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Chapter 59: It's In His Kiss

Girl group pop

Despite my snark three chapters earlier, I’m not a Phil Spector hater, I just prefer when he pulls back slightly from his full wall of sound. The Crystals’ “There’s No Other Like My Baby” is just right, a spine-tingling cloud of harmonics. On the opposite end of the girl group scale, “Egyptian Shumba” is far from crystalline, an unabashed raver humming on pre-riot-grrl energy. Other songs pack an album’s worth of charm into tiny, iconic moments - the first eight beats of “Be My Baby,” the ‘mwah’ on “Great Big Kiss,” or the jump rope breakdown of “Clapping Song.”
1. The Ronettes

Be My Baby

2. The Shangri-Las

Give Him a Great Big Kiss

3. The Crystals

There's No Other Like My Baby

4. Betty Everett

The Shoop Shoop Song (It's in His Kiss)

5. Shirley Ellis

The Clapping Song

6. Dionne Warwick

Do You Know the Way to San Jose

7. The Tammys

Egyptian Shumba

8. Skeeter Davis

Am I That Easy to Forget?

9. The Crystals

Then He Kissed Me

10. The Shirelles

Will You Love Me Tomorrow