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Posted on 12/12/2025 5:19:38 PM PST by nickcarraway
Among its countless achievements, the song was named the 20th century’s most-played song on American radio and television by the BMI.
Only the most momentous songs in pop history make it into the Grammy Hall of Fame, the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, the Top 40 of Rolling Stone’s 2004 list of the 500 greatest songs of all time, and the Top 10 of the RIAA’s Top 365 Songs of the Century. But only one could achieve all that and be named the most-played song on American radio and television during the 20th century by the BMI. Its title? “You’ve Lost That Lovin’ Feelin.’”
That remarkable set of achievements befits a song that completely changed the lives of vocal duo Bill Medley and Bobby Hatfield. They’d formed the Righteous Brothers in 1962, having recorded as the Paramours for the Smash label that same year. Now signed to Moonglow, the “brothers” made the Hot 100 twice in 1963, but neither “Little Latin Lupe Lu” nor “My Babe” could crack the Top 40, peaking at Nos.49 and 75 respectively.
Hotshot producer Phil Spector happened to see the duo performing at the Cow Palace in San Francisco on a bill with one of his acts, the Ronettes. He was so impressed that he bought the Righteous Brothers out of the remaining two and a half years of their contract with Moonglow and signed them to Philles, the label he’d formed with Lester Sill in 1961.
Longer than it seemed
“Lovin’ Feelin,’” written by the A-list team of Spector and husband and wife Barry Mann and Cynthia Weil, and imbued with Spector’s undeniable production genius, was a melodrama of epic proportions. So much so, in fact, that Spector lied about its running time: the track’s duration on the Philles label was listed as 3’05”, so as not to deter disc jockeys from playing what was actually a recording of 3’45.”
It needed every one of those seconds to wring out all of the emotion in Medley and Hatfield’s tortured, back-and-forth vocalising. Broadcasters welcomed it with open arms, and so did the public. The song made its debut on the Hot 100 of December 12, 1964 at No.77, and was No.1 in the US by February 6, replacing Petula Clark’s “Downtown” for a two-week run.
It did the same in the UK that week, succeeding the Moody Blues‘ “Go Now.” Just to underline the power that brought it all those accolades we mentioned at the beginning, the indestructible ballad returned to the Top 20 in versions by Dionne Warwick in 1969 and Daryl Hall & John Oates in 1980.
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"I hate it when she does that."
That song brings me to my knees to this day!
We’ve all been there...
Unchained Melody was our wedding song.
Glen Campbell (Wrecking Crew) on guitar on the studio version.
It did a lot better in Southern California, reaching #1 just before New Years and then staying there for the next two months. For several weeks, "Downtown"--a song I didn't like at the time--was at #2 while "Lovin' Feeling" stayed at #1. Finally in the first week of March, "My Girl" by the Temptations knocked the Righteous Brothers out of the top spot.
The song I’ve probably danced to more than any other.
You've Lost That Lovin' Feeling--Cilla Black (1965)
Its a song I could handle never hearing again.
As a 17/18 year old, I had a fairly good diaphramic falsetto, but nothing like Bobby Hatfield.
I even had a workable harmony to Bobby.
I was crushed when I learned he had died.
Goin' to the bahba shop, gonn'a have 'im do me up . . . Justine !
https://youtu.be/GjRLwYs-FXE
https://youtu.be/N6O-fFgl5vE?list=RDN6O-fFgl5vE
“We’ve all been there...”
I was about 20 feet from their stage in Vegas.
Bill Medley had a great run with crowd favorites like this number, Unchained Melody and Time of My Life, and Phil Spector’s Wall of Sound almost a performer in its own right. Pretty tragic the way Phil spiraled towards the end. And, on a topical note, Phil died from COVID, one of a significant number of musical luminaries who went out that way.
[Its a song I could handle never hearing again.]
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=UaNGtgYwSsU
youtube has some very good recordings
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uOnYY9Mw2Fg
Originally sun by Todd Duncan, African American opera singer. Born in Kentucky. From movie “Unchained” in 1955.
Movie is about a prison warden who puts men who are in prison for various minor crimes in very minimal control. Wardens rules allow voluntary serving time. Men are free to leave. Warden was precursor to modern idealist prison reform. This was all before psychotropic drugs, kids without parents, and moral relativism. Movie based on warden Kenyon Scudder...who brought minimal control in Chino, CA. Prison.
We see how that worked out in modern times...total failure.
FYI...if you don’t already know.
I don’t really spend time rating songs this way. :)
I could handle not hearing either, again, though.
The song I’ve probably danced to more than any other.
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>....
For me that would be the Platters “Only You”. It was the trigger for several passionate love affairs which sort of contradicted the lyrics now that I think of it!
KRLA, "Your Official Beatles Station" played a lot of good music back then. As a DJ there in 1963, Casey Kasem even played The Beatles "From Me to You" six months before they became popular in America on the Ed Sullivan Show.
Dang that was a great song, performance and recording. Brings me back to being a kid “fixing” an old radio my dad gave me, in my cubby in the basement. KXOK AM 630.
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