Aware of Love

by Bruce EderJerry Butler's third album, Aware of Love, is comprised of a dozen good if slightly uneven tracks, mostly pop-type ballads done in an early soul style with restrained string accompaniment, interspersed with a very impressive handful of originals. The latter, composed by Butler and Curtis Mayfield (and featuring Mayfield in a supporting role on vocals and guitar, roles he fulfills throughout this album), show real invention in the writing as well as the singing and arrangements, and outclass most of the rest here. The title track is a soaring soul ballad with a killer performance by Butler, backed by a lean electric band accompaniment and muted horns. "When Trouble Calls," "I'm a Telling You," and "Find Another Girl" are the other originals here, and between those four cuts that's most of the best parts of the album -- Butler does well enough on "The Wicked Man" and some of the other older-style, bluesier R&B tracks, but they're as stuck in the past as the originals point toward the future.