"Gimme Some Lovin'" | ||||
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![]() Netherlands single picture sleeve | ||||
Single by the Spencer Davis Group | ||||
B-side | "Blues in F" | |||
Released | 28 October 1966 [1] | |||
Recorded |
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Genre | ||||
Length | 2:51 | |||
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Songwriter(s) | ||||
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The Spencer Davis Group singles chronology | ||||
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Audio sample | ||||
"Gimme Some Lovin'" is a song first recorded by the Spencer Davis Group. Released as a single in 1966, it reached the Top 10 of the record charts in several countries. Later, Rolling Stone included the song on its list of the 500 Greatest Songs.
Other artists have also recorded versions of the song; group singer Steve Winwood later recorded it live with Traffic and a rendition by the Blues Brothers reached number 18 on the main US singles chart.
As recalled by bassist Muff Winwood, the song was conceived, arranged, and rehearsed in just half an hour. At the time, the group was under pressure to come up with another hit, following the relatively poor showing of their previous single, "When I Come Home", written by Jamaican-born musician Jackie Edwards, who had also penned their earlier number one hits, "Keep On Running" and "Somebody Help Me". The band auditioned and rejected other songs Edwards offered them, and they let the matter slide until, with a recording session looming, manager Chris Blackwell took them to London, put them in a rehearsal room at the Marquee Club, and ordered them to come up with a new song:
"We started to mess about with riffs, and it must have been eleven o'clock in the morning. We hadn't been there half an hour, and this idea just came. We thought, bloody hell, this sounds really good. We fitted it all together and by about twelve o'clock, we had the whole song. Steve had been singing 'Gimme, gimme some loving' –you know, just yelling anything, so we decided to call it that. We worked out the middle eight and then went to a cafe that's still on the corner down the road. Blackwell came to see how we were going on, to find our equipment set up and us not there, and he storms into the cafe, absolutely screaming, 'How can you do this?' he screams. Don't worry, we said. We were all really confident. We took him back, and said, how's this for half an hour's work, and we knocked off 'Gimme Some Lovin' and he couldn't believe it. We cut it the following day and everything about it worked. That very night we played a North London club and tried it out on the public. It went down a storm. We knew we had another No. 1." [5]
The Spencer Davis Group: [6]
Chart (1966–1967) | Peak position |
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Australia (Kent Music Report) [7] | 6 |
Austria (Ö3 Austria Top 40) [8] | 4 |
Belgium (Ultratop 50 Flanders) [9] | 20 |
Belgium (Ultratop 50 Wallonia) [10] | 10 |
Canada Top Singles ( RPM ) [11] | 1 |
Germany (Official German Charts) [12] | 12 |
Ireland (IRMA) [13] | 7 |
Netherlands (Single Top 100) [14] | 3 |
New Zealand (Listener) [15] | 5 |
UK (Singles Chart) [16] | 2 |
US (Billboard Hot 100) [17] | 7 |
In 2004, Rolling Stone magazine ranked "Gimme Some Lovin'" at number 247 on its list of the 500 Greatest Songs of All Time. [18] Winwood later recorded live versions of the song with Traffic for Welcome to the Canteen (1971) [19] and The Last Great Traffic Jam (2005). [20] In an album review for Welcome to the Canteen, AllMusic's William Ruhlmann wrote 'the [set list] capper was a rearranged version of Steve Winwood's old Spencer Davis Group hit "Gimme Some Lovin'." ' [19]
"Gimme Some Lovin'" has been recorded by several rock and other artists. [21] Pop artist Olivia Newton-John covered it for her 1978 album, Totally Hot , which an album reviewer called "as close to a drunken party as one will get on a Newton-John album". [22] A performance for the musical comedy film The Blues Brothers (1980) "featur[es] an arrangement notable for the horn section that replaces Steve Winwood's rumbling organ work", according to critic Bret Adams. [23] Released as single by Atlantic Records, it reached number 18 on Billboard magazine's Hot 100 chart, [24] number 22 on the Canadian RPM Top Singles chart, [25] and number 20 on the Dutch Single Top 100. In 1990, British group Thunder recorded it for their debut album Backstreet Symphony . [26] AllMusic writer Alex Henderson commented: "Another high point of this CD is an inspired cover of the Spencer Davis Group's 'Gimme Some Lovin',' which Thunder changes from blue-eyed soul/rock to straight-up hard rock." [26]
Traffic were an English rock band formed in Birmingham in April 1967 by Steve Winwood, Jim Capaldi, Chris Wood and Dave Mason. They began as a psychedelic rock group and diversified their sound through the use of instruments such as keyboards, sitar, and various reed instruments, and by incorporating jazz and improvisational techniques in their music.
Stephen Lawrence Winwood is an English musician and songwriter whose genres include blue-eyed soul, rhythm and blues, blues rock and pop rock. Though primarily a guitarist, keyboard player and vocalist, prominent for his distinctive soulful high tenor voice, Winwood plays other instruments proficiently, including drums, mandolin, bass and saxophone.
Nicola James Capaldi was an English singer-songwriter and drummer. His musical career spanned more than four decades. He co-founded the progressive rock band Traffic in 1967 with Steve Winwood with whom he co-wrote the majority of the band's material. He was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame as a part of Traffic's original lineup.
David Thomas Mason is an English singer-songwriter and guitarist from Worcester, who first found fame with the rock band Traffic, and went on to play and record with many notable pop and rock musicians, including Paul McCartney, George Harrison, the Rolling Stones, Jimi Hendrix, Eric Clapton, Michael Jackson, David Crosby, Graham Nash, Steve Winwood, Fleetwood Mac, Delaney & Bonnie, Leon Russell, and Cass Elliot.
James Miller was an American record producer and musician. While he produced albums for dozens of different bands and artists, he is known primarily for his work with several key musical acts of the 1960s and 1970s.
Mervyn "Muff" Winwood is a British songwriter and record producer, and the elder brother of Steve Winwood. Both were members of the Spencer Davis Group in the 1960s, in which Muff Winwood played bass guitar. Following his departure from the group he became an A&R man and record producer.
The Spencer Davis Group were a British blues and R&B influenced rock band formed in Birmingham in 1963 by Spencer Davis (guitar), brothers Steve Winwood and Muff Winwood, and Pete York (drums). Their best known songs include the UK No. 1 hits "Keep on Running" and "Somebody Help Me" and the UK and US Top 10 hits "Gimme Some Lovin'" and "I'm a Man".
Spencer Davis was a Welsh musician. He founded the Spencer Davis Group, a band that had several hits in the 1960s including "Keep On Running", "Gimme Some Lovin'", and "I'm a Man", all sung by Steve Winwood. Davis subsequently enjoyed success as an A&R executive with Island Records.
Welcome to the Canteen is the first live album by English rock band Traffic. It was recorded live at Fairfield Halls, Croydon and the Oz Benefit Concert in the canteen of the Polytechnic of Central London London, on 3 July 1971 and released in September of that year. It was recorded during Dave Mason's third stint with the band, which lasted only six performances.
The Finer Things is a compilation album box set of recordings by Steve Winwood. It includes songs from his early days with The Spencer Davis Group through Traffic and Blind Faith and into his work during his solo career.
"I'm a Man" is a song written by Steve Winwood and record producer Jimmy Miller. It was first recorded in 1967 by the Spencer Davis Group; Winwood sang lead vocals and played keyboards. The song was a hit in the United Kingdom and the United States, reaching No. 9 and No. 10, respectively. It has been recorded by many other performers over the years, most successfully by Chicago, whose version charted at No. 8 in the UK in 1970 and No. 49 in the US in 1971.
Shot in the Dark is the second studio album by American rock band Great White, released in 1986. It was originally released by Telegraph Records and distributed by Greenworld Entertainment. Later that same year it was picked up and re-issued by Capitol Records. The original issue featured a different intro to "She Shakes Me", a different recording entirely of the song "Run Away", and a different mix of the several tracks. Great White's music in this album shows the transition from the pure heavy metal of the first album to a more blues-influenced style of heavy metal, paying homage to the great rock bands of the 1970s, like Led Zeppelin and AC/DC. This was the first album to feature drummer Audie Desbrow.
The Last Great Traffic Jam is a live album and DVD from the English rock band Traffic. The album was recorded on the 1994 reunion tour supporting Far from Home.
Back to Back is a live album by the Mar-Keys and Booker T & the M.G.'s, released on Stax Records in 1967. It features both groups playing live on the Stax/Volt package tour of Europe. The album peaked at number 98 on the Billboard 200 album chart in the United States.
In is the third studio album by the Outsiders. It is the first album released by the band that did not make the Billboard charts.
With Their New Face On is the fourth studio album by the Spencer Davis Group, the first to be released after the departure of Steve Winwood, and his brother Muff Winwood. The album was released in 1968 in both the UK and the U.S. on the United Artists label.
Winwood is the first compilation album of music featuring Steve Winwood. This two-record set was issued in 1971 by United Artists Records and features music which Winwood performed with The Spencer Davis Group, Powerhouse, Traffic and Blind Faith. UA Records issued this album after Winwood's band Traffic left UA when their home label Island Records set up their own American operation. Issued without Winwood's authorization as catalogue number UAS-9950, it was taken off the market after legal action by Winwood and Island Records. It was then reissued with minor changes as catalogue number UAS-9964. Currently out of print, it was issued on CD by Universal Music of Japan for the Japanese market.
This article is the discography of British band The Spencer Davis Group.
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"When I Come Home" is a song written by Steve Winwood and Jackie Edwards, first recorded by Winwood's band the Spencer Davis Group in 1966. Released as a single that summer, it reached number 12 in the UK Singles Chart. The single received mixed reviews upon release, with Penny Valentine deeming it inferior to their previous singles. The band was featured in the movie The Ghost Goes Gear (1966), miming to the track.