Make It With You – Bread | Top 40 Chart Performance, Story and Song Meaning

Chart Performance: Pop(#1) and Adult Contemporary(#4); 1970

Story Behind The Song By Ed Osborne

What a difference a few years made in the turbulent 1960’s. In 1967, the Rolling Stones came under critical fire for Let’s Spend The Night Together, as did Van Morrison for his lovemaking comments in Brown Eyed Girl.

Just three years later, however, Bread would top the Hot 100 and even cross over to the more conservative Adult Contemporary stations with the seductive come-on, “I wanna make it with you.” Perhaps it was Bread’s soft romantic style, vs. the more in-your-face tack taken by the Stones and Van, which made their approach more palatable. Or perhaps the times, indeed, had a-changed.

Whatever the reason, Make It With You went down as easy as summer wine in 1970. The members of Bread never doubted that the suggestive song would be a monster hit. They were right. Make It With You debuted in mid-June, and two months replaced their chief rock lite rivals, the Carpenters and (They Long To Be) Close To You, at #1

This content and all Song Meaning articles were created and written by Top 40 Contributing Editor Ed Osborne. © 2024 Ed Osborne. All Rights Reserved. In addition to these song meaning articles, Ed has written our “Year in Music 1960s-1990s” articles.

Produced by:

• David Gates

Lyrics Written by:

• David Gates

Awards:

• Disc Award: Disc Award Ltd. recognized Bread’s classic track with a label award (1970)
• RIAA Gold Record Award for selling over 1 million “Make It With You” copies.
• Soundtrack: The song was featured on the “Maid in Manhattan” soundtrack.