monday,” a song originally recorded by honky tonk/outlaw country icon Merle Haggard. In 1977, “If You’re Not Back in Love by Monday” was a #2 country hit for Haggard and a #5 R&B hit for Jackson.

One of the things that Jackson became known for during the 1970s was the humorous, sexually candid monologues she sometimes interjected into her recordings. Some of those spoken monologues were mildly risqué; others were flat-out raunchy. And they became a Millie Jackson trademark. Jackson, in fact, includes some of her edgy monologues on An Imitation of Love. But by 1986, Jackson’s monologues weren’t considered overly shocking—certainly not among people who had been listening to the sexually explicit lyrics that were coming from Prince and his Minneapolis colleagues as well as from hip-hop.

After An Imitation of Love, Jackson remained with Jive until 1993 (when she moved to Ichiban Records, an Atlanta-based label known for recording a lot of soul stars of the 1960 and 1970s). After her association with Ichiban ended, Jackson formed her own independent label, Weird Wreckurds (weirdwreckuds.com).

Jackson, now 68, continues to perform and record and has maintained a loyal fan base. And that fan base will find that she was in excellent form when she made her Jive Records debut with An Imitation of Love.

—Alex Henderson, March 2013

Alex Henderson’s work has appeared in Billboard, Spin, Creem, The L.A. Weekly, JazzTimes, Jazziz, AlterNet, Cash Box, HITS, CD Review, Skin Two, Black Beat, The Pasadena Weekly, Black Radio Exclusive (BRE), Music Connection, Latin Style, The New York City Jazz Record and many other well known publications. Henderson (alexvhenderson.com) has also contributed several thousand CD reviews to The All Music Guide’s popular website and series of music reference books.