Songfacts®:

• This was written by the songwriter Daniel Moore, who had written hits for Three Dog Night ("Shambala) and B.W. Stevenson ("My Maria). The song is about a woman who does the singer wrong, but the title came from a street: Yolanda Avenue in Reseda, California. Moore told us: "99% of my songs are written for myself. 'Yolanda' is one of those. I was signed to ABC Dunhill in the early '70s as a staff songwriter and lived in Northridge, California at the time. One of the cities next door is Reseda. I noticed a street sign in Reseda named Yolanda, while visiting a friend there. That night I went back home and wrote the song. A few days later I recorded it and submitted it to my publisher. They set up a meeting between me and Bobby 'Blue' Bland because he had just signed up with their recording label. I was totally familiar with his work and was really impressed with the man himself when I met him. We went over the song a few times and he seemed to like it. A few weeks later he recorded it and blessed me with some great singing. To my knowledge, 'Yolanda' made it to the top 10 soul singles at the time. I just let my imagination loose and made up the whole thing. That's what writing is all about. You just make it up."
• Daniel Moore, who wrote this song, produced a very refined demo of the song which you can hear here. Songwriters make demos so artists can hear what the song sounds like and decide if they want to record it. Since they are not for broadcast, most writers don't put too much effort into them, but Moore took a different approach. Moore told us: "I didn't believe in pulling any punches. My demos were treated like masters, in my mind."