Bill Withers (born July 4, 1938 in Slab Fork, West Virginia) is an American singer-songwriter who performed and recorded from the late 1960s until the mid 1980s.

Bill’s father died when he was thirteen. He joined the US Navy at seventeen, and stayed there for nine years, before he moved to Los Angeles in 1967. While in Los Angeles, he worked full-time in a Lockheed assembly plant in the day, making toilets for Boeing 747 airliners, then recorded demo tapes and performed in juke joints during the night. When he debuted on the music scene with “Aint No Sunshine,” he refused to give up his job at Lockheed because of his belief that the music business was a fickle industry and that he was still a novice compared to other working acts like The Temptations or Sammy Davis, Jr.

His first success was with the company Sussex Records in 1971 with his debut hit single Ain’t No Sunshine on the album Just as I Am. He assembled a touring band made up of: drummer ... read more »