Use Me (Bill Withers song)
From The Art and Popular Culture Encyclopedia
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"Use Me" is a song composed and originally recorded by Bill Withers, and was included on his 1972 album Still Bill. It is his second-biggest hit in the United States, released in September 1972, and later reaching No. 2 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart.
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The singer complains about the advice of friends, who seem to have made it "their appointed duty" to talk the singer out of a romantic relationship that they see as one-sided, and where the singer is "used". But the singer has no doubt in wanting things to continue as they are, and implies that it is pleasurable enough to be "used" in that fashion that being "used up" completely would be welcome.
The singer goes on to describe telling a relative who urges resistance to being "walked on", that envy for the singer's circumstances would follow from really comprehending them.
The singer admits that some of the lover's behavior is abusive -- for example, snubbing him when those of higher status, whom the lover apparently seeks to curry favor with, are present -- but "when you love me", the singer "can't get enough".
Finally, as the song fades out, the singer admits to being used, but says that "it aint too bad the way you're using me, 'cause I sure am using you to do the things you do."
Use in popular culture
The song is the background music that Alice Eve's character puts on in the movie She's Out of My League(2010), for the make-out scene on the couch.
Covers
Artists
A variety of artists have covered the song, including: Template:Col-start Template:Col-3
- Widespread Panic
- Aaron Neville
- Fiona Apple
- Better Than Ezra
- Coolbone
- D'Angelo
- Hootie & the Blowfish, on their 2000 compilation album Scattered, Smothered and Covered.
- Eran James
- Esther Phillips
- Mick Jagger
- Al Jarreau
- Grace Jones, on her 1981 album Nightclubbing
- Isaac Hayes
- Jim White (for the 2005 Starbucks compilation album, Sweetheart 2005: Love Songs)
- Kimiko Kasai
- Tenth Avenue North
- Raw Stylus
- Liza Minnelli, on her 1973 album The Singer
- Holly Golightly
- Lindsay Mac
- My Brightest Diamond
- Walter "Wolfman" Washington
- Rick Braun from "Kisses in the Rain" (2001)
- Junior Wells
- Gentlemen's Blues Club
- Fred Wesley & The J.B.'s
- As a duet, Mick Jagger and Lenny Kravitz
- As a duet, Alicia Keys and Rob Thomas
- Ben Harper
- The Shoeless Revolution
- Zoobombs
- Rockapella
- Omar