The song builds on "It Must Be Jesus" by the Southern Tones, which Ray Charles was listening to on the radio while on the road with his band in the summer of 1954, as well as a bridge inspired by Big Bill Broonzy's "Living on Easy Street".
He and a member of his band, trumpeter Renald Richard, wrote a song that was built along a gospel-frenetic pace with secular lyrics and a jazz-inspired rhythm and blues (R&B) background.
[2] The song was recorded on November 18, 1954, in the Atlanta studios of Georgia Tech radio station WGST.
From February 17 to 20, 1962, French musician Johnny Hallyday (who is considered the French version of Presley), for the first time in Nashville, at the Bradley Studios, recorded sixteen songs performed entirely in English, which would result in Hallyday's foreign-language and English-language debut and seventh studio album overall, Sings America's Rockin' Hits (1962),[13] produced by legendary producer Shelby Singleton.
The first version was recorded on 16 July 1963 at the BBC Paris Theatre in London for the Pop Go the Beatles radio show.
An interpolation by Jamie Foxx, who portrayed Charles in the 2004 biopic Ray, of "I Got a Woman" serves as the introduction to "Gold Digger".