When a Man Loves a Woman

This song is a huge part of music history, as it is the first #1 Hot 100 hit recorded in Muscle Shoals, Alabama, where Aretha Franklin, Paul Simon, The Rolling Stones and many other famous musicians would later record some of their classic songs. It's a legendary love song and a huge hit, but the story of its writing and recording is quite murky. Sledge, who died in 2015 at age 74, told very florid tales about coming up with the song, but Quin Ivy, who produced the track, has a much more pedestrian story. A little background: FAME studios in Muscle Shoals was run by Rick Hall, and was picking up steam in the mid-'60s, with successful recordings by Jimmy Hughes, Joe Tex, The Tams and Joe Simon. Ivy was a songwriter there, and also a DJ at the local radio station WLAY. He set up his own record store/recording studio nearby called Norala Sound Studios to handle the overflow work, since so many artists wanted to record at FAME. Sledge was an orderly at Colbert County (Alabama) Hospital in the daytime and sang with a local band, The Esquires Combo, at night. As Sledge tells it, one night while performing with The Esquires Combo, he was upset about a woman - a broken relationship - so upset that he couldn't concentrate on the music he was supposed to sing. He was so overcome with emotion as the group started their set in a Sheffield, Alabama club, that he turned to his bass player Calvin Lewis and organ player Andrew Wright and asked them if they could play a slow blues backing - any key, their choice - to which he could sing. After a quick conference (one source indicated that the "conference" consisted of glances and shrugs), the band started to play and Sledge vented in song for about six minutes. In Sledge's story, Quin Ivy was at the show and approached the band about polishing the song and recording it. Sledge says he worked on the lyrics with Lewis and Wright, and recorded it at Norala Sound with Ivy producing. Quin Ivy's sound studio was also a record store, and Ivy says that he met Sledge when the singer walked into the store one day and they were introduced by a mutual friend. Sledge and The Esquires tried recording the song at FAME, but it didn't work, so the engineer there, Dan Penn, sent them over to Norala to record with Ivy, complete with their big B-3 organ for Wright to play. This recording was a success, and the song got proper distribution when Ivy played it for FAME's owner Rick Hall, who contacted Jerry Wexler at Atlantic Records (who knew there was talent in Alabama and told Hall to call him if he found any), who signed Sledge and released the song, which became a massive hit.

In Sledge's version of the story, he co-wrote the song with his bandmates Calvin Lewis and Andrew Wright, but let them have sole composer credits, since they gave him the opportunity to sing his heart out. Whether Sledge was acting out of the goodness of his heart or had nothing to do with writing the song is a matter of debate, but the writing credit had huge implications, resulting in a windfall for Lewis and Wright, who get the royalties every time it is played. Since the song went on to be covered by many artists, they get paid for those as well. If it was a goodwill gesture by Sledge, it cost him millions of dollars.

The musicians who played on this song were many of the same guys who recorded at FAME, and later at Muscle Shoals Sound Studios, a competing studio that opened in 1969. This included Spooner Oldham on organ, Marlin Greene on guitar, Junior Lowe on bass, and Roger Hawkins on drums.