In 1977, Leo Sayer released “When I Need You”. The song, written by Albert Hammond and Carole Bayer Sager, is on Sayer’s Endless Flight album.
Sayer knew right away that he liked “When I Need You”. Still, he later admits it took him a while to figure out how to release the song, especially since he didn’t write it.
“I was still a singer-songwriter,” Sayer explains. “And so, I had to find something I believed in. Then cool, it would be no problem. There was a lot of compromising, but I liked Albert Hammond’s songs. And of course, Carole wrote ‘Groovy Kind Of Love’, ’99 Miles From LA’’, ‘The Air That I Breathe’, and ‘It Never Rains In Southern California’. [They] were all great songs. So I put on ‘When I Need You’ and wow! My wife, Janice, was home in England, and those were the words I wanted to say on the phone.”
Sayer initially wanted to make “When I Need You” like the blues. Unfortunately, after finishing the song, Sayer realized that a blues version wasn’t going to work.
“To me it was like a blues, and we recorded it first with Booker T. [Jones] on organ, and I did it like Otis Redding doing ‘I’ve Been Loving You Too Long’,” he admits. “It was completely wrong for the song, and we went back to how it was on the demo.”
The Lawsuit About “When I Need You” by Leo Sayer
“When I Need You” became a No. 1 single, but it wasn’t all smooth sailing for Sayer or the songwriters. Hammond and Sager were later sued by Leonard Cohen, claiming that the melody of “When I Need You” was too similar to his 1986 “Famous Blue Raincoat” song.
“Somebody sued them on my behalf… and they did settle,” Cohen says. “Even though they hired a musicologist, who said that particular motif was in the public domain and, in fact, could be traced back as far as Schubert.”
Settlement money aside, Hammond and Sager likely made out okay with the success of “When I Need You”. The song has been covered multiple times, including by Julio Iglesias, Rod Stewart, Celine Dion, and Cliff Richard, among others.
“When I Need You” is Sayer’s final No. 1 hit in the United States. Endless Flight remains Sayer’s most successful album. The record also includes “You Make Me Feel Like Dancing” and “How Much Love”, both hit singles for Sayer.
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