489. Phil Spector and Various Artists, "Back to Mono (1958-1969)"

 


This is a good chance to tell you about my methodology for this project, which is, I’m not required to listen to every song on every album.  My solemn pledge to you is that I will endeavor to listen to every album in its entirety but, if I already know the album really well or it's boring or awful, I may only listen to 6 or 7 songs.  I promise I will make a good faith effort to hear the whole thing though.

That brings us to this "album" which isn't really an "album" at all, it's a box set with 73 fucking songs, many of which are essentially indistinguishable because of Phil Spector's rather uniform production.  Did I listen to all 73 songs?  No I did not.  Did I want to listen to all 73 songs?  Also no.

You will undoubtedly know many of the songs in this set, like "Chapel of Love" by Darlene Love, "Da Doo Ron Ron" by the Crystals, and "You've Lost that Lovin' Feeling" by the Righteous Brothers.  I especially want to call out "Then He Kissed Me" by the Crystals, because it has such a killer hook.


(Fellow Gen Xers may have first become aware of "Da Doo Ron Ron," as I did, from teen heartthrob Shaun Cassidy's 1977 cover.)

Remember a while ago when we were talking about possibly disturbing lyrics on Phil Spector albums?  Let me introduce you to "He Hit Me (And It Felt Like a Kiss)" by the Crystals.


It's exactly as bad as it sounds:

He hit me
And it felt like a kiss
He hit me
But it didn't hurt me

He couldn't stand to hear me say
That I'd been with someone new,
And when I told him I had been untrue

He hit me
And it felt like a kiss
He hit me
And I knew he loved me


Yikes.  Probably unsurprisingly, later covered by Hole.

Anyway, of course this box set is stuffed with classics but I'm not convinced that box sets should even be on this list.  That's a problem for another day, however.

One last thing: look at that cover!  This box set came out in 1991 and that cover is SO 90's IT HURTS.  I don't know what font that is but it was everywhere in the 90's.  Also the brick wall.  Brick walls were everywhere. Bricks.  The 90's.

(P.S. It seems fitting that the entry for tomorrow, Election Day, will be the Stooges.)

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