It was made into a bigger hit by Solomon Burke, who sent the song to #2 on the R&B charts that year.
The song was written by Wilson Pickett with two former members of the Satintones, Robert Bateman (who had also co-written "Please Mr. Postman") and Sonny Sanders.
Atlantic refused to sign him at that time, so we got Wilson to release the song on the Lloyd-Logan label.
[3] Burke recalled in 2003: "I was furious when Wexler rejected Pickett",[4] and when radio personality the Magnificent Montague started spinning Pickett's original version, Wexler rushed out Burke's, with both in Billboard 's "Singles Review" column on April 13[5] and both featured on Billboard's "Artists' Biographies" on May 4, 1963.
[10] "If You Need Me" was "the first of several great preaching scorchers": "Can’t Nobody Love You", "You’re Good For Me", and "Goodbye Baby, Baby Goodbye", which were all arranged by Gary Sherman, the man behind many Garnet Mimms hits.