To Be a Lover in early 1969. This version has since been sampled by Ludacris on his song "Growing Pains" from "Word of Mouf", by Jaheim on "Put That Woman First" from "Still Ghetto" and by Dilated Peoples on the song "Worst Comes to Worst". In 1977, the song was covered as a more uptempo reggae number by the Jamaican singer George Faith under the amended title of "To Be a Lover (Have Mercy)" for his Lee "Scratch" Perry-produced album also called "To Be a Lover". In 1986, the track was again reworked and became the second high-profile cover Billy Idol released as a
Everybody Loves a Lover of a quote by Ralph Waldo Emerson.) Adler and Allen quickly wrote "Everybody Loves a Lover" in New York City. Doris Day and Adler knew each other through Day's having starred in the film version of "The Pajama Game" whose songs Adler and Ross had written (originally for the stage musical version of "The Pajama Game"), and Day had mentioned to Adler that she was looking for a new novelty song to record and Allen on a visit to Los Angeles presented "Everybody Loves a Lover" for consideration by Day, her husband-manager Marty Melcher, and Mitch Miller, who headed Columbia