Forget about the pale and fluffy pop hit that Glen Campbell would take up the charts a few years on, the title track for Toussaint’s 1975 album is as dreamy, redolent, and hazy as a muggy bayou evening. It drifts in and out of focus across its ten songs. The psychedelic haze of the title track, as well as the phased sunburst horns that emerge on “Last Train,” stand apart from Toussaint’s other productions of the era. For good reason: Van Dyke Parks once told me he produced the album (and not Toussaint’s business partner, the credited Marshall Sehorn).

What happens when you’re a smooth songwriter and producer and your buddies are the most lethal house band in the world? You get this sweet 1975 rollup of sugared crispies and hot ham. Toussaint is such a gentle singer, he doesn’t really have an “amped up” setting, and The Meters basically live in that energy zone, no matter how gently they play. It’s a sweet combo, and there are more than a few full albums Toussaint and The Meters worked on in the Seventies. This is very close to the top of the pile. “Southern Nights,” the title track, feels like a model for the space funk of “Strawberry Letter 23,” by The Brothers Johnson, and the rest of the album has that Toussaint caramel feel, a bit like the base layer of what Steely Dan got up to, without the cynicism.