Madam Butterfly (album)

This article is about the Tavares album. For Puccini's opera, see Madama Butterfly. For other works with this title, see Madame Butterfly (disambiguation).
Madam Butterfly
Studio album by Tavares
Released January 1979
Genre R&B, soul
Length 37:39
Label Capitol
Producer Bobby Martin
Tavares chronology

Future Bound
(1978)		 Madam Butterfly
(1979)		 Supercharged
(1980)
Professional ratings
Review scores
Source Rating
Allmusic link

Madam Butterfly is the seventh album by American soul/R&B group Tavares, produced by Bobby Martin and released in 1979 on the Capitol label. By this stage in the group's career, they had become known as a disco act due to successful singles such as "Heaven Must Be Missing an Angel", "Whodunit" and "More Than a Woman. Madam Butterfly is however noted for its lack of anything approaching disco material, and as such is considered to be more akin in style to the group's 1973-1975 albums than to their 1976-1978 Freddie Perren-produced output.

"Never Had a Love Like This Before", one of several slow jams on the album, became a top 5 R&B hit and has subsequently become a quiet storm classic, while tracks such as "I'm Back for More" are more funk-based than listeners had come to expect from Tavares. Madam Butterfly performed respectably on the R&B chart, peaking at #13, but failed to achieve substantial sales in the crossover market. Its reputation has grown over the years and it is now considered among the group's best.

Track listing

  1. "Straight From Your Heart" (Len Ron Hanks, Zane Grey) - 4:23
  2. "Games, Games" (Sam Dees) - 4:30
  3. "Madam Butterfly" (Johnny Simon, Kenny Stover) - 4:29
  4. "Let Me Heal the Bruises" (Sam Dees) - 4:24
  5. "Never Had a Love Like This Before" (Len Ron Hanks, Zane Grey) - 4:32
  6. "One Telephone Call Away" (Benorce Blackmon) - 4:22
  7. "My Love Calls" (Sam Dees) - 5:05
  8. "Positive Forces" (J. Reaves, L. Reaves) - 2:56
  9. "I'm Back for More" (Kenny Stover) - 2:58

Singles