If I Had You

Album: For Your Entertainment (2009)
Charted: 30
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Songfacts®:

  • This high octane Europop track was co-written and produced by Swedish hit-makers Max Martin and Johan Shellback. Texan songwriter Savan Kotecha, whose credits include the 2007 X-Factor winner Shayne Ward's hit single, "Breathless," and "Brave" from Leona Lewis' 2009 album, Echo, also co-penned the song.
  • Lambert discussed this song with Digital Spy: "I think it's got a great message. It does sound a bit cliché but I love promoting love and acceptance and I think the song definitely gets that across. In the pop market we're so sex-saturated and a lot of the big artists are popular because they're "so fierce!" and badass. I love that and get a kick out of that - people like GaGa and Beyoncé especially - but that's the ground I was trying to cover with 'For Your Entertainment'. The thing about 'If I Had You' is that it reflects what I'm really about, which is joy."
  • Lambert told MTV News: "The message in the song is really exciting, because basically what it's saying is no matter what color your skin is, no matter what religion you are, no matter what your sexuality is, no matter what your age is, we can all party together. We can all find common love. And all this other stuff - money, success, fortune, fashion, glam - it's all great, but it doesn't mean anything if you're not connecting. I love it."
  • Lambert told MTV News about the song's music video: "The thing about the video [is] there is a love interest: It's all my friends," he explained. "It's about the love that you have with your circle of people that you surround yourself with.

    "The 'If I Had You' video we shot in the woods at night," he continued. "I was inspired by the parties that I've gone to in the past, like Burning Man and this other party called Lightning in a Bottle. There's a big kind of subculture in California and around the country of people who are designers and performance artists, just free spirits that like to come together and play dress-up and have a good time. And it's a very specific community, one that's inspired me a lot."

    Lambert added that rather than casting actors to look like they could be part of this subculture, he got his pals onboard. "I invited my friends to come party in my video, so there's a real authentic joy," he explained. "And it gets kind of psychedelic. There's just gonna be a lot of special effects - Some are from [Los Angeles variety extravaganza] The Zodiac Show some are from parties [and] clubs. Some of them I've done theater with. It's a big variety of people."
    Amongst Lambert's friends that make cameo appearances in the clip are Allison Iraheta and Kesha.

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