With my feet resting on a brown ottoman bench, I take a sip of rum from the Glencairn glass that rests between my lips. A familiar smooth but funky beat glides through the air. “If loving you is wrong…I don’t want to be right,” hypnotize by the music I sing in unison with Millie Jackson. While I sing the words of If Loving You Is Wrong I Don’t Want To Be Right, I study the album cover that reveals a man surrounded by two women caught in a spider web. To the right and above the web, reads Millie Jackson. Below the name Millie Jackson, I see Caught Up…the name of the album. I can hear sincere emotion in Jackson’s strong soulful voice. As the song plays on, I consider the irony of my dad having this album. Did my dad visualize himself as the man between the two women in the web – things that make you go hmm.

Jackson’s delivery of If Loving You Is Wrong I Don’t Want To Be Right flawlessly rolls into The Rap…an interlude of sorts. Unapologetically, Jackson states, “You see, the terrible thing about being in love with a married man is the fact that you can’t see him when you really want to. And, that can get to you sometimes”. Her directness catches my attention. As the seconds pass, the funky guitar riffs accentuate Jackson’s words while she bounces from talking and singing. Mentally, I take inventory of the game she spits as I search for the song’s lyrics on my phone.

After a quick search, I find the lyrics and focus on the following words, “Cause I found out that when a man starts tipping away from home. Somebody at home has fallen down on the home front. That’s because when those women marry these men. They have the tendency to take advantage of ‘em. They forget about all the sweet things they say to get ‘em. That they have to keep on saying to keep ‘em. Cause you got a whole lot of women out there these days, just like me who will tell a man anything in the world he feel like he might wanna hear”. As Jackson articulates – I mumble under my breath, “That’s real”. Rather man or woman, you gotta take care of home – the thought emerges in my mind.

Drama…drama…drama – is what I hear on All I Want Is A Fighting Chance. Jackson, as the lover, confronts her lover’s wife. A scene that possibly plays out multiple times by multiple people every day. You know how it goes – or maybe you don’t. It’s the situation where a side piece forgets the rules, gets emotionally attached, and decides they want to replace, fill in the blank – the wife, the husband, the girlfriend, the boyfriend. I digress, let’s get back to the music at hand. Deep into the song, Jackson aggressively belts out, “Come on here. Turn him over to me. Give that man to me”. With 32 seconds remaining, a saxophonist starts to intensely blow their horn, matching the song’s intensity.

Not to be outdone, Jackson opens I’m Tired Of Hiding talking to her lover about meeting his wife. Jackson’s vocals float with authority over the soulful composition. An ultimatum is given – either me or your wife. While Jackson sings, I begin to focus on the melodic horns and strings filling the background until the song fades out.

It’s All Over But The Shouting starts Side 2, with horns at full strength – a call to arms…to put it into words. Not to be overlooked, the drums enter with authority followed by funky electric guitar chords. As Jackson sings, I start to envision an upset wife shouting at her husband about his infidelity. Shouts of it’s all over…emotions of anger, sadness, and frustration viciously gush out from the wife’s soul – just like water out a burst pipe.

The emotions seamlessly continue through It’s Easy Going that immaculately evolves to I’m Through Trying To Prove My Love To You. On the song, Jackson as the wife reflects on the struggle of proving her love to her husband, which is firmly summed up when she sings, “Cause I’m through staying up all night…waiting on you to return. I don’t think there’s a better lesson…I had better learn. But you’ll find out…further down the road. You see I let you take my heart…and I just can’t let you take my soul”. “Yeah,” I say as I nod my head up and down while looking at the song credit showing Bobby Womack as the composer. The string elegance, the soulful lyrics, the vocal cadence, and the overall rhythm screams Bobby Womack, which is a good thing.

Summer (The First Time) begins with strumming of an acoustic guitar with the sound of children talking and playing in the background. Over the next 5 minutes or so, Jackson joyfully sings about the first time she met her soon to become ex-husband. And, about the first time they made love – the beginning of her being Caught Up.

After further review…

Caught Up was released by Spring Records in October 1974. Caught Up was a concept album that was perfectly summed up by the album cover. Side 1 of the album represents the perspective of a mistress and side 2 represents the perspective of a wife, both caught up loving the same man. On January 20, 1975, the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) certified Caught Up as a gold album. Caught Up reached number 4 and 21 on the Billboard R&B Album and Pop Album charts, respectively. Additionally, three songs on the album charted on Billboard, which were The Rap, If Loving You Is Wrong I Don’t Want To Be Right, and I’m Through Trying To Prove My Love To You. As part of the 17th Annual Grammy Awards, Jackson received a Best R&B Female Vocal Performance nomination for If Loving You Is Wrong I Don’t Want To Be Right.

In a July 15, 2014 article published by Atlanta, Jackson discussed the concept of the album by saying, “You have to realize that in 1974, songs on the radio clocked in right around two minutes and 50 seconds,” Jackson explained. “‘If Loving You is Wrong’ clocked in at nine minutes! But we knew we were onto something. Then somebody in the studio asked, ‘What now?’ and I said, ‘We finish the story. We’ve heard from the girlfriend, but what about the wife? If the other woman has a say-so, so should the wife.’ It was about equality. It wasn’t about taking sides or making judgments. I did it out of fairness.”