The Need of Love (1971)

 The Need of Love is the second studio album by American band Earth, Wind & Fire, released in November 1971 by Warner Bros. Records.^[2] The album reached No. 35 on the Billboard Top Soul Albums chart.^[3] The Need of Love would be the band's final album for Warner Bros. until 1993's Millennium on Reprise Records. 

 The ambitions of Earth, Wind & Fire only increased after their stellar debut, and the group brought an abstract sense of composition to their sophomore record, The Need of Love. The opener, a ten-minute piece named "Energy," is proof enough, with several extended passages inspired by everything from free jazz as well as in-the-pocket funk like Kool & the Gang. The next song up, "Beauty" is also positive and intriguing, though in an overly similar groove as "Fan the Fire" from the first album. The closer, a cover of Donny Hathaway's gloriously funky "Everything Is Everything," does justice to the original (and that's saying a lot). Compared to the debut, The Need of Love lacks a sense of exuberance as well as a passel of solid songs and performances.