"What It Comes Down To" is a song by

The Isley Brothers The Isley Brothers ( ) are an American musical group originally from Cincinnati, Ohio, that began as a vocal trio consisting of brothers O'Kelly Isley Jr., Rudolph Isley and Ronald Isley in the 1950s. With a career spanning over seven decade ...

, who released it in late 1973 as a follow-up to the group's crossover pop hit, " That Lady, Pt. 1 & 2".

Song information

Both songs were featured on the group's Epic debut, ''

3 + 3 ''3 + 3'' is the eleventh album released by the Isley Brothers for the Epic label under their T-Neck imprint on August 7, 1973. In 2020, the album was ranked at 464 on ''Rolling Stone'' 500 Greatest Albums of All Time list. Background Their ...

''. It features a synthesizer keyboard solo from

Chris Jasper Christopher Howard Jasper (born December 30, 1951) Allmusic biography/ref> is an American singer, composer, and producer. Jasper is a former member of the Isley Brothers and Isley-Jasper-Isley and is responsible for writing and producing the ...

Ernie Isley Ernest Isley (born March 7, 1952) is an American musician, best known as a member of the musical ensemble The Isley Brothers, and also the splinter group Isley-Jasper-Isley. Biography Ernie was born in Cincinnati, where his older brothers for ...

on guitar and

Ronald Isley Ronald Isley (; born May 21, 1941) is an American recording artist, songwriter, record producer, and occasional actor. Isley is the lead singer and founding member of the family music group The Isley Brothers. Early life Born in 1941 to Sally ...

on lead vocals. The b-side of the song was the ballad "

The Highways of My Life "The Highways of My Life" is a song by The Isley Brothers. It was released in 1974 as a single from their album ''3 + 3''. The song was released as the b-side of "What It Comes Down To", though the song attracted UK fans of the group enough to p ...

Charts

The song peaked at number 55 on the ''Billboard'' Hot 100 and was a top five hit on the

R&B singles The Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs chart ranks the most popular R&B and hip hop songs in the United States and is published weekly by '' Billboard''. Rankings are based on a measure of radio airplay, sales data, and streaming activity. The chart had 100 ...

chart where it peaked at number 5.

Personnel

– lead vocals *Ronald Isley,

Rudolph Isley Rudolph Bernard Isley (born April 1, 1939 in Cincinnati, Ohio) is an American singer-songwriter and is one of the founding members of The Isley Brothers. Life and career Born and raised in Cincinnati, Ohio, Rudy began singing in church at a youn ...

and O'Kelly Isley Jr. – backing vocals *

– guitars, percussion, backing vocals *

Marvin Isley Marvin Isley (August 18, 1953 – June 6, 2010)
– accessed June 2010 was the youngest member of the family music grou ...

– bass guitar, backing vocals *

– electric piano, clavinet,

ARP synthesizer ARP Instruments, Inc. was a Lexington, Massachusetts manufacturer of electronic musical instruments, founded by Alan Robert Pearlman in 1969. It created a popular and commercially successful range of synthesizers throughout the 1970s before de ...

, backing vocals *Truman Thomas – Hammond organ *George Moreland – drums

External links

1973 singles The Isley Brothers songs T-Neck Records singles {{1970s-single-stub