''Color of Success'' is the debut album by the

funk Funk is a music genre that originated in African-American communities in the mid-1960s when musicians created a rhythmic, danceable new form of music through a mixture of various music genres that were popular among African-Americans in the ...

/ R&B singer,

Morris Day Morris E. Day (born December 13, 1957) is an American musician and songwriter. He is best known as the lead singer of The Time. Music career Morris Day is best known as the lead singer of The Time, a group associated with Prince. Day and Pr ...

released in 1985 on

Warner Bros. Records Warner Records Inc. (known as Warner Bros. Records Inc. until 2019) is an American record label. A subsidiary of Warner Music Group, it is headquartered in Los Angeles, California. It was founded on March 19, 1958, as the recorded music division ...

. This album has been certified Gold in the US by the

RIAA The Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) is a trade organization that represents the music recording industry in the United States. Its members consist of record labels and distributors that the RIAA says "create, manufacture, and/o ...

Background

Released a year after departing previous band The Time, the album is similar in style to The Time's material, even going so far as to copy The Time's formula of six songs per album. The album's highlight is "The Oak Tree", a funky-pop number about a dance, akin to " The Bird" by The Time. The album was produced, arranged and composed by Day, who also played drums and keyboards throughout the album. Also on keyboards was Rickey "Freeze" Smith, who would later join Day in the revamped version of The Time in the mid-1990s.

Critical reception

James Henke of ''

Rolling Stone ''Rolling Stone'' is an American monthly magazine that focuses on music, politics, and popular culture. It was founded in San Francisco, California, in 1967 by Jann Wenner and the music critic Ralph J. Gleason. The magazine was first known fo ...

'', in a 3 out of 5 stars review, remarked "On his first solo album, former The Time singer Morris Day continues to play the role he perfected in '' Purple Rain'' that of the coolest, baddest dude around. Musically, this is uptempo R&B, not quite heavy on the synths as the Time's material was." Rob Theakston of

AllMusic AllMusic (previously known as All-Music Guide and AMG) is an American online database, online music database. It catalogs more than three million album entries and 30 million tracks, as well as information on Musical artist, musicians and Mus ...

wrote "''The Color of Success'' offers to fans what Day does best, funky but accessible dance-pop music in the vein of many of his Minneapolis contemporaries. While the album runs a little bit on the short side, there is no filler and it is surprisingly consistent from start to finish."

Track listing

Credits

Drums The drum is a member of the percussion instrument, percussion group of musical instruments. In the Hornbostel–Sachs classification system, it is a membranophones, membranophone. Drums consist of at least one Acoustic membrane, membrane, c ...

and

percussion A percussion instrument is a musical instrument that is sounded by being struck or scraped by a percussion mallet, beater including attached or enclosed beaters or Rattle (percussion beater), rattles struck, scraped or rubbed by hand or ...

- Morris Day *

Drum programming Programming is a form of music production and performance using electronic devices and computer software, such as sequencers and workstations or hardware synthesizers, sampler and sequencers, to generate sounds of musical instruments. These mu ...

- Steve Mitchell *

Engineer Engineers, as practitioners of engineering, are professionals who Invention, invent, design, build, maintain and test machines, complex systems, structures, gadgets and materials. They aim to fulfill functional objectives and requirements while ...

- Richard Kaplan *Guitar - Horace Bokie Coleman Jr., Howie Rice, Roland Bautista, Tony Berg * Mixing - Michael Brauer, Morris Day *Piano -

Greg Phillinganes Gregory Arthur Phillinganes (born May 12, 1956) is an American keyboardist, vocalist, and arranger. A session musician, Phillinganes has contributed to numerous albums over a broad array of artists and genres. He has toured with artists includin ...

* Producer - Morris Day *Synthesizer - Howie Rice,

Larry Dunn Larry Dunn (born Lorenzo Russell Dunn; June 19, 1953) is an American keyboardist, producer, songwriter and musical director, known as one of the original members of the music group Earth, Wind & Fire. Dunn was inducted, as a former band member, in ...

, Morris Day, Ricky "Freeze" Smith, Steve Mitchell *Vocals - Morris Day (lead), Angie Johnson, Bunny Hull, Clydene Jackson,

Kit Hain Kit Hain (born Keturah V Hain, 15 December 1952) is a British singer, songwriter, musician and writer. She was a member of the pop rock duo Marshall Hain and had a solo career as a performer and songwriter. Musical career Hain met Julian Mar ...

, Mary Bridges, Maxayne Lewis, Mimi Brodsky, Sharon Robinson

Charts

References

{{Authority control Morris Day albums 1985 debut albums Warner Records albums