Song of the Day 5/8: Wilbert Harrison, “Let’s Work Together”

This seems like as good a time as any to remind everyone that “united we stand, divided we fall,” even if it took Wilbert Harrison years to realize it. The song we now know as “Let’s Work Together” was released in 1970, but it’s the same tune he released in 1962 as “Let’s Stick Together,” an appeal to a woman to patch up their relationship. It went nowhere. But in 1970, with new lyrics that sounded like an appeal to anti-establishment forces to quit their infighting, it found an audience. Harrison’s version reached the charts, the first time he did so since “Kansas City” was a No. 1 hit in 1959.

Even more people heard the version Canned Heat recorded shortly after Harrison’s was released. It reached No. 26 on the Billboard chart in America, but was a No. 2 hit in the UK.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tnPkEyP_Tzg