Dobie Gray was known in his career for dabbling in a few genres, and took Mentor Williams 1970 song to the Top 10 on the charts before it was revitalized in a surprising way decades later.
Williams penned “Drift Away” in 1970 as a rock track, but it wasn’t originally recorded by him. Instead, the song was first sung and released by singer and actor Mike Berry for his 1972 album of the same name. He had already been known for his 1963 song “Don’t You Think It’s Time” (1963) and would later become known for starring in the British sitcom Are You Being Served?
Berry’s version didn’t do well, and neither did John Henry Kurtz‘s when he released his own cover a few months later, but as a swamp rock track. It wasn’t until 1973 that “Drift Away” finally gained popularity on the charts, and it was all thanks to the pop and soul singer.
The track was released by the singer as a soft rock/soul song on his album of the same name. It became Gray’s biggest hit of his career and a surprise international favorite that landed at No.5 on the Billboard Hot 100. It also went overseas to Canada and Australia, while entering the Adult Contemporary chart and Hot Soul Singles chart.
“Drift Away” has an upbeat sound with a resonating story about heartbreak. The song wasn’t only a major success for Gray, but also became a pivotal shift for Williams.
“I think one of the hardest things for me to learn about songwriting was to really expose my feelings and weaknesses and to write personal, emotional things. As soon as I started doing that, I realized other people were relating to my song,” he said, according to SongFacts.
“You can study how to write and spend a lot of time writing, but without this emotional content in a song, it’s just not there. ‘Drift Away’ was a big breakthrough for me. It was a song where it suddenly was okay for me to write about being hurt and let people know that I had been hurt and I wasn’t afraid to expose my feelings.”
Over the years, there were a handful of covers, but none achieved the success of Uncle Kracker’s version from his No Stranger to Shame album in 2003. His version featured Gray singing parts of the song and landed at No. 9 on the Billboard Hot 100. Kracker’s “Drift Away” was the only cover to land at No.1 on the Adult Contemporary chart for a record-breaking 28 weeks.
He told SongFacts that he had only recorded the track because of DJ Scott Shannon. The singer was promoting his debut album and Shannon suggested the Gray track for his appearance performances.
“If it wasn’t for him, that song would have never gotten cut. He pretty much put the bug in my ear for that,” said Kracker.
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