“Save Your Lovin’ Just For Me”
Song by Ray Charles
The synthesizers are out in force on “Save Your Lovin’ Just For Me”, written by Billy Osborne and appearing as the seventh track on Ray Charles’ CD-only 2002 album Thanks For Bringing Love Around Again. As on the rest of the little-known but rewarding album, Ray sounds youthful and refreshed on “Save Your Lovin’ Just For Me”, which is a plea to a woman for fidelity.
Billy Osborne was one of Ray’s main collaborators towards the end of his life, and his simple (you may say simplistic) R&B tunes generally deliver unremarkable messages that music fans have heard many times before. “Save Your Lovin’ Just For Me” is no different; while he’s away, the singer wants his woman to save her “lovin'” for him and not let anyone else “put their hands on you”. He tries to sweeten the deal by promising her “ecstasy” and that he’ll “teach you every little thing you need to know”.
Musically, “Save Your Lovin’ Just For Me” is highly energized, with a thin processed percussion sound relentlessly driving the frisky beat. The chord sequence is the regular ol’ I-IV-V. Osborne himself arranged the synthesizers, which burble and pop along with Ray’s searing, soulful wails and earnest promises. Singer Katrina Harper Cooke, like a lone Raelet, is multi-tracked to provide the soothing female background vocals so beloved by Ray; it is she that actually sings the chorus each time, while Ray repeats and improvises each line after her.
Ray Charles also plays the solo; he had grown fond of the odd sounds possible on a synthesizer, and his bright, spacious notes curl and dance about while the rest of the music quiets down, shining a kind of aural spotlight on him. (Ray Charles gets a specific credit for the keyboard solo in the CD liner notes, something that he had felt necessary on his last few albums since the synthesizers were often played by someone else.)
“Save Your Lovin’ Just For Me” stretches out over five minutes, letting Ray get comfortable and allowing him to repeat and underscore his entreaties in a performance that never wavers or tires. That he had sung so often about real heartache and disappointment in his decades-long career, and could still feel and communicate a genuine enthusiasm for a woman he was falling in love with “more and more” every day, is a testament to his skill as an artist and to his passion as a person.
“Save Your Lovin’ Just For Me” is one of a handful of Ray Charles songs never to have been released on vinyl in any form. You’ll have to track down a copy of the Thanks For Bringing Love Around Again CD to hear it; it’s easy to find for sale, new or used, and is an impressive collection from a randy old master of ceremonies.
Listen to “Save Your Lovin’ Just For Me”
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