Review: 'But Will You Love Me Tomorrow?: An Oral History of the '60s Girl Groups'

Between the original rock and roll era of Chuck, Buddy, and Bo and the British Invasion, the most happening thing happening in rock and roll was the girl group sound. Fresh, sexy, fun, and often emotionally raw, hits by The Supremes, The Marvelettes, The Ronettes, Darlene Love, The Angels, The Vandellas, The Crystals, The Shirelles, and the rest made radio worth listening to. Once The Beatles arrived in the Colonies, only the Motown groups really hung on (and let's not forget that The Supremes remained America's most unstoppable hit machine of the sixties), but the music they all made is timeless.

Review: Lynne Goldsmith's 'Music in the '80s'

If you paid any attention to rock music during the eighties, you've seen a bunch of Lynn Goldsmith's pictures. She shot all of the decade's biggest stars from the coolest (Prince, The B-52s, The Ramones, Siouxsie) to the squarest (Barry Manilow). The variety of her photos is as eclectic as the people she photographed. She took glossy posed pics and candid back-stage ones that could be Polaroids. She took black and whites and colors and electrifying live shots and casual al fresco ones. My personal faves are the weird after-party pics featuring unlikely gatherings of stars. You want to see John Mellencamp beaming alongside Jayne County and David Johansen? You want to see Nile Rogers, Chrissie Hynde, Dexter Gordon, and Paul Shaffer sharing a table? You want to see Darlene Love in a clutch with Joan Jett and Elton John, who's wearing a huge, fake mohawk? Then Music in the '80s is the book for you. 

Review: 'Holly Jolly: Celebrating Christmas Past in Pop Culture'

John Waters once said, “If you don’t have yourself a merry little Christmas, you might as well kill yourself.” While I wouldn’t go quite that far, I do agree that there’s something pointlessly self-spiting about refusing the tinsely, tacky joys of Christmas. After all, are you really living if you deny yourself the pleasure of yucking it up when Ralphie nearly shoots his eye out with a Red Ryder BB gun? Are you really living if you don’t get a lump in your throat when Darlene Love wails “They’re singing ‘Deck the Halls,’ but it’s not like Christmas at all” or the Monkees harmonize like angels on “Riu Chiu”? Are you really living if you don’t ensconce yourself in pine and fairy lights every December?

I’ve been a stalwart atheist since my teens, and Christmas is the one vestige of a Catholic upbringing I still enjoy. Actually, I agree with seasonal-icon Charles Schulz, who once said, “I doubt very much that Christmas was ever a religious holiday in the first place.” The holiday was always more about the cartoon specials and very special episodes, pop songs and Scrooge movies, Coke and toy ads anyone can dig than magical mangers.

How to Have Yourself a Merry Little Psychobabble X-Mas

A real evergreen decked with handmade ornaments. Choruses of “O Little Town of Bethlehem” around a roaring fire. A ham dinner with all the trimmings for you and yours. Midnight mass. These are the things that make up an old-fashioned Christmas. But there aren’t very Psychobabbley.

Here on Psychobabble, old-fashioned does reign supreme, but it ain’t that kind of sweater-vest brand of old-fashioned. It’s the stupendously, tremendously retro brand. Don’t understand what I mean? Well, don’t fear, don’t panic, and don’t throw yourself in front of the next oncoming reindeer-drawn sleigh. My holiday gift to you is the following 24-hour schedule for having a very merry Psychobabble-style X-Mas….with all the groovy trimmings.

December 25

Midnight: Wake up. Ideally you spent the entirety of Christmas Eve sleeping and building up reserves of energy, because the following is—as I’ve already stated—a 24-hour schedule. No sleep ’til Boxing Day. And you’re really going to need that energy because the first task on our holiday schedule is stocking up on the gifts. No lazy shopping in front of your fancy home computer. We do it the old-fashioned way: Midnight Sale at Toys R’ Us.  Be prepared to gouge out the eyeballs of a fellow loving parent for that last Cabbage Patch Kid on the shelf, because in Psychobabble Land, that kind of thing still happens.

1:00 A.M.: Now get all that booty home and wrap it as fast as possible because it is time to deck some fucking halls the Psychobabble way. If you’ve already set up projected LED snowflakes or any other newfangled decoration, tear that shit down and replace it with toxic melted plastic peanut snowmen on the windows, garish blow-molded Santa and reindeer display on the roof, and flaming hot C7 ½ multicolored bulbs around the eaves. Tarp up that brick fireplace and hang your stockings from a vintage cardboard fireplace by Toymaster. Finish it all off with an aluminum tree sprinkled with satin-covered Styrofoam balls and bathed in the artificial glow of a motorized color wheel.  

Psychobabble’s 50 Favorite Holiday Season Songs

Oh, I’m quite sure you’ve been bombarded with various versions of “Jingle Bells”, “Jingle Bell Rock”, and “Jingle Bells, Batman Smells” since well before Halloween. Don’t let that put you off holiday season songs, though. The ones you probably haven’t been hearing a dozen times a day will turn around the “Bah Humbug” attitude that fucking “Christmas Shoes” song induces. Clean that sleet out of your stocking to make room for these 50 festive and freaky holiday season favorites delivered down your chimney with Psychobabble’s Christmas seal of approval!

50. “Merry Xmas Everybody” by Slade

With its glitzy lights, gaudy decorations, and multi-layered garb, Christmas is the glammest holiday. Wolverhampton glammers Slade recognized this and cut one of the all-time seasonal classics with an anthem made for stomping through slush in platform boots.

49. “Christmas Everyday” by The Miracles

If you’re more inclined to go for a slow, romantic stroll in fresh, clean snow, “Christmas Everyday” will be more your speed. Smokey’s love is such a perennial gift that she could turn any day into December 25. That would be a welcome prospect if every holiday song sounded like this one.

48. “Christmas Is My Time of Year” by The Christmas Spirit (AKA: The Turtles)

Track by Track: 'A Christmas Gift for You from Philles Records'

In this ongoing feature on Psychobabble, I’ve been taking a close look at albums of the classic, underrated, and flawed variety, and assessing them Track by Track.

“The biggest thanks goes to you for giving me the opportunity to relate my feelings of Christmas through the music that I love.”

-Phil Spector “Silent Night”

Like so many visionaries, Phil Spector refused to grow up. Perhaps this has been the cause of so many of his problems—his infantilizing of ex-wife Ronnie Spector, his daddy issues, and his fatal obsession with playing with guns—but it is also the source of his art. His favorite toys are the ones found in a recording studio and his favorite time of the year is Christmas. In 1963, Spector attempted to capture the essence of the holiday several months before December 25^th in the less than seasonal setting of sunny Los Angeles’ Gold Star Studios. How would his thunderous Wall-of-Sound work with corny kiddie songs like “Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer” and “Frosty the Snowman” or the hymn carol “Silent Night” or the easy-listening standard “Winter Wonderland”? Brilliantly, of course, though it has taken longer than Spector surely wished for this to become common knowledge.

Review: 'My Name Is Love' by Darlene Love

If the cliché that great suffering makes great blues singers holds true, and the same could be said of great rhythm and blues singers, then there’s no wonder why Darlene Love possessed the greatest R&B voice of her generation. The daughter of an abusive mother uprooted from a liberal South Californian community to a racist Texas burg, a magnet for unfaithful men, and one of the many victims of Phil Spector’s huge ego and insidious business practices, Darlene Love’s mightily expressive voice can be heard on some of the biggest records of the sixties, both as a soloist and as in-the-shadows support to artists as diverse as Sam Cooke and Bobby “Boris” Pickett. Yet because her name so rarely appeared on the labels of these discs, she never received the acclaim she deserved. The bitterness such misfortunes brewed is evident in Darlene’s autobiography My Name Is Love, which often swells into outright nastiness.

Psychobabble’s 20 Greatest Singles of 1963!

Few artists were thinking in long-playing terms in 1963. Yes, The Beatles, Beach Boys, Dylan, and Spector all put out A-level albums that year. Everyone else was focused exclusively on the hit parade, and the competition was deadly. Along with the aforementioned artists, there were Smokey and Marvin and Roy continuing their lush, soulful onslaught. The Trashmen and Kingsmen made known the rumblings in many an American garage. The Stones, The Supremes, and The Ronettes made their first major statements, and the mighty Darlene Love belted out from more stunning discs than those that actually bore her name. Even Elvis managed to hang on while the new guard raged around him to release one of his last great discs. In a lesser year, any one of the following 45s could have been record of the year. But this is 1963, one of the greatest notches on the Rock & Soul timeline.

20. “Bossa Nova Baby” by Elvis Presley

In the year ruled by Motown, Phil Spector, and the Fab Four, the writing was well on the wall for the man who helped launch the Rock & Roll era so all those upstarts could have their shots. As recently as 1962, Elvis’s recorded output was still pretty consistent, if far poppier than the raw records of his electrifying early days. In 1963, he only managed two truly memorable sides. First up was the radical mood shifter “(You’re the) Devil in Disguise,” which John Lennon supposedly likened to a Bing Crosby record. More interesting was Leiber and Stoller’s frantic “Bossa Nova Baby.” With its freaky percussion, sudden Mariachi horn solo, and lead guitar work out, “Bossa Nova Baby” shined even as an unusually restrained Elvis sounded like a guest on his own record. The following year, he’d release the similar sounding “Viva Las Vegas,” which would be his last decent single until “Suspicious Minds” five years later.

19. “My Boyfriend’s Back” by The Angels

While the King of Rock & Roll no longer seemed capable of exuding Rock & Roll attitude, a trio of Jersey bad girls were putting out enough snarl for a dozen Elvises. The Angels sound anything but angelic as they purr sexy threats to a letch who hung around to bother the girls every night and say “things that weren’t very nice.” Sorry, sucker, but their beau is back now and you’re gonna get your ass kicked. Peggy Santaglia’s audible smirk as she tells her nasty admirer what’s coming to him lends the song a near sadistic tone, and when she loses control at the end of the record, she sounds like she’s going to dish out the punishment herself. “My Boyfriend’s Back” was apparently originally cut as a demo fro The Shirelles, but it’s hard to imagine those sweethearts working up as much switchblade edge as The Angels do on their slashing hit version.

18. “Pride and Joy” by Marvin Gaye

Speaking of sweet, was anyone sweeter than Marvin Gaye in 1963? Gorgeous to look at and hear, Marvin was a heart melter, and on “Pride and Joy,” he lets you know that you ain’t so bad yourself. Backing up Marvin on this cool cube of finger-snapping soul was a group who’d break out on their own a couple of months later with a hot hit you’ll find occupying the sixth spot of this list.

17. “Pain in My Heart” by Otis Redding

Psychobabble’s 20 Greatest Singles of 1962!

At last! Following a couple of dry years for Rock & Roll, many interesting new developments were afoot. Breakthrough records by The Beach Boys and Phil Spector joined great new discs by old favorites like Elvis Presley and Roy Orbison. A young troubadour named Bob was having his first go at Rock & Roll. And some odd rumbling began in merry-old England when a London band topped the U.S. charts for the first time and a quartet of shaggy weirdos from Liverpool released their first hit on their home shore. Here are Psychobabble’s picks for the twenty greatest singles released during that revolutionary year, 1962!

20. “Puddin’ N’ Tain” by The Alley Cats

Phil Spector’s early production of the doo-wop nonsense “Puddin’ N’ Tain” lacks the drama of his great girl-group work, but right from the opening moments, this is clearly a leap forward from earlier records in the same vein. Echo shrouds a popping percussion ensemble soon joined by dancing-finger piano. Over it all, The Alley Cats lose it, repeating the title mantra, leaping into hysterical falsetto. But the Spectorian bells that twinkle out on the bridge leave no question as to who brought the magic to this record.



19. “Love Me Do” / “P.S. I Love You” by The Beatles

The decision to introduce The Beatles to the world with the halting folk ditty “Love Me Do” was a strange one considering they had better original material, and that includes the single’s flipside, “P.S. I Love You” (early evidence of McCartney’s brilliance with the pop-standard form). Certainly this isn’t one of The Beatles’ best, yet it’s historical significance lies somewhere between Darwin’s fish crawling out of the ocean and man setting foot on the moon.



18. “Telstar” by The Tornadoes

Joe Meek’s freaky production of The Tornadoes’ instrumental is not quite as monumental as “Love Me Do”, yet it is significant as the very first record by a British band to top the Billboard charts. More importantly, it is a transporting period piece buzzing with Meek’s signature special effects. Although the title was inspired by the first communication satellite launched into the atmosphere, the track is more reminiscent of the ambling of a wind-up robot.


17. “Sheila” by Tommy Roe

Buddy Holly’s death left a hiccup in the pop world that several singers tried to fill. Bobby Vee was the first, but the most convincing was Tommy Roe, who copped Holly’s delivery over a dead-on Jerry Allison beat on his debut single, “Sheila”. Roe went on to a surprisingly long career as a chirper of bubblegum smashes like “Sweet Pea”, “Hooray for Hazel”, and “Dizzy”, but none lived up to the Rock & Roll promise of the rolling Holly-homage “Sheila”.


16. “Hitch Hike” by Marvin Gaye

Review: ‘Phil Spector Presents the Philles Album Collection’

Phil Spector built a pop empire on the otherworldly singles he produced in the early ‘60s. His reputation at 33 1/3 rpms was less solid. The long player didn’t become a vital Rock & Roll conveyance until the British Invasion that ended Spector’s reign. So he didn’t always put a great deal of thought into the way his albums were presented. When he finally resolved to make a masterful L.P., he released it the same day JFK was assassinated. A mourning public didn’t feel much like jingling all the way, and A Christmas Gift for You from Philles Records flopped. Justly, that album has gone on to achieve classic status with its numerous reissues over the decades. Philles Records’ other L.P.s were never afforded that same boost until now.

Phil Spector Presents the Philles Album Collection collects all six non-holiday albums released on Spector’s label on CD for the very first time. This set is fascinating both for its pleasant surprises and its emphasis on just how cavalier Spector was about everything but his single A-sides. There is a large and disappointing amount of overlap between these discs. The Crystals’ first two records, Twist Uptown and He’s a Rebel, are nearly identical. More of the group’s songs are repeated on The Crystals Sing the Greatest Hits Vol. 1. One third of the tracks on that particular L.P. are tossed-off covers of creaky standards, such as “The Wah Watusi” and “The Twist”. And The Crystals aren’t even the artists on those tracks! The Ronettes are!


Yet Spector’s offhand approach to making albums could also be genuinely interesting. Bob B. Soxx & the Blue Jeans’ Zip-A-Dee-Doo-Dah finds him experimenting with greater abandon than he usually dared on his hits. His use of cagey distortion, odd bits of discordance (the guttural, out-of-tune bass on “Baby, I Love You”), and tightly controlled tempos and dynamics make an already eccentric selection of songs—“The White Cliffs of Dover”, “This Land Is Your Land”, the title track, which was certainly Spector’s oddest hit— even odder. Even the Disney-esque cartoon on the front cover is kind of unusual. Zip-A-Dee-Doo-Dah also provides the box set’s most concentrated dose of Darlene Love, whose magnificent solo material is sadly underrepresented here.

Even weirder is Phil’s Flipsides, a bonus compilation of the two-minute instrumental improvisations Spector’s Wall of Sound Orchestra recorded to fill the B-sides of his hit singles and discourage DJs from playing the wrong sides. By design this isn’t the producer’s most essential music, but the combination of wacky Rock & Roll instrumentals and pretty convincing straight jazz is refreshing. Half this disc would sound smashing on a John Waters soundtrack. The other half is great cocktail party mood music. The goofy titles further reveal how little Spector cared about his non-A-sides: “Flip and Nitty”, “Chubby Danny D.”, “Dr. Kaplan’s Office” (named for Spector’s psychiatrist, who was apparently pretty shitty at his job).

Phil Spector Presents the Philles Album Collection will be most appealing to Spector completists, but there is a lot of amazing music here. Granted, those two debut Crystals records are pretty flimsy. The best of their tracks are collected on Sings the Greatest Hits Vol. 1 and the various-artists compilation Philles Records Presents Today’s Hits, which also features a handful of Darlene Love solo sides, including the transcendent “Wait Til’ My Bobby Gets Home”, and The Alley Cats’ fun novelty “Puddin’ N’ Tain”. Best of all is Presenting the Fabulous Ronettes Featuring Veronica, Spector’s first truly great album despite its failure to generate classic status. All of the group’s prime-era hits (“Be My Baby”, “Walking in the Rain”, “Baby, I Love You”, “I Wonder”—Yow!), classic oddities (“You Baby”, “So Young”), and some unexpected surprises (a raucous phony live version of Ray Charles’s “What’d I Say”) converge in a spectacular line up. Along with The Beach Boys, who it so inspired, this is the freshest pop that came out of America during the first year of the British Invasion.