The mood on 1974's Rhapsody in White, reissued as part of Mercury's Funk Essentials series, is just what you'd expect. Its eight cuts alternate between honeymoon-suite stuff and what sounds like leftover score from Starsky and Hutch--except, of course, for "Love's Theme," the number one pop hit that became a favorite of figure skaters everywhere. Barry White's album in all but name only, Rhapsody finds him taking up the primest real estate on the front cover, writing all but one of these instrumentals, coarranging (with Gene Page), conducting, and providing a handful of his trademark seduction raps. This is romance: "You know what I feel like doin' to you right now?" --Rickey Wright