The Sylvers: Something Special (Capitol ST 11580); Tavares: Love Storm (Capitol ST AO-11628)

I KNOW, I know. I'm not supposed to admit liking a record by the Sylvers, much less write about it. Even my girlfriend, who prefers people like Loleatta Holloway and Jean Carn but tolerates my P-Funk binges, finds 'Hot Line' by the Sylvers going a bit too far. And then there's the latest Tavares single, 'Whodunit', which I first heard on WABC of all places. Tavares doesn't suffer from the same stigma as the Sylvers, so there's no problem when I want to turn up the song on the car radio. Which is good, because 'Whodunit' is even better than 'Hot Line'— one of the year's best pop singles.