“Be Thankful For What You Got” by William Devaughn

"Be Thankful for What You Got" made William DeVaughn's name in the spring of 1974, a soul record on Chelsea that went all the way to number one on the R&B charts and number four on the Billboard Hot 100, and sold close to two million copies. It started out as "A Cadillac Don't Come Easy", which DeVaughn wrote and then reworked in 1972, putting $900 into a development deal with Omega Sound, a Philadelphia production house, in the hope of getting it released.

The title says it plainly enough, and the hook, a cool, unhurried roll call of sunroofs, diamonds and a lean behind the wheel, has been sampled and borrowed by song after song since. Rolling Stone placed it at number 374 on its list of the 500 greatest songs of all time in 2021.

Written with AI assistance from RockLists chart data, MusicBrainz and Wikipedia.