‘If I Can’t Have You’: The Bee Gees’ Generation-Spanning Classic
It’s been a smash hit for both Yvonne Elliman and Kim Wilde – and this Gibb brothers’ track continues to beguile.
If it’s astonishing to discover that the Bee Gees’ worldwide record sales amount to at least 150 million, the stats surrounding the songs the band wrote for other artists are simply awe-inspiring. Estimates reveal they penned tracks for at around 2,500 artists and during their late 70s heyday, hits bearing the Gibb brothers’ stamp were truly ubiquitous. In fact, when Yvonne Elliman’s recording of “If I Can’t Have You” topped the Billboard Hot 100 early in 1978, it proved to be the first of 12 Gibb-penned songs to make the U.S Top 40 in that year alone.
Still one of the most sublime readings of a Gibb brothers’ song, Elliman’s version of “If I Can’t Have You” became the third of four U.S. chart-toppers taken from the multi-platinum Saturday Night Fever soundtrack album. The Bee Gees also recorded a polished, dynamic version of the song, but that ended up on the flipside of their monster hit “Stayin’ Alive.” The band’s label boss, Robert Stigwood, liked the Bee Gees’ recording, but believed “If I Can’t Have You” was a better vehicle for Yvonne Elliman: the Hawaii-born singer who previously appeared in Jesus Christ Superstar in addition to working with Eric Clapton and scoring a U.S. Top 10 hit with another Barry and Robin Gibb-penned track, 1976’s “Love Me.”
Despite its dark lyric (“Don’t know why I’m surviving every lonely day/When there’s got to be no chance for me,”) Elliman’s passionate vocal and the widescreen sweep of the music ensured “If I Can’t Have You” had (and still has) a radio-friendly appeal. It sounded on-trend circa Saturday Night Fever, but Elliman believes it will always sound good because it’s a really well-crafted pop song.
“I really loved “If I Can’t Have You,” but I liked it that the song wasn’t typically disco as I wasn’t a huge disco fan,” she said in a documentary made by NTR in the Netherlands in 2011. “The disco thing was fun, but it was glittery and I wasn’t into glitter. I was really into classic rock, my jeans and my guitar.”
Certainly, “If I Can’t Have You” had a rare quality and it still convinces today. Yvonne Elliman’s take is perhaps the song’s definitive recording, though the Bee Gees’ original cut was rightly included in their best-selling compilation Their Greatest Hits: The Records in 2001, along with songs the Gibbs wrote for Dionne Warwick, Celine Dion and other big names. It’s been described by American Songwriter as “one of the Bee Gees’ most notable works” and its reappearance in the U.K. Top 20 when British singer Kim Wilde covered it in 1993 only reemphasizes the belief that you can’t keep a great song down.
“My brother (and songwriter) Ricki’s wife suggested I cover the song and it worked,” Wilde said, explaining her reason for covering “If I Can’t Have You” in an interview on her official fan site. “I’ve always liked it and I have good memories of it. I’d always thought it was one of the classier songs on Saturday Night Fever. It’s transcended it in many ways.”
