(Your Love Keeps Lifting Me) Higher and Higher

For songs of a similar title, see Higher and Higher (disambiguation).

"(Your Love Keeps Lifting Me) Higher and Higher"
Single by Jackie Wilson
from the album Higher and Higher
B-side	"I'm the One to Do It"
Released	August 1967 (original version) June 17, 1998 (digitally remastered Dolby Surround version)
Format	7" single, cassette single
Recorded	July 6, 1967, Columbia Studios, Chicago, Illinois
Genre	Chicago soul
Length	2:59
Label	Brunswick Records 55336
Writer(s)	Gary Jackson and Carl Smith
Producer(s)	Carl Davis
Jackie Wilson singles chronology
"I've Lost You" (1967) "(Your Love Keeps Lifting Me) Higher and Higher" (1967) "Since You Showed Me How to Be Happy" (1967)

"(Your Love Keeps Lifting Me) Higher and Higher" is a R&B song, originally performed and made a Top 10 Pop, # 1 R&B hit by Jackie Wilson in 1967.

Overview

As the song was originally used as a backing track for Wilson to use later, it was recorded on July 6, 1967, at Columbia's studios in Chicago. Produced by Carl Davis, the session, arranged by Sonny Sanders, featured bassist James Jamerson, drummer Richard "Pistol" Allen, guitarist Robert White, and keyboardist Johnny Griffith; these four musicians were all members of the Motown Records house band The Funk Brothers who often moonlighted on sessions for Davis to augment the meager wages paid by Motown. According to Carl Davis, the Funk Brothers "used to come over on the weekends from Detroit. They'd load up in the van and come over to Chicago, and I would pay 'em double scale, and I'd pay 'em in cash." Similarly two of Motown's house session singers The Andantes, Jackie Hicks and Marlene Barrow, along with Pat Lewis (who was filling in for Andante Louvain Demps), performed on the session for "Higher and Higher".

Davis brought the track to New York City for Wilson to add his vocal; Davis recalls Wilson originally sang the song "like a soul ballad. I said that's totally wrong. You have to jump and go with the percussion...if he didn't want to sing it that way, I would put my voice on the record and sell millions".

After hearing Davis' advisement Wilson cut the lead vocal for "...Higher and Higher" in a single take.

Release

Released in August 1967, the song reached No. 1 in the US Billboard R&B chart and, in November, peaked on the Billboard Hot 100 at No. 6. In the UK Singles Chart, Wilson's version was a hit in 1969 (No. 11), 1975 (No. 25), and 1987 (No. 15).

Columbia Records then released an album titled Higher and Higher in November 1967. Its chart peak was No. 163 (Billboard 200) and No. 28 (Billboard R&B Albums chart.)

The track was ranked No. 246 on Rolling Stone's list of The 500 Greatest Songs of All Time, and was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame in 1999.

Cover versions

A live version was recorded by The Move, long before it was ever a British hit, in May 1968 at the Marquee Club, London. Because of the poor sound quality, it remained unreleased until a remastered version appeared in 1997.

In 1970, the song was recorded under the title "Higher and Higher" by Canada Goose, a group from Ottawa who had been discovered by Jerry Ragovoy. This version, with a shared lead vocal by Barbra Bullard and John Matthews, became a hit in Canada (#44) and reached #92 on the Record World 100 Pop Chart.

The song was recorded by Bette Midler on her self-titled 1973 album Bette Midler. It was also recorded by The Dells on their 1968 hit album There Is; it was recorded by the group in 1967, and is reputed to have been the original version, and was recorded with slightly different lyrics than the better-known Jackie Wilson hit version, but was not released as a single. In an recorded interview with famed Cleveland/New York Dee-Jay Norm N. Nite, Jackie stated that when he first heard a tape of the song, "a vocal group was singing it". That group was quite probably The Dells.

In 2008 the song, still known as "Higher and Higher", charted in Sweden due to Kevin Borg, the eventual winner of season 8 of Idol, performing it in the competition, and downloads of Borg's version secured it a #29 ranking.

Rita Coolidge version

"(Your Love Has Lifted Me) Higher and Higher"
Single by Rita Coolidge
from the album Anytime...Anywhere
B-side	originally "I Don't Want to Talk About It" replaced on later pressings with "Who's To Bless And Who's To Blame"
Released	March 1977
Format	7" single
Genre	Glam rock
Length	3:30
Label	A&M Records
Writer(s)	Billy Davis, Gary Jackson, Raynard Miner and Carl Smith
Producer(s)	David Anderle
Certification	Gold
Rita Coolidge singles chronology
"Mean to Me" (1975) "(Your Love Has Lifted Me) Higher and Higher" (1977) "We're All Alone" (1977)

In 1977 Rita Coolidge remade the song as "(Your Love Has Lifted Me) Higher and Higher" for her album Anytime...Anywhere. Her version is more mid-tempo than the driving original and largely omits the chorus which is evidenced only in the background vocals sung under the repetition of the first verse with which she closes the song. Coolidge and her sister Priscilla Jones had sung background on a version of the song for a prospective album by Jones' husband Booker T. Jones; when that album was shelved Coolidge asked him if she could cut the song using his arrangement.

Released as a single, her version became Coolidge's first major hit in nine years of recording: the track peaked at No. 2 on the Billboard Hot 100. Cash Box ranked it at No. 1. Both the song and a subsequent release, "We're All Alone", earned Coolidge gold records for each selling a million copies.

In the UK it was released as the follow-up single after "We're All Alone" which had reached No. 6, but it only achieved a peak of No. 48 there.

Preceded by "Best of My Love" by The Emotions

Cash Box #1 on Top 100 Singles chart September 10, 1977

Succeeded by "Don't Stop" by Fleetwood Mac

References

Preceded by "Funky Broadway" by Wilson Pickett

Billboard Hot R&B Singles number-one single October 7, 1967

Succeeded by "Soul Man" by Sam & Dave