By TEDDY ALLEN/Designated Writers
Bill Withers took a strong stance on the physical distancing issue and passed away Monday at 81 from heart complications, his family said, and that hurts me.
We can’t lean on Bill anymore.
When I was coming of age in the 1970s and Bill was making music, he had to be the coolest dude we knew or could ever know. He was telling us about it being a lovely day and how we could lean on him when we weren’t strong and how there was not one bit of sunshine when she was gone. Neg on the sunshine situation.
Bill was soulful and cool like the Atlantic is salty.
How cool? He won three Grammys, wrote and performed some of the most soulful songs of his era, and was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2015. BUT, he got fed up with the music business in 1985 and instead of hanging around or duking it out he said SEEYA!, and for the last 35 years he has hung around off the charts but still, I imagine, dripping cool. Still “Bill Withering,” night and day, just without a record contract.
And check this out: I haven’t seen it but would love to, a 2009 documentary called Still Bill (told you!), and I read today that in it he’s quoted as dropping this on his children and close friends: “On the road to wonderful, you’ve got to pass through OK; take a good look around, because it may not get better than that.”
Strong as an acre of onions. Man was for reals.
Quickly, his Top Five Songs, According To Me.
- “Use Me” There. Bill told her. He didn’t mind, he said. Said it several times to make sure she understood that he’d checked both his pride and his ego at the door. It’s like that sometimes.
- “It’s All Over Now” with Bobby “Lookin’ for a Love” Womack, another soulful dude. He used to love her but …
- “Ain’t No Sunshine When She’s Gone” Dang. Again, neg on the sunshine.
- “Just the Two of Us” with Grover Washington Jr. and Grover’s sax.
- “Lean on Me” It’s against the rules to lean on ANYbody now. We could lean when Bill was on the scene.