''In Square Circle'' is the twentieth studio album by American singer-songwriter Stevie Wonder, released in 1985. The album features the hit singles " Part-Time Lover" (No. 1), " Go Home" (No. 10), " Overjoyed" (No. 24), and "Land of La La" (No. 86). The album earned Wonder a Grammy for

Best Male R&B Vocal Performance The Grammy Award for Best Male R&B Vocal Performance was awarded between 1968 and 2011. The award has had several minor name changes: *In 1968 it was awarded as Best R&B Solo Vocal Performance, Male *From 1969 to 1994 it was awarded as Best R&B V ...

at the 1986 Grammy Awards. ''In Square Circle'' made the top five on the

Pop Albums The ''Billboard'' 200 is a record chart ranking the 200 most popular Album, music albums and extended play, EPs in the United States. It is published weekly by ''Billboard (magazine), Billboard'' magazine and is frequently used to convey the ...

chart, and spent 12 weeks at number one on the

Top R&B Albums Top R&B/Hip-Hop Albums is a music chart published weekly by ''Billboard'' magazine that ranks R&B and hip hop albums based on sales in the United States and is compiled by Nielsen SoundScan. The chart debuted as Hot R&B LPs in the issue dated Ja ...

chart. On the UK Albums Chart, it peaked at number five.

Track listing

All songs written, produced and arranged by Stevie Wonder. Side one #" Part-Time Lover" – 4:09 #"I Love You Too Much" – 5:30 #"Whereabouts" – 4:17 #" Stranger on the Shore of Love" – 5:01 #"Never in Your Sun" – 4:07 Side two #"Spiritual Walkers" – 5:12 #"Land of La La" – 5:14 #" Go Home" – 5:18 #" Overjoyed" – 3:43 #"It's Wrong (Apartheid)" – 3:29

Musicians

"Part-Time Lover" * Stevie Wonder – lead vocal, synthesizers, drums * Luther Vandross – lead vocal, background vocal *

Syreeta Wright Syreeta Wright (February 28, 1946 – July 6, 2004), who recorded professionally under the single name Syreeta, was an American singer-songwriter, best known for her music during the early 1970s through the early 1980s. Wright's career heights we ...

– background vocal *

Philip Bailey Philip James Bailey (born May 8, 1951) is an American R&B, soul, gospel and funk singer, songwriter and percussionist, best known as an early member and one of the two lead singers (along with group founder Maurice White) of the band Earth, ...

– background vocal * Keith John – background vocal * Melody McCully, Billy Durham, Peter Byrne, Renee Hardaway, Darryl Phinnessee – background vocal "I Love You Too Much" * Stevie Wonder – lead vocal, background vocal, synthesizers, drums, percussion "Whereabouts" * Stevie Wonder – lead vocal, synthesizers, drums, percussion * Keith John – background vocal * Darryl Phinnessee – background vocal *

Deniece Williams Deniece Williams (born June Deniece Chandler; June 3, 1951) is an American singer. She has been described as "one of the great soul voices" by the BBC. She is best known for the songs " Free", " Silly", "It's Gonna Take a Miracle" and two ''Bil ...

– background vocal * Howard Smith – background vocal "Stranger on the Shore of Love" * Stevie Wonder – lead vocal, background vocal, synthesizers, drums, harpsichord, accordion "Never in Your Sun" * Stevie Wonder – lead vocal, background vocal, synthesizers, drums, percussion, harmonica "Spiritual Walkers" * Stevie Wonder – lead vocal,

Yamaha CS-80 The Yamaha CS-80 is an analog synthesizer released in 1977. It supports true 8-voice polyphony, with two independent synthesizer layers per voice each with its own set of front panel controls, in addition to a number of hardwired preset voice set ...

synthesizer, drums, percussion * Edwin Birdsong – Yamaha CS-80 synthesizer * Larry Gittens – trumpet * Bob Malach – saxophone * Janice Moore, Cheta Akins, Carolyn Garrett, Ruthell Holmes, Kay Gibbs, Valencia Cox – background vocal "Land of La La" * Stevie Wonder – lead vocal, background vocal, synthesizers, electric piano, percussion, drums * Ben Bridges – guitar * Rick Zunigar – guitar * Renee Hardaway – background vocal "Go Home" * Stevie Wonder – lead vocal, background vocal, synthesizers, drums,

vocoder A vocoder (, a portmanteau of ''voice'' and ''encoder'') is a category of speech coding that analyzes and synthesizes the human voice signal for audio data compression, multiplexing, voice encryption or voice transformation. The vocoder was ...

* Bob Malach – saxophone * Larry Gittens – trumpet "Overjoyed" * Stevie Wonder – lead vocal, background vocal,

acoustic piano The piano is a stringed keyboard instrument in which the strings are struck by wooden hammers that are coated with a softer material (modern hammers are covered with dense wool felt; some early pianos used leather). It is played using a keyboa ...

, environmental percussion (incl.: crickets, bird sounds, ocean, pebbles in pond, stone dropped, crushing leaves), Yamaha CS-80 synthesizer *

Earl Klugh Earl Klugh ( ; born September 16, 1953) is an American acoustic guitarist and composer. He has won one Grammy award and thirteen nominations. Klugh was awarded the “1977” Best Recording Award For Performance and Sound” for his album “Fin ...

– guitar *

Paul Riser Paul Riser (born September 11, 1943) is an American trombonist and Motown musical arranger who was responsible for co-writing and arranging dozens of top ten hit records. His legacy as one of the " Funk Brothers" is similar to that of most of ...

– string arrangement "It's Wrong (Apartheid)" * Stevie Wonder – lead vocal, synthesizers, drums, percussion, kora * Musa Dludla, Thandeka Ngono-Raasch, Linda Bottoman-Tshabalala, Muntu Myuyana, Lorraine Mahlangu-Richards, Fana Kekana, Tsepo Mokone – background vocal

Personnel

* Stevie Wonder – producer, performer, writer, composer *

Bob Bralove Bob Bralove is a keyboard–synthesizer player who worked as a sound technician with the Grateful Dead from 1986 to 1995. Throughout his tenure, he performed as an auxiliary musician throughout "Drums" and "Space", the band's signature aleatoric ...

Brad Buxer Bradley Buxer is an American keyboardist and composer, known for his many collaborations with the American musician Michael Jackson. In addition to recording with Jackson, Buxer was also the musical director for Jackson's tours for many years. Pr ...

, Abdoulaye Soumare – synthesizer programming * Gary Olazabal – synthesizer programming, recording engineer, associate producer, audio mixing * Bobby Holland – photography (album cover/booklet), concept designer (album cover) * Renee Hardaway – concept designer (album cover) * Johnny Lee – art direction (album cover)

Notable performances

"Go Home" was performed during the 1986 Grammy Awards ceremony as part of a synthesizer

jam Jam is a type of fruit preserve. Jam or Jammed may also refer to: Other common meanings * A firearm malfunction * Block signals ** Radio jamming ** Radar jamming and deception ** Mobile phone jammer ** Echolocation jamming Arts and ente ...

with

Thomas Dolby Thomas Morgan Robertson (born 14 October 1958), known by the stage name Thomas Dolby, is an English musician, producer, composer, entrepreneur and teacher. Dolby came to prominence in the 1980s, releasing hit singles including "She Blinded Me ...

, Herbie Hancock, and Howard Jones. It was also performed, along with "Overjoyed," on the May 7, 1983, episode of ''

Saturday Night Live ''Saturday Night Live'' (often abbreviated to ''SNL'') is an American late-night live television sketch comedy and variety show created by Lorne Michaels and developed by Dick Ebersol that airs on NBC and Peacock (streaming service), Peacock. ...

'', which Wonder hosted.

Charts

Weekly charts

Year-end charts

Certifications

References

{{Authority control Stevie Wonder albums 1985 albums Motown albums Albums produced by Stevie Wonder Tamla Records albums