"You've Lost That Lovin' Feelin' is a song by Phil Spector, Barry Mann, and Cynthia Weil, first recorded in 1964 by the American vocal duo the Righteous Brothers and released as the lone single and title track from their 1965 album of the same name. This version, produced by Spector, is cited by some music critics as the ultimate expression and illustration of his Wall of Sound recording technique. The record was a critical and commercial success on its release, reaching number one in early February 1965 in both the United States and the United Kingdom. The single ranked No. 5 in Billboard's year-end Top 100 of 1965 Hot 100 hits – based on combined airplay and sales, and not including three charted weeks in December 1964 – and has entered the UK Top Ten on three occasions.
"You've Lost That Lovin' Feelin has been covered successfully by numerous artists. In 1965, Cilla Black's recording reached No. 2 in the UK Singles Chart. Dionne Warwick took her version to No. 16 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart in 1969. A 1971 duet version by singers Roberta Flack and Donny Hathaway peaked at No. 30 on the Billboard R&B singles chart. Long John Baldry charted at No. 2 in Australia with his 1979 remake and a 1980 version by Hall and Oates reached No. 12 on the US Hot 100.
Various music writers have described the Righteous Brothers version as "one of the best records ever made" and "the ultimate pop record". In 1999 the performing-rights organization Broadcast Music, Inc. (BMI) ranked the song as the most-played song on American radio and television in the 20th century, having accumulated more than 8 million airplays by 1999, and nearly 15 million by 2011. It held the distinction of being the most-played song for 22 years until 2019, when it was overtaken by "Every Breath You Take". In 2001 the song was chosen as one of the Songs of the Century by RIAA, and in 2003 the track ranked No. 34 on the list of the 500 Greatest Songs of All Time by Rolling Stone. In 2015, the single was inducted into the National Recording Registry by the Library of Congress for being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant".
Background and composition
In 1964, music producer Phil Spector conducted the band at a show in San Francisco where the Righteous Brothers was also appearing, and he was impressed enough with the duo to want them to record for his own label, Philles Records. All the songs previously produced by Spector for Philles Records featured African-American singers, and the Righteous Brothers would be his first white vocal act. However, they had a vocal style, termed blue-eyed soul, that suited Spector.
Spector commissioned Barry Mann and Cynthia Weil to write a song for them, bringing them over from New York to Los Angeles to stay at the Chateau Marmont so they could write the song. Taking a cue from "Baby I Need Your Loving" by The Four Tops, which was then rising in the charts, Mann and Weil decided to write a ballad. Mann wrote the melody first, and came up with the opening line, "You never close your eyes anymore when I kiss your lips", influenced by a line from the song "I Love How You Love Me" that was co-written by Mann and produced by Spector – "I love how your eyes close whenever you kiss me". Mann and Weil wrote the first two verses quickly, including the chorus line "you've lost that lovin' feelin. When Spector joined in with the writing, he added "gone, gone, gone, whoa, whoa, whoa" to the end of the chorus, which Weil disliked. The line "you've lost that lovin' feelin was originally only intended to be a dummy line that would be replaced later, but Spector liked it and decided to keep it. The form of the song is of verse-chorus-verse-chorus-bridge-chorus or ABABCB form.Friedman, Sidney (2007). "In the Middle of the Music" lecture notes Mann and Weil had problems writing the bridge and the ending, and asked Spector for help. Spector experimented on the piano with a "Hang On Sloopy" riff that they then built on for the bridge.
Weil recalled that, "after Phil, Barry and I finished [writing it], we took it over to the Righteous Brothers. Bill Medley, who has the low voice, seemed to like the song." However, Medley initially felt that the song did not suit their more uptempo rhythm and blues style, and Mann and Spector had sung the song in a higher key: "And we just thought, 'Wow, what a good song for The Everly Brothers.' But it didn't seem right for us." The song, which has a very big range, was originally written in the higher key of F. But to accommodate Medley's baritone voice, the key was gradually lowered to C in the recording, which, together with slowing the song down, changed the "whole vibe of the song", according to Medley.
Bobby Hatfield reportedly expressed his annoyance to Spector when he learned that Medley would start the first verse alone and that he had to wait until the chorus before joining in. Prior to this, they would have been given equal prominence in a song. When Hatfield asked Spector just what he was supposed to do during Medley's solo, Spector replied, "You can go directly to the bank!" Notes from Phil Spector: Back to Mono (1958-1969) boxed-set booklet, see the recording details for the song
The Righteous Brothers recording
The song was recorded on September 26, 1964, at Studio A of Gold Star Studios in Los Angeles. When Hatfield and Medley went to record the vocals a few weeks after the song was written, all the instrumental tracks had already been recorded and overdubbed. They recorded the vocal many times – Medley sang the opening verse over and over again until Spector was satisfied, and the process was then repeated with the next verse. The recording took over 39 takes and around eight hours over a period of two days.
The song would become one of the foremost examples of Spector's "Wall of Sound" technique. It features the studio musicians the Wrecking Crew; playing on this recording were Don Randi on piano, Tommy Tedesco on guitar, Carol Kaye and Ray Pohlman on bass, and Steve Douglas on sax. They were also joined by Barney Kessel on guitar and Earl Palmer on drums. Jack Nitzsche usually arranged the songs for Spector, but he was absent, and the arrangement was done by Gene Page. As with his other songs, Spector started by cutting the instrumental track first, building up layers of sound to create the Wall of Sound effect. The recording was done mono so Spector could fix the sound exactly as he wanted it. According to sound engineer Larry Levine, they started recording four acoustic guitars; when that was ready, they added the pianos, of which there were three; followed by three basses; the horns (two trumpets, two trombones, and three saxophones); then finally the drums. The vocals by Hatfield and Medley were then recorded and the strings overdubbed. The background singers were mainly the vocal group the Blossoms, accompanied by the Ronettes and joined in the song's crescendo by a young and then-unknown Cher. Reverb was applied in the recording, and more was added on the lead vocals during the mix. According to music writer Robert Palmer, the effect of the technique used was to create a sound that was "deliberately blurry, atmospheric, and of course huge; Wagnerian rock 'n' roll with all the trimmings."
The song started slowly in the recording, with Medley singing in a low baritone voice. Right before the second verse started, Spector wanted the tempo to stay the same, but the beat to be just a little behind where they are supposed to land to give the impression of the song slowing down. The recorded song was three ticks slower and a tone and a half lower than what Mann and Weil had written. When Mann heard the finished record over the phone, he thought that it had been mistakenly played at 33 1/3 instead of 45 rpm and told Spector, "Phil, you have it on the wrong speed!"
Even with his interest in the song, Medley had his doubts because it was unusually long for a pop song at the time. In an interview with Rolling Stone magazine, he recalled, "We had no idea if it would be a hit. It was too slow, too long, and right in the middle of The Beatles and the British Invasion." The song ran for nearly four minutes when released. This was too long by contemporary AM radio standards; radio stations at that time rarely played songs longer than three minutes because longer songs meant that fewer ads could be placed between song sets. Spector, however, refused to shorten it. Following a suggestion by Larry Levine, Spector had "3:05" printed on the label, instead of the track's actual running time of 3:45. He also added a false ending which made the recording more dramatic, and also tricked radio DJs into thinking it was a shorter song.
The production of the single cost Spector around $35,000, then a considerable amount. Spector himself was deeply concerned about the reception to a song that was unusual for its time, worrying that his vision would not be understood. He canvassed a few opinions – his publisher Don Kirshner suggested that the song should be re-titled "Bring Back That Lovin' Feelin, while New York DJ Murray the K thought that bass line in the middle section, similar to that of a slowed-down "La Bamba", should be the start of the song. Spector took these as criticisms and later said: "I didn't sleep for a week when that record came out. I was so sick, I got a spastic colon; I had an ulcer."
Reception Andrew Loog Oldham, who was then the manager of the Rolling Stones and a fan and friend of Spector, chanced upon Spector listening to a test pressing of the song that had just been delivered. Loog Oldham later wrote, "The room was filled with this amazing sound, I had no idea what it was, but it was the most incredible thing I'd ever heard." He added, "I'd never heard a recorded track so emotionally giving or empowering." Later, when Cilla Black recorded a rival version of the same song and it was racing up the British charts ahead of The Righteous Brothers' version, Loog Oldham was appalled, and took it upon himself to run a full-page ad in Melody Maker:
In other ads, Loog Oldham also coined a new term to describe the song, "Phil Spector's Wall of Sound", which Spector later registered as a trademark.
Assessments by later music writers were highly positive. Nick Logan and Bob Woffinden thought that the song might be "the ultimate pop record ... here [Spector's] genius for production truly bloomed to create a single of epic proportion ..." Richard Williams, who wrote the 1972 biography of Phil Spector Out of His Head, considered the song to be one of the best records ever made, while Charlie Gillett in his 1970 book The Sound of the City: The Rise of Rock and Roll wrote that "the ebb and flow of passion the record achieved had no direct equivalent." Mick Brown, author of a biography of Spector, Tearing Down the Wall of Sound, considered the song to be "Spector's defining moment" and his "most Wagnerian production yet – a funeral march to departed love". The opening line was said to be "one of the most familiar opening passages in the history of pop", and Vanity Fair described the song as "the most erotic duet between men on record". However, when it was first presented on the BBC television panel show Juke Box Jury in January 1965 upon its release in the UK, it was voted a miss by all four of its panelists, with one juror echoing Barry Mann's concerns by questioning if it was played at the right speed.