When I Need You - Remastered

Albert Hammond wrote this song with Carole Bayer Sager. The song deals with Hammond's personal experiences being away from home and his loved one.

This was Leo Sayer's sixth hit in the UK and third in the US, but his first he had not co-written. Leo Sayer was born Gerard Hugh Sayer at Shoreham-by-Sea, Sussex, England. He first came to the notice of the record-buying public early in 1973 when the debut solo LP by Roger Daltrey of The Who was released featuring songs by Sayer and Dave Courtney. Included on the album was a single "Giving It All Away," which was a Top 5 hit for the Who frontman. At the end of 1973 Sayer launched his own solo career under the guidance of Adam Faith. His first single, "The Show Must Go On," raced to #2 in the UK charts while Sayer performed the song with a whitened face and a clown's outfit. In America it was covered by Three Dog Night, who took it to the Top 5. Sayer carried on over the next 10 years recording a succession of hits. These have included his other US #1, "You Make Me Feel Like Dancing" (also #2 in UK), the remake of Bobby Vee's "More Than I Can Say" (#2 in both the UK & US), and his other transatlantic Top 10, "Long Tall Glasses (I Can Dance)." In the early '80s he had his own BBC television series.

Sayer says about this song in 1000 UK #1 Hits by Jon Kutner and Spencer Leigh, "I was still a singer/songwriter 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' 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. To me it was like a blues, and we recorded it first with Booker T on organ and I did it like Otis Redding doing 'I've Been Loving You Too Long.' It was completely wrong for the song, and we went back to how it was on the demo." In the final version the keyboards are played by James Newton and Michael Omartian rather than Booker T.