Still Bill

CTL-E-5280 · Work · album · 1972

VERIFIED evidence grade of this record

Still Bill is the second studio album by Bill Withers, released in 1972 on Clarence Avant’s Sussex Records. Built around Withers’s guitar, plainspoken baritone, and a working band rather than studio gloss, it extends the approach of his 1971 debut, Just As I Am: songs written like plain advice from a friend. The album contains “Lean on Me,” his song of mutual dependence drawn from the community of his West Virginia childhood, which topped the Billboard charts in July 1972 and became one of the most covered and beloved songs in American popular music, and “Use Me,” its harder-edged companion hit. The title — the insistence that sudden success had not changed him — became Withers’s public signature, and it later named the 2009 documentary film about his life. Still Bill stands as the fullest single statement of Withers’s writing: economical, unsentimental, and built to be sung by other people for the rest of its life.

Notes

Staged 2026-10-15 under CTL-GOV-006 (Next Slate D2); Gate A clear; Gate B met (3 sources incl. West Virginia Encyclopedia); Gate F: authored_by edge to CTL-E-5279. Statistics carried: “Lean on Me” No. 1, three weeks from July 8, 1972 (e-WV). No album chart position or sales figure carried — none verified from a located source at staging. CTL treatment: Short #103 “Bill Withers — Still Bill (1972),” published 2026-10-13 (Shorts Link Map, 2026-10-15). PHOTO SLOT: HELD — album artwork is Sussex Records property (rights-reserved); no cleared substitute used.

Relationships

• Bill Withers — authored by
  Still Bill (Sussex, 1972) is Bill Withers’s second studio album; its songs, including “Lean on Me” and “Use Me,” are his compositions.

Sources

• West Virginia Encyclopedia (e-WV), “Bill Withers” — Sussex released “Lean On Me” in April 1972; it topped the charts on July 8, 1972, remaining three weeks — https://wvencprod.wvnet.edu/entries/1276 (primary source)
• BET News (Associated Press), “Legendary ‘Lean on Me’ Singer Bill Withers Dies at 81” — Still Bill identified as his sophomore album, on which “Lean on Me” appeared — https://www.bet.com/article/1r5ati
• CNN Wire obituary via NBC Palm Springs — “His 1972 album, ‘Still Bill,’ launched another hit with ‘Use Me’” — https://www.nbcpalmsprings.com/national/2020/04/03/bill-withers-lean-on-me-and-lovely-day-singer-has-died-at-81

Record CTL-E-5280 · CultureTechLens Knowledge Graph · evidence grade: VERIFIED · 3 sources (1 primary) · 1 mapped relationship · CTL research: PPL-001.
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