Doobie brothers greatest hits

In late 1961, Spector and Sill formed Philles Records. (The label name was a contraction of the owners’ first names.) Spector’s reputation as a producer ballooned as he focused his attention on girl group called the Crystals, who had hits with “There’s No Other (Like My Baby)” and “Uptown.” After a third single, the controversial “He Hit Me (And It Felt Like a Kiss)” flopped, Spector fired the original Crystals, replacing them with singer Darlene Love her backing group, the Blossoms. (Such summarily dictatorial decisions would be a hallmark of Spector’s career.) The personnel change worked: The new Crystals’ first single, the million-selling “He’s a Rebel,” became Philles’ first Number One single. Just a year after forming the label, Spector bought out Lester Sill’s share. At 21 years old, Phil Spector was a millionaire. … [Read more...] about Phil Spector, Famed ‘Wall of Sound’ Producer Convicted of Murder, Dead at 80

Spector himself became a Hall member in 1989. As his marriages deteriorated, recording artists also began to quit working with Spector and musical styles passed him by. He preferred singles to albums, calling the latter, "Two hits and 10 pieces of junk." He initially refused to record his music in multichannel stereo, claiming the process damaged the sound. A Spector box set retrospective was called "Back to Mono." … [Read more...] about Phil Spector, “Wall of Sound” Producer Convicted of Murder, Dies at 81

Another British singer who has died that you had a connection to was Amy Winehouse. You were performing her “Back to Black” before her death.Amy Winehouse was so great for me, because she made me feel like what I did mattered. The hair, the eye makeup. I recorded “Back to Black” three years before she died. I used to sort of make fun of her saying, “She has a beehive, but it’s sort of tilted like the Eiffel Tower,” but I don’t say that anymore since she passed because her and I became very close – even if it was through magazines. I’d read where she’d say, “I loved all-girl groups but my specialty was the Ronettes and Ronnie Spector with the way she wore her hair.” I got messages through her interviews. And now her mother comes to every show I do in the U.K. She wrote a book about Amy and gave me a copy. She wrote an inscription that was so sweet and personal about how I was her daughter’s inspiration. … [Read more...] about Ronnie Spector on Keith Richards, David Bowie and Life After Phil

You grew up in Spanish Harlem. What’s the most New York thing about you?I loved watching the black and Puerto Rican girls with their cigarettes and their high hair. We had a Jewish deli and a Chinese laundry. My father was white, and my mother was black and Indian. I thought it was great that everybody was dark – or not so dark. … [Read more...] about The Last Word: Ronnie Spector on Childhood Hero, Sobriety, Life with Phil

Spector's "Wall of Sound" was a technique he discovered in a tunnel near Hollywood Blvd. The sound created a roaring effect, which Spector called the "Wagnerian approach to rock 'n' roll" -- it involved overdubbing scores of musicians in an orchestral style to make a fuller sound. … [Read more...] about Music Producer Phil Spector Dead at 81