Lots of love songs are ballads. Most of them are. Not too many upbeat songs scream romance. This one does, though. Listening to Stevie sing about how everything in the universe knows its place, so does his heart know that he loves her. As he continues, it occurs to me that I could listen to him sing the phone book. Who else could make “Anderson, Stephanie A, Anderson Theodore, Angelo Constantine E” sound like poetry? But in this case, he just gives us poetry. Telling his best loved not only that he will love her always, but comparing it to the great events of the universe. Now that’s love. Here’s what he has to say:

Just as time knew to move on since the beginning

And the seasons know exactly when to change

Just as kindness knows no shame

Know through all your joy and pain

That I'll be loving you always

That’s all you need to know. As long as… well, pretty much anything… I’m going to love you. The lyrics to this song make all of us guys who wish we could say these things fume at the fact that Stevie just hit the nail on the head. I guess we’ll have to let him do the talking for us.

With the music, you’re transfixed by his little interludes of keyboard magic that dance around the main melody. Herbie Hancock played keyboards on this song, so you can definitely see the jazz influence that he brought to a more traditional R&B song, helping take it to another level of sophistication and listenability (is that even a word?). The bass line is deceptively intricate, but doesn’t really kick in until the choruses, when it just makes you want to get up out of your chair and dance around like a big fool.

Musically, this is a dance song. Lyrically, a love song. Put them together, and it’s just a great song. Some people may say that the song is too long, and at seven minutes long, they may be a little right. But if you can hear seven minutes of this instead of two crappier 3 1/2 minute songs, wouldn’t you?

Me too.