''Takin' It Easy'' is the ninth studio album by

Seals and Crofts Seals and Crofts were an American soft rock duo formed in Los Angeles, California in 1969 by James Eugene Seals (October 17, 1942 – June 6, 2022) and Darrell George "Dash" Crofts (born August 14, 1938). They are best known for their hits " Su ...

, released in 1978 by

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 ...

. It was their last album to chart and contain any charting singles. " You're the Love" reached #18 in early 1978 and #8 in Canada. The title track reached #79 later the same year and #13 on the Canadian AC charts. The title track has a more rock-oriented approach than was the band's usual fare, and was essentially a James Seals solo track, with Dash Crofts making no contribution to either writing or performing it. Seals in turn was absent from the album's second track, "One More Time". The album in general relied more heavily on outside musicians and songwriters than Seals and Crofts's previous albums, with the duo writing barely half the songs themselves and only occasionally performing anything other than lead vocals. The cover photograph was taken at the historic Oak Alley Plantation in Louisiana.

Track listing

#"Takin' It Easy" (Sean MacLeod, Bob Phillips) #"One More Time" (Lewis Anderson) #"Midnight Blue" ( Jim Seals, Dash Crofts) #" You're the Love" (

David Batteau David Hurst Batteau (born June 25, 1949) is an American singer-songwriter. Batteau is the son of Blanca Batteau and Dr. Dwight Wayne Batteau, of Harvard University and Tufts University. He is the brother of singer-songwriters Robin Batteau an ...

Louie Shelton William Louis Shelton (born April 6, 1941) is an American guitarist and music producer. Biography During the 1960s, 1970s, and 1980s Shelton was a session musician working in recording studios around Hollywood, Los Angeles, California, Hollywood. ...

) #"Sunrise" (Grant Gullickson, Brian Whitcomb) #"Breaking in a Brand New Love" (Seals, Crofts) #"Magnolia Moon" (Seals, Crofts) #"Nobody Gets Over Lovin' You" (Seals, Crofts) #"Forever Like the Rose" (Seals, Crofts) #"A Tribute to

ʻAbdu'l-Bahá ʻAbdu'l-Bahá (; Persian: , ;, 23 May 1844 – 28 November 1921), born ʻAbbás (, ), was the eldest son of Baháʼu'lláh, founder of the Bahá’í Faith, who designated him to be his successor and head of the Baháʼí Faith from 1892 un ...

" (Seals, Crofts)

Personnel

* James Seals – lead vocals (except on "One More Time"), acoustic guitar (on "Midnight Blue", "Breaking in a Brand New Love", "Forever Like the Rose", and "A Tribute to ʻAbdu'l-Bahá"), tenor sax on "Sunrise" * Dash Crofts – lead vocals (except on "Takin' It Easy" and "Midnight Blue"), mandolin *

– production, guitars (except on "A Tribute to ʻAbdu'l-Bahá"), arrangements, art concept * Tony Peluso – guitars on "Takin' It Easy" and "Sunrise",

Buchla synthesizer Buchla Electronic Musical Instruments (BEMI) was a manufacturer of synthesizers and unique MIDI controllers. The origins of the company could be found in Buchla & Associates, created in 1963 by synthesizer pioneer Don Buchla of Berkeley, Californi ...

on "Sunrise", backing vocals on "Takin' It Easy" and "One More Time", arrangements (for "Takin' It Easy", "One More Time", and "Sunrise") *

Marty Walsh Martin Joseph Walsh (born April 10, 1967) is an American politician and trade union official who served as the 58th mayor of Boston from 2014 to 2021 and as the 29th United States Secretary of Labor from 2021 to 2023. A member of the Democr ...

– guitars on "Takin' It Easy" and "Forever Like the Rose" * Larry Rolando – guitars (on "One More Time", "Midnight Blue", "You're the Love", "Breaking in a Brand New Love", and "Nobody Gets Over Lovin' You") * Dan Fergueson –

dobro Dobro () is an American brand of resonator guitars owned by Gibson and manufactured by its subsidiary Epiphone. The term "dobro" is also used as a generic term for any wood-bodied, single-cone resonator guitar. The Dobro was originally a gui ...

on "Midnight Blue" * Dennis Belfield – bass (except on "Takin' It Easy", "Midnight Blue", and "Forever Like the Rose") * Dominic Genova – bass on "Takin' It Easy" and "Forever Like the Rose" * David Parlota – bass on "Midnight Blue" * Steven Olitzky – piano (on "Takin' It Easy", "One More Time", "You're the Love", "Nobody Gets Over Lovin' You", and "Forever Like the Rose") * Tom Hensley – piano (on "One More Time", "You're the Love", "Breaking in a Brand New Love", "Magnolia Moon", and "Nobody Gets Over Loving You") * Brian Whitcomb – piano on "Sunrise" and "Breaking in a Brand New Love" *

David Foster David Walter Foster (born November 1, 1949) is a Canadian record producer, composer, arranger, and musician. He has won 16 Grammy Awards from 47 nominations. His career began as a keyboardist for the pop group Skylark in the early 1970s befor ...

– piano on "Midnight Blue" * Danny Deardroff – harmonica on "Midnight Blue" * Ralph Humphrey – drums (on "Takin' It Easy", "One More Time", "You're the Love", "Magnolia Moon", and "Nobody Gets Over Lovin' You") * Ron Krasinski – drums (on "Takin' It Easy", "You're the Love", "Nobody Gets Over Lovin' You", and "Forever Like the Rose") * James Divisek – drums and Buchla programming on "Sunrise" and "Breaking in a Brand New Love" *

Jim Keltner James Lee Keltner (born April 27, 1942) is an American drummer and percussionist known primarily for his session work. He was characterized by Bob Dylan biographer Howard Sounes as "the leading session drummer in America". Howard Sounes. ''Do ...

– drums on "Midnight Blue" * Bob Zimmitti –

tympani Timpani (; ) or kettledrums (also informally called timps) are musical instruments in the percussion family. A type of drum categorised as a hemispherical drum, they consist of a membrane called a head stretched over a large bowl traditionally ...

on "Midnight Blue" * Shaun Furlong – strings programming on "Sunrise" *

Don Menza Don Menza (born April 22, 1936) is an American jazz saxophonist. Career Menza was born in Buffalo, New York, Buffalo, where he attended Grover Cleveland High School (Buffalo, New York), Grover Cleveland High School. After serving in the U.S. ...

– tenor sax on "Magnolia Moon" * Alan Estes – vibraphone on "Nobody Gets Over Lovin' You" * Manoochehr Sadeghi –

santur The santur ( ; ) is a hammered dulcimer of Iranian origin.--- Rashid, Subhi Anwar (1989). ''Al-ʼĀlāt al-musīqīyya al-muṣāhiba lil-Maqām al-ʻIrāqī''. Baghdad: Matbaʻat al-ʻUmmāl al-Markazīyya. History The santur was invented ...

and Persian chanting on "A Tribute to ʻAbdu'l-Bahá" * Sean MacLeod and Bob Phillips – backing vocals on "Takin' It Easy" *

Tanya Tucker Tanya Denise Tucker (born October 10, 1958) is an American country music singer and songwriter who had her first hit, "Delta Dawn", in 1972 at the age of 13. During her career Tucker became one of the few child performers to mature into adulthood ...

Sherlie Matthews Sherlie Mae Matthews (born November 10, 1934) is an American singer, songwriter and former Motown Records producer, best known as a backing vocalist for pop, R&B and rock groups from the mid-1960s to the present. Mirwood Employing her as bot ...

Jim Gilstrap James Gilstrap is an American singer and session musician. He is best known for his 1975 solo hit single " Swing Your Daddy", as well as singing co-lead to the theme from the TV series ''Good Times''. Career Gilstrap was born November 10, 1946 ...

, and

Venetta Fields Venetta Lee Fields (born 1941) is an American-born Australian singer and musical theater actress, and vocal coach. Fields was a backing vocalist for touring American and British rock and pop acts of the 1960s and 1970s, as well as working as a ...

– backing vocals on "Nobody Gets Over Lovin' You" * Gary Sims – arrangement and backing vocals on "One More Time" * Doug Strawn – arrangement and backing vocals on "One More Time" *

Gene Page Eugene Edgar Page Jr. (September 13, 1939 – August 24, 1998) was an American conductor, composer, arranger and record producer, most active from the mid-1960s through the mid-1980s. His sound can be heard in the arrangements he did for Jeffer ...

– string arrangement for "You're the Love" *

Lee Holdridge Lee Elwood Holdridge (born March 3, 1944) is a Haitian-born American composer, conductor, and orchestrator. An 18-time Emmy Award nominee, he has won two Primetime Emmy Awards, two Daytime Emmy Awards, two News and Documentary Emmy Awards, and o ...

Track listing

Personnel

Charts

Notes

References