Don't You Worry 'Bout A Thing / Blame It On The Sun
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Album Summary
Now here's a record that came straight from the soul, baby — this is the double A-side single 'Don't You Worry 'Bout A Thing / Blame It On The Sun,' drawn from Stevie Wonder's landmark 1974 album 'Fulfillingness' First Finale,' issued on Tamla/Motown Records. Stevie produced both sides himself, a testament to the hard-won creative autonomy he renegotiated with Motown back in 1971 — a deal that handed him the keys to his own artistic kingdom and changed the sound of soul music forever. With Wonder handling the bulk of the instrumentation and vocal production in his signature self-contained studio style, this single put two distinct masterworks back to back: the Latin-inflected, jazz-funk fire of 'Don't You Worry 'Bout A Thing' on one side, and the tender, aching balladry of 'Blame It On The Sun' on the other — a pairing that showed the world exactly who Stevie Wonder had become at the absolute peak of his classic period.
Reception
- 'Don't You Worry 'Bout A Thing' reached number 16 on the Billboard Hot 100 and performed strongly on the R&B charts, becoming one of the most recognizable and celebrated tracks of the Fulfillingness era.
- Critical reception at the time highlighted Wonder's sophisticated incorporation of Afro-Latin rhythmic influences and his extraordinary vocal range, reinforcing his standing as one of the most innovative artists in popular music.
- 'Blame It On The Sun' was widely praised for its emotional vulnerability and lyrical maturity, with critics citing it as evidence of Wonder's remarkable stylistic versatility across a single release.
Significance
- This single stands as a defining artifact of Stevie Wonder's classic period, showcasing a self-sufficient artist-producer who was not merely participating in the soul and funk traditions but actively expanding and reshaping their boundaries.
- The pairing of an uptempo Latin-influenced funk track alongside a delicate, introspective ballad on one release illustrated a breadth of artistic vision that was exceptionally rare in popular music of the era and contributed to broader mainstream acceptance of genre-blending within Black popular music of the 1970s.
- 'Don't You Worry 'Bout A Thing' endured far beyond its chart moment to become a cornerstone of Wonder's legacy, its Afro-Latin groove and jazz-funk sensibility influencing generations of R&B and hip-hop artists and cementing the track as one of the defining sounds of 1970s soul.
Samples
- "Don't You Worry 'Bout A Thing" — one of Stevie Wonder's most sampled recordings, with a rich history of interpolations and samples across R&B and hip-hop; among its most recognized uses is the interpolation by Incognito on their 1992 recording of the same name, and its groove and piano figure have been drawn upon by numerous producers across decades of popular music.
Tracklist
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A Don't You Worry 'Bout A Thing 61
3:40
-
B Blame It On The Sun 72
3:28
Artist Details
Stevie Wonder, born Steveland Hardaway Morris in Saginaw, Michigan in 1950, came up through the soul and R&B world as a child prodigy signed to Motown Records at just eleven years old, eventually blossoming into one of the most transcendent musical geniuses this world has ever been blessed to hear — a man who weaved together soul, funk, pop, and jazz into something that felt like pure human truth. His landmark run of albums in the 1970s — Talking Book, Innervisions, Fulfillingness' First Finale, and Songs in the Key of Life — set a standard so impossibly high that even the heavens had to take notice, earning him Grammy after Grammy while simultaneously speaking to the struggles, joys, and spiritual yearning of Black America and all of humanity. Stevie Wonder didn't just make music — he made medicine for the soul, and his influence on everything that came after him in R&B, pop, and beyond is so deep and wide that you simply cannot tell the story of modern music without his name sitting right at the very center of it.
