I knew that he had a lovely voice and that, when he used it, women of a certain age would get hot and bothered. I knew that he was a staple of 98.7 KISS-FM. But, many years after I first heard his name and, presumably, his voice, I could still not name a single Luther Vandross song. His name sounds like all of those things rolled up into a single voice. The mere utterance of his name conjures images of beaches and swans and perfume bottles and Showtime at The Apollo. Perhaps more astounding, though, was my most obvious and embarrassing blind spot - Luther Vandross. Through osmosis, I seemingly knew every song in the canon, but understood nothing about its roots or its significance. Candidly, I had never even heard the term until a couple of years ago. Given its genteel nature, Quiet Storm is easily missed and dismissed. Like a mist of fragrance or like the theme song to a daytime soap opera on a sick day from school. To be clear, I did not seek any of these songs out as a child or a teen. And I swear that I can still feel the clay that was used in Lionel Richie’s “Hello” video. I remember my older cousin swooning when Billy Ocean’s “Suddenly” came on the radio. I remember Anita Baker’s “Sweet Love” floating behind the sound of silverware and dinner conversation at the local Italian restaurant. I recall Grover Washington Jr’s “Just the Two of Us” playing while I ran errands with my mother. Throughout most of my youth, I listened to Quiet Storm, though almost never intentionally. It differs from Slow Jams, though, in that the desire is kinder, gentler and a little less (Keith) sweaty. And, to state the obvious, Quiet Storm is slow, patient music. Quiet Storm, however, is all rounded edges. Soul frequently pleads and pushes through the vocals. And even when it isn’t hard, it grooves from the bottom. Funk, for example, is typically hard on the edges and its rhythms are heavy on the one. Though it’s not a codified genre, Quiet Storm is clearly distinguishable from Funk, Soul and R&B. You might hear the Quiet Storm in the background, but you definitely noticed the flushness in your cheeks. It was music made mostly by Black women and men, but ultimately appreciated by anyone who understood that the path to sex ran through the senses. It was a perfect soundtrack for the bummer days of the Carter administration and for the latent desires of the Me Generation. But for over a decade, it functioned as both an opiate and an aphrodisiac. By the early 90s, as Hip Hop ascended and R&B got freakier, Quiet Storm became something of a quaint anachronism. It grooved just enough to help accelerate foreplay but was inconspicuous enough to not distract from the climax. It was music meant to be played in the background while you shopped for groceries, or washed the dishes or daydreamed of romance. In time, the format became synonymous with bougie Black domesticity and female-centric sensuality. Though it has strong genetic connections with both Ambient music and Soul music, Quiet Storm was never taken quite so seriously as its close relatives.
But, when it reached its peak in the mid-80s, DJs would play Al Green into Bill Withers in Sade into Lionel Richie into The Isley Brothers into Anita Baker into the champion of the form, Luther Vandross. If you search hard enough, you’ll still find a smattering of Quiet Storm programs broadcasting today. DJs would pull tracks from Funk, Soul, R&B, Adult Contemporary, AM Gold and Pop, itself. In fact, it was never one specific thing. And It wasn’t a passing trend, like Disco. “Quiet Storm” was never a dominant format. Just a year later, Melvin Lindsey, on WHUR in Washington D.C., was hosting a radio show named after and devoted to this sinuous form. In 1975, uncoincidentally the same year as Eno’s ambient debut, Smokey Robinson’s released “A Quiet Storm.” On that album, the Motown legend, who was on a bit of a cold streak, tried to capture the sad, but beautiful, feeling of rolling thunder and cleansing rain. And then there is Quiet Storm, a sub-genre of Soul and R&B that may be more a vibe than a particular strain. When Brian Eno released “Discreet Music” in 1975, he imagined music that could mingle with the sound of a family eating dinner or talking in their living room. New Age music exists mostly to calm or heal. In the genealogy of modern music, good manners are hard to find. Pop music demands that you pay attention. Indie Rock is more abstract or poetic than it is gallant or amiable. Otis and Aretha didn’t ask for “Respect” - they demanded it. When The Stones said “please to meet you,” they were obscuring a more satanic truth. When The Beatles sang “Please Please Me,” they sounded young and adorable, but really they were complaining about a lack of reciprocity. Politeness is hardly a virtue in Pop music.
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