The Crystals

I'm, uh, just more in a disco theme, but I figured something else that would be kind of fun is to show off Darlene Love's, um, girl groups that she was in.

Um, The Crystals was one of them.

The main one that she was in was called The Blossoms.

The next track that you're about to hear is called That's When the Tears Start by The Blossoms, and that is off of the album One Kiss Can Lead to Another.

Um, technically Darlene Love is a stage name.

Um, but otherwise, she wasn't allowed to do any solo work.

She was only allowed to do backing music or in these specific girl groups such as The Crystals, uh, and The Blossoms, as well as doing backing music for a lot of other bands as well.

Again, that was That's When the Tears Start by The Blossoms off of the album One Kiss Can Lead to Another.

Famous for developing the revolutionary Wall of Sound recording technique in the '60s, it inspired everyone from Brian Wilson to Bruce Springsteen.

By layering multiple acoustic and electric instruments through echo chambers, Phil Spector produced hits for acts like The Ronettes, The Crystals, and The Righteous Brothers, transforming teen pop into grand orchestral records.

Phil Spector later co-produced The Beatles' Let It Be, and he helmed iconic solo albums, including John Lennon's Imagine and George Harrison's All Things Must Pass.

However, alongside his artistic genius, Phil Spector exhibited severe personal instability and erratic behavior, to say the least.

The song you just heard a bit of there was He's a Rebel, and you just heard Darlene talk a little bit about her work with Phil Spector.

What is so wild about this chapter in her life is that Darlene was the voice on that number one hit, but it was released as a Crystals song.

Phil Spector didn't tell her that her name wouldn't be on it.

He essentially erased Darlene Love.

Even when The Crystals performed it, they were actually lip-syncing Darlene's vocals.

But as Darlene told Tom Power, most people had no idea that was happening, but that that was pretty typical Phil Spector behavior.

Here's more of Tom's conversation with Darlene Love.

In California it was completely different, 'cause all the musicians knew I had did it.

they're sort of

groundbreaking, but it's, um, only towards 62 when you get Phil Spade's productions, the Crystals and, uh, Bobby Socks and Blue Jeans and people.

Um, And the Brill Building writers, so Goffin and King write for Little Eve.

Yeah, that's all happening in 62.

yeah so this week that documentary had its premiere at the toronto international film festival it's been getting good reviews and it's about the woman who was the voice and occasionally the name behind many of your favorite 1960s girl group hits she was the lead singer in the in the 60s of a los angeles girl group called the blossoms who were signed to phil spector's label And in 1962, they recorded a cover version of Gene Pitney's He's a Rebel, which ended up going to number one.

However, the song was actually credited to a different girl group, the New York-based group The Crystals, another one of Spectre's stable.

They apparently didn't even know this had happened until they heard their song on the radio.

The story behind it was that the Crystals weren't able to make it to LA fast enough for Spectre, so he just had Darlene Love sing it and then credited it to the Crystals.

And in fact, to add insult to injury, one of the Crystals was tasked with mimicking Love's voice when they performed it live.

And this sort of set up a bit of a painful pattern for Darlene Love.

The Crystals' follow-up hit, He's Sure the Boy I Love, was also sung by Darlene Love and the Blossoms, who were led to believe they would be credited this time.

Phil Spector then assigned Love to sing Dadoo Ron Ron, but in the studio, he demoted her last minute to backing and the lead went to her crystal sound like Lala Brooks.