I Never Loved a Man (The Way I Love You)

Ronnie Shannon wrote it, and Franklin brought the song with her to FAME Studios in January 1967. It was the first one they worked on. Spooner Oldham had been hired to play piano, but as soon as Franklin sat down and played the first chord he stepped aside to the electric piano. Jerry Wexler knew within minutes that they had a hit. The fight that ended the session came afterward, which left the B-side, Do Right Woman, Do Right Man, to be finished in New York.

It reached number 1 on the R&B chart and number 9 on the Hot 100, and Billboard called it a powerful blues wailer. It entered the Grammy Hall of Fame in 2009. Rolling Stone ranked it 189th on its list of the 500 greatest songs. A demo of the song opens the 2007 collection Rare & Unreleased Recordings from the Golden Reign of the Queen of Soul, and a live version appears on Aretha in Paris (1968). The BBC Two series Soul Deep, in 2005, told its story with Franklin, Shannon and Wexler.