Havens' first three albums for the Verve-Forecast label established him as a major artist, and his history-making appearance opening the 1969 Woodstock Festival helped to make him a household name. By 1970, Havens had achieved sufficient success to launch his own Stormy Forest label, distributed by Verve's parent company, MGM. Havens released seven albums on Stormy Forest, until MGM's sale to PolyGram led to a buyout of Havens' label deal. Havens then signed to A&M, whose co-founder Jerry Moss had long expressed interest in working with him.

The changes that had occurred in the popular-music landscape in the decade since Havens began recording were reflected in the two albums Havens made for A&M, 1976's The End Of The Beginning and 1977's Mirage. Where Havens' prior albums had been built around the spare rhythmic spontaneity of his voice and guitar, his A&M releases recast Havens in a more explicitly contemporary pop/R&B mode. The artist rose to the occasion, delivering vocal performances whose warmth and honesty balanced the smoothly accessible arrangements.

The End Of The Beginning teamed Havens with producer David Kershenbaum. "He understood what I was doing, and he didn't try to force songs on me," says Havens, who reports that his transition to a more formal recording method was a smooth one. "I was equally comfortable with that approach, because for me it was always about the lyric, and whatever atmosphere that lyric needed. For me, it was about the songs, and the musicians who could play the atmosphere that I thought the song needed."

The End Of The Beginning—on which Havens was supported by an impressive musical cast including three-quarters of Booker T. & the MGs—featured a selection of material drawn from a variety of sources, some quite unexpected. The album opened with a haunting reading of 10cc's "I'm Not in Love," whose original version had been a hit just the year before. "It didn't matter to me if the song was current and was still on the radio with somebody else singing it," says Havens. "What mattered to me was if the lyric spoke to me and if I thought that I could bring something to it. I've always been good at looking past the grandiose arrangement to hear what the lyrics are really saying. 'I'm Not In Love' is a guy crying out from being so damn in love that he has to say he's not, and that really spoke to me."

Elsewhere on the album, Havens continued his longstanding exploration of the Bob Dylan songbook with a sensitive reading of the master's "If Not For You," while lending immediacy to such familiar tunes as Steely Dan's "Do It Again," Van Morrison's "Wild Night" and the Doobie Brothers' "Long Train Running," and bringing an organic intimacy to "Dreaming As One," "You Can Close Your Eyes" and his own "I Was Educated By Myself."

The veteran acoustic performer supported The End Of The Beginning by touring with his first electric touring band, including several of the musicians who'd played on the album. "It was different," he recalls, "but it didn't feel that different to me. On some of the songs we did on stage together, I didn't even have a guitar in my hand when I sang them, but that was sort of a flashback to my early days singing doo wop."

For his second A&M effort, Havens used his live band to back him in the studio. "By the time we made Mirage, we had been out on the road for a year, so it really was a band, and I think you can hear that," Havens notes.

In addition to three strong, reflective Havens compositions, Mirage—recorded with new producer Christopher Bond—found Havens taking on outside material that was less familiar than that on The End of the Beginning. "Those were the songs of that time for me, including some songs by friends that I'd always wanted to sing. There are songs that I carry around with me until they find the other group of songs that they belong with, and there are several of those on Mirage."

Havens would eventually return to his acoustic roots, but his A&M albums stand as a fascinating departure, offering an alternate perspective on a one-of-a-kind talent. "In a way," he says, "it was a wonderful vacation from what I usually do."

Scott Schinder
New York City
March 2004