Phil Spector Research Paper

In the middle to late 1900’s Phil Spector was an American producer, musician, and songwriter whose popularity spiked to the top after developing the Wall Of Sound also called Spector’s Sound. Withstanding establishment of the common stereo and preferring to have various instruments combined in a single monaural track, Spector composed this technique at the Gold Star Studios in Los Angeles. Conforming relatively facile equalizations aided in his popularity because his approach was crucial to avoid sounding like the “nonsense” that many teenagers at that time listened to on transistor radio. He included two major things in his production of music; reverb, an electronically produced echo effect in recorded music, and layering, different instruments …show more content…
The majority of his productions sounded as if many bands were playing the same song at once, which made them so unique. Spector began working with The Crystals producing many songs that displayed his stylistic traits with one of the most successful ones being “Then He Kissed Me,” released in 1963 and making the top 10 hits in the United States and the United Kingdom. Spector worked with The Crystals for long hours rarely wanting to give them breaks, but that wasn’t because he wanted to over-work them. Spector’s engineer Larry Levine said in an interview that he believes Phil wanted to tire them so “they weren’t playing individualistic” which made them “meld into this wall of sound” that Spector wanted. After many long hours in the studio, he was satisfied with the final results. In the popular song “Then He Kissed Me” his wall of sound is easily recognized through the blending of the singers’ voices and the instrumentation, which was a primary factor in the song’s success. Spector also presents a reverb of the instruments through the use of lots of percussion, castanets, shakers, and