''At the Top'' is the eighteenth studio album by American

soul music Soul music is a popular music genre that originated in African-American culture, African-American African-American neighborhood, communities throughout the United States in the late 1950s and early 1960s. Catchy rhythms, stressed by handclaps ...

vocal group A musical ensemble, also known as a music group, musical group, or a band is a group of people who perform instrumental and/or vocal music, with the ensemble typically known by a distinct name. Some music ensembles consist solely of instrume ...

Four Tops The Four Tops are an American vocal group formed in Detroit, Michigan in 1953 as the Four Aims. They were one of the most commercially successful American pop music groups of the 1960s and helped propel Motown Records to international fame. The ...

, released by

ABC Records ABC Records was an American record label founded in New York City in 1955. It originated as the main popular music label operated by the Am-Par Record Corporation. Am-Par also created the Impulse! jazz label in 1960. It acquired many labels bef ...

. The album was the last the group recorded for ABC and was followed by a brief hiatus from recording. Four Tops had experienced a decline in their album sales in the 1970s and also had difficulty booking touring dates, so they initially planned to team up with former

Motown Motown is an American record label owned by the Universal Music Group. Founded by Berry Gordy, Berry Gordy Jr. as Tamla Records on January 12, 1959, it was incorporated as Motown Record Corporation on April 14, 1960. Its name, a portmanteau ...

associates

Holland–Dozier–Holland Holland–Dozier–Holland, often abbreviated as H-D-H, was a songwriting and production team consisting of Lamont Dozier and brothers Brian and Eddie Holland. The trio wrote, arranged and produced many songs that helped define the ...

, but they instead recorded this album with

Philadelphia soul Philadelphia soul, sometimes called Philly soul, the Philadelphia sound, Phillysound, or The Sound of Philadelphia (TSOP), is a genre of late 1960s–1970s soul music characterized by funk influences and lush string and horn arrangements. The ...

producer Norman Harris at his

Sigma Sound Studios Sigma Sound Studios was an American independent recording studio in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, founded in 1968 by recording engineer Joseph Tarsia. Located at 212 North 12th Street in Philadelphia, Sigma Sound is closely associated with Philade ...

Reception

Editors at

AllMusic Guide AllMusic (previously known as All-Music Guide and AMG) is an American online music database. It catalogs more than three million album entries and 30 million tracks, as well as information on musicians and bands. Initiated in 1991, the dat ...

scored this release three out of five stars, with reviewer Andrew Hamilton characterizing release as "a quality Four Tops album", but "the songs, productions, and singing deserved a better fate", with "lightweight promotion" from ABC. The 1992 edition of ''The'' Rolling Stone ''Album Guide'' rated this release two out of five stars.

Track listing

#"H.E.L.P." ( Norman Harris and

Ron Tyson The Temptations is an American vocal group formed in Detroit, Michigan, in 1961 as The Elgins, known for their string of successful singles and albums with Motown from the 1960s to the mid-1970s. The group's work with producer Norman Whitfield ...

) – 5:55 #"Bits and Pieces" (Bruce Gray, Leroy Green, and Harris) – 4:10 #"Seclusion" (Harris and Tyson) – 4:28 #"Put It on the News" (Harris and Tyson) – 4:21 #"This House" (Harris and Tyson) – 4:41 #"Just in Time" (Harris and Tyson) – 3:47 #"Inside a Brokenhearted Man" (Jerry Akines, John Bellman, Victor Drayton, and Buddy Turner) – 3:26 #"When Your Dreams Take Wings and Fly" (Gray, Green, and Harris) – 6:18

Personnel

Four Tops *

Renaldo Benson Renaldo "Obie" Benson (June 14, 1936 – July 1, 2005) was an American soul and R&B singer and songwriter. He was best known as a founding member and the bass singer of Motown group the Four Tops, which he joined in 1953 and continued to perfo ...

– bass vocals *

Abdul Fakir Abdul Kareem "Duke" Fakir (December 26, 1935 – July 22, 2024) was an American singer. He co-founded the Motown quartet the Four Tops and performed in an ensemble under that name from 1953 until shortly before his death. He was the group's las ...

– first tenor vocals *

Lawrence Payton Lawrence Albert Payton Sr. (March 2, 1938 – June 20, 1997) was an American tenor, songwriter, vocal arranger, musician, and record producer for the popular Motown quartet, the Four Tops. Career Payton and Obie Benson both attended a Northern ...

– second tenor vocals *

Levi Stubbs Levi Stubbs (born Levi Stubbles, June 6, 1936 – October 17, 2008) was an American baritone singer, widely known as the lead vocalist of the R&B group the Four Tops, that released a variety of Motown hit records during the 1960s and 1970s. He ...

– lead baritone vocals Additional personnel *Keith Benson – drums *Caryle J. Blackwell – production assistance, coordination *Bruce Bluestein – assistant engineering *George "Go-Madd" Bussey – arrangement *Dirk Devlin – engineering *Don Renaldo & His Swinging Strings & Horns – strings, horns *Bill Dorman – assistant engineering *Jack Faith – arrangement *Richard Germinaro –

art direction Art director is a title for a variety of similar job functions in theater, advertising, marketing, publishing, fashion, live-action and animated film and television, the Internet, and video games. It is the charge of a sole art director to super ...

, artwork *Bruce Gray – keyboards, production *Norman Harris – guitar, arrangement, production *Carlton Kent – keyboards *Stuart Kusher – art direction, artwork *Leon Mitchell – arrangement *Earl Miller – photography *Edward Moore – guitar *Tom Nikosey – lettering *Carl Paruolo – engineering *Darrell Rogers – assistant engineering *Rocky Schnaars – assistant engineering *Henri Smith – percussion *Jeffrey Stewart – assistant engineering *Michael Tarsia – assistant engineering *T. J. Tindall – guitar *

– production *Larry Washington – percussion *James Williams – bass guitar

Chart performance

''At the Top'' peaked at 73 on the R&B charts.

References

External links