“You’ve Lost That Lovin’ Feelin'” (The Righteous Brothers)

In honor of the late Cynthia Weil, who passed away last week, we’re doing an entire week of songs she wrote with her husband Barry Mann. There’s only one place to start, of course, with their best-known composition, the one that was the most-played song of the 20th century, “You’ve Lost That Lovin’ Feelin'” by the Righteous Brothers. If you don’t know it, you’ve been hiding under a rock without a radio for the past 60 years.

“You’ve Lost That Lovin’ Feelin'” was written by Ms. Weil and Mr. Mann, with a technical assist by producer Phil Spector. (Phil always took a cut of the songwriting credits back then, because he wanted a cut of the songwriting royalties.) Spector commissioned Mann and Weil to write a song for the Righteous Brothers emphasizing their “blue-eyed soul” style and brought them from their home in New York City to the Chateau Marmont in Los Angeles to get to work.

The duo was inspired by the Four Tops’ then-current hit, “Baby I Need Your Loving.” Mann wrote the melody first, along with the opening line, “You never close your eyes anymore when I kiss your lips.” Mann and Weil wrote the first two verses quickly, including the chorus line “you’ve lost that lovin’ feelin'” that was originally just a dummy line that they later decided they liked. Spector added the “gone, gone, gone, whoa, whoa, whoa” to the end of the chorus, along with the “Hang On Sloopy” riff in the bridge.

“You’ve Lost That Lovin’ Feelin’” starts slow and low, with the protagonist ruminating on the little changes he’s noticed in his lover:

You never close your eyes anymore when I kiss your lips
And there’s no tenderness like before in your fingertips

Musically, we have a lot of tension here. The song is in the key of Db (that’s five flats, for you musicians in the audience), which has an interesting, quite emotional feel. Mann starts with an outside-the-key altered bass chord, VII/I (Cb/Db), an unsettling combination that immediately sets the tone for the rest of the song. In the third measure he resolves the tension with a simple I chord (Db); the effect is a droning tonic in the bass (Db through all four measures) with the Cb and Db chords alternating up above.

The first four bars are repeated, then Mann starts a majestic upward progression (on “You’re trying hard not to show it”): Ebm7 – Fm – Gb – Ab. This leads straight into the chorus, full of altered bass chords: Db – Ebm/Db – Ab7 – Db – Ebm/Db – Cb/Db – Db. What’s interesting here is that the bass line is relatively simple, alternating between the tonic (Db) and the dominant (Ab). It’s the chords played over the bass line that add harmonic complexity and increase the rising tension in the song.

After that explosive first chorus, the second verse returns to the protagonist listing more things that have changed about his lover:

Now there’s no welcome look in your eyes when I reach for you
And girl you’re starting to criticize little things I do
It makes me just feel like crying (baby)
‘Cause baby something beautiful’s dying

Now the song drives into the second chorus, which repeats the same chords as the first chorus. The song ramps up to yet another emotional level as it enters its extended bridge. The protagonist literally gets down on his knees and goes into a soul shout, begging his lover for a return to the way things used to be:

Baby baby I’d get down on my knees for you
If you would only love me like you used to do yeah
We had a love a love a love you don’t find everyday
So don’t don’t don’t don’t let it slip away

Behind these words, the music becomes slightly less complex, which helps to cool things down for a brief moment. At first listen, all you hear is the bass line (as noted, straight out of “Hang On, Sloopy”), moving from Db to Gb to Ab to Gb to Eb (1 – 4 – 5 – 4 – 2), over and over. The chords above the bass, implied at first, are almost as simple. But when the two-bar phrase repeats, Mann adds some harmonic complexity above the same bass line, this time using a Db – Ebm/Gb – Fm/Ab – Ebm/Gb – Ab7 progression. These new chords serve the same function as the previous batch, but the added notes help to build the tension throughout this section.

By the end of the bridge the protagonist’s pleas are successful; the song shifts into yet another emotional gear as it repeats the chorus, this time with the more hopeful “Bring back” replacing the earlier “You’ve lost”:

Bring back that lovin’ feelin’
Whoa, that lovin’ feelin
Bring back that lovin’ feelin’
‘Cause it’s gone gone gone and
I can’t go on whoa

When Mann and Weil originally played the song for Bill Medley and Bobby Hatfield (AKA the Righteous Brothers), Medley didn’t think the song fit their then-uptempo style. Mann and Weil ended up slowing the song down and lowering the key from its original key of F down to Db, to better fit Medley’s vocal range. According to Medley, those alterations did the trick, changing the “whole vibe of the song.”

Interestingly, Medley’s partner Bobby Hatfield was annoyed that the song started with Medley on his own and he didn’t come in until the chorus; he was used to the two of them singing together throughout the entire tune. When Hatfield asked Spector what he was supposed to do during Medley’s solo verse, Spector reportedly replied, “You can go directly to the bank!”

To record the song, producer Phil Spector contracted Gene Page to do the arranging and brought engineer Larry Levine and the L.A.-based studio cats dubbed the Wrecking Crew into Studio of A Gold Star Studios on September 26, 1964. The Crew that day included Don Randi on piano, Tommy Tedesco and Barney Kessel on guitar, Carol Kaye and Ray Pohlman on bass, and Steve Douglas on sax. Earl Palmer was on drums because Spector’s regular drummer, Hal Blaine, was in England as a guest of Richard Harris, who would shortly record Jimmy Webb’s opus, “MacArthur Park.” For background vocals, Spector brought in Darlene Love and the Blossoms, augmented by a young singer named Cher. Anyway, the cats spent a few hours recording the track, Bill and Bobby added their vocals a few weeks later, Phil did his magic in the booth, and the song was in the can.

The result was something fantastic. Spector employed generous reverb to create what may be the ultimate Wall of Sound recording. The sound is immense, almost operatic, what one critic called “Wagnerian rock ‘n’ roll with all the trimmings.” It’s a song that starts with a gut punch and goes up from there, hitting peaks that were previously unimagined.

Philles Records released “You’ve Lost That Lovin’ Feelin'” in November of 1964 and it hit #1 on the Billboard Hot 100 in February the following year. Critics have called it “one of the best records ever made” and “the ultimate pop record.” BMI named “You’ve Lost That Lovin’ Feelin” the most-played song on American radio and television in the 20th century, with more than 8 million airplays by 1999. (That number rose to 15 million by 2011.) The song was chosen one of the Songs of the Century by RIAA and Rolling Stone magazine ranked it #34 on its list of the 500 Greatest Songs of All Time. In 2015, the Library of Congress inducted the song into its National Recording Registry in 2015 for being “culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant.”

Knowing all this, is “You’ve Lost That Lovin’ Feelin'” the best song ever written? It doesn’t hit the peak on my personal list, but I definitely put it in my top five. It’s just one of many great songs written by the late Ms. Weil and one that will last long after her passing.