Withers, the youngest of six children, was born in the small coal-mining town of Slab Fork, West Virginia, on July 4, 1938. He was the son of Mattie (Galloway), a maid, and William Withers, a miner. He was born with a stutter and later said he had a hard time fitting in. His parents divorced when he was three, and he was raised by his mother's family in nearby Beckley, West Virginia. He was 13 years old when his father died. Withers enlisted in the United States Navy at the age of 17, and served for nine years, during which time he became interested in singing and writing songs.
He left the Navy in 1965, relocating to Los Angeles in 1967 to start a music career. His debut release was "Three Nights and a Morning" in 1967. Arranged by Mort Garson, the song went unnoticed at the time but was later reworked by Withers as the track "Harlem".
Withers worked as an assembler for several different companies, including Douglas Aircraft Corporation, IBM and Ford, while recording demo tapes with his own money, shopping them around and performing in clubs at night. When he returned with the song "Ain't No Sunshine" in 1971, he refused to resign from his job because he believed the music business was a fickle industry. In early 1970, Withers's demonstration tape was auditioned favorably by Clarence Avant, owner of Sussex Records. Avant signed Withers to a record deal and assigned former Stax Records stalwart Booker T. Jones to produce Withers' first album. Four three-hour recording sessions were planned for the album, but funding caused the album to be recorded in three sessions with a six-month break between the second and final sessions. Just as I Am was released in 1971 with the tracks, "Ain't No Sunshine" and "Grandma's Hands" as singles. The album features Stephen Stills playing lead guitar. On the cover of the album, Withers is pictured at his job at Weber Aircraft in Burbank, California, holding his lunch box.
Withers was known for his "smooth" baritone vocals and "sumptuous" soul arrangements. He wrote some of the most covered songs of the 1970s, including "Lean on Me" and "Ain't No Sunshine". The former entered the Hot 100 chart through multiple versions, including Club Nouveau's 1987 cover, which made the composition one of nine songs to have led the chart via different acts. With "Lovely Day", he set the record for the longest sustained note on a chart hit on American charts, holding a high E for 18 seconds. Editors from The Guardian considered that Withers' songs are "some of the most beloved in the American songbook," citing, "'Ain't No Sunshine' is regarded as one of the all-time great breakup tracks, while 'Lean on Me', an ode to the supportive power of friendship ..." For the same newspaper, Alex Petridis noticed "[he] laid pain and paranoia under his deceptively gentle songs, and retired early having conquered gospel, funk, blues, disco and more." In Rolling Stone, writer Andy Greene noted that several of his songs "are embedded in the culture and have been covered countless times."
Writing for The New York Times, Giovanni Russonello considered Withers "[a] soulful singer with a gift for writing understated classics", adding, "the ultimate homespun hitmaker, he had an innate sense of what might make a song memorable, and little interest in excess attitude or accoutrements. Ultimately Withers reminded us that it’s the everyday that is the most meaningful: work, family, love, loss." A Billboard article considered that Withers "stands as one of R&B/soul music's most revered singer-songwriters." In the same magazine, writer Gail Mitchell acknowledged "Withers' legacy has flourished in the decades since, thanks to a cross-section of artists who have covered/sampled his songs or cited him as a major influence." Musician and music journalist Questlove referred to Withers' post-breakup 1974 album +'Justments as "a diary [...] [it] was a pre-reality-show look at his life. Keep in mind this was years before Marvin Gaye did it with Here, My Dear." The Beach Boys' Brian Wilson deemed him "a songwriter's songwriter". Musicians Sade, D'Angelo, Justin Timberlake, John Legend and Ed Sheeran have credited Withers as a music inspiration.
Withers died from heart complications in Los Angeles on March 30, 2020, at age 81; his family announced his death four days later. He is interred in the Forest Lawn Memorial Park (Hollywood Hills).
I Don't Know
Bill Withers Lyrics
Jump to: Overall Meaning ↴ Line by Line Meaning ↴
Even chilly darkness has the brightest glow
And I just love you so, sometimes I just don't know
Time just seems to help this wondrous feeling grow
Maybe I might wake up early one morning
And find it isn't so
I just love you so
Feeling like a rich man haven't got a dime
Feeling like a young man but I'm old as father time
And I just love you so
Sometimes I just don't know
I just don't know
The opening lines of the song I Don't Know by Bill Withers are quite paradoxical. The line "I get a warm summer feeling walking through the snow" is an example of chiasmus, a rhetorical device where a sequence of words or concepts is repeated, but in reverse order, to create an artistic effect. The following line, "Even chilly darkness has the brightest glow," highlights how the singer is able to find beauty in unexpected places. The chorus of the song, "I just love you so, sometimes I just don't know," brings out a sense of confusion, where the singer's feelings for their loved one are overwhelming and they cannot fully comprehend them.
The singer expresses conflicting thoughts and emotions, such as feeling like a "rich man" despite not having a dime, and feeling like a "young man" despite being old. These lines could be interpreted as the singer acknowledging how the feeling of love transcends material possessions and age. As the song progresses, the singer expresses their fear of losing this love and how they might wake up one day to find that it was only a dream.
Overall, the song I Don't Know is about the complexities of love and how it can stir up conflicting emotions within a person.
Line by Line Meaning
I get a warm summer feeling walking through the snow
Even in the midst of difficult situations, I can still feel warmth and joy
Even chilly darkness has the brightest glow
Even though times can be tough, there is always a silver lining
And I just love you so, sometimes I just don't know
My love for you is so strong that it's hard to express in words
Time just seems to help this wondrous feeling grow
My love for you grows stronger every day
Maybe I might wake up early one morning
There is a chance that my love for you will change, but it's unlikely
And find it isn't so
Realizing that my love for you has faded would be devastating
Feeling like a rich man haven't got a dime
Although I may not have material wealth, I feel rich in love
Feeling like a young man but I'm old as father time
Though I may have age and experience, my love for you keeps me feeling young and alive
And I just love you so, sometimes I just don't know
I may not always have the words to express my love, but it is genuine
I just don't know
Even though I don't always have the answers, my love for you remains strong
Lyrics © Universal Music Publishing Group
Written by: BILL WITHERS
Lyrics Licensed & Provided by LyricFind