Tag: Baby I love you

Aretha Franklin – Baby I Love You

This is my personal favorite song of Aretha Franklin…and she has a boatload of great songs to pick from. She could bring soul to You Light Up My Life and THAT is saying something. I’ve said this a lot but Aretha Franklin and Janis Joplin are my top female singers.

This Aretha Franklin song was released in 1967 and it was on the Aretha Arrives album. It peaked at #4 on the Billboard 100, #3 in Canada, and #39 in the UK in 1967.  Her sisters Carolyn and Erma provided backing vocals along with the Sweet Inspirations, an R&B girl group founded by Cissy Houston. Musicians who were featured on the track included engineer Tom Dowd and Muscle Shoals players Jimmy Johnson and Joe South on guitars, Tommy Cogbill on bass, Spooner Oldham on electric piano, and Roger Hawkins on drums. Truman Thomas also played the organ.

Franklin recorded this with Atlantic producer Jerry Wexler in New York City during the same session as Chain Of Fools. The song was written by Ronnie Shannon, who was also responsible for another hit for Aretha with I Never Loved A Man (The Way I Love You).

The horns are on point and perfect in this song. The music and vocal backups make a perfect backdrop for Aretha’s explosive voice. She never sounded like she was singing by a formula…each song is marked by her individuality. We lost her great voice and soul on August 16, 2018.

This woman could sing the phonebook and I would listen. This is one of many songs I like from her… She has sold over 75 million records in her career. This is the first song I remember hearing from her.

Aretha Franklin:  “Those sessions were a lot of fun, and there was a lot of good food coming in and out of the studio. Lots of burgers, fries, and milkshakes. In between takes, we would sit and chat, with whoever was producing, Jerry or Arif. They’d be enjoying those burgers so much I couldn’t wait until mine came!”

Baby, I Love You

If you want my lovin’If you really doDon’t be afraid, babyJust ask meYa know I’m gonna give it to you

Oh, and I do declare (I do)I wanna see you with itStretch out your arms, little boyYou’re gonna get it‘Cause I love you, oh(Baby, baby, baby, I love you)There ain’t no doubt about itBaby, I love you(Baby, baby, baby, I love you)I love you, I love you, I love youI love you, baby I love you

If you feel you wanna kiss meGo right ahead I don’t mindAll you got to do is snap your fingersAnd I’ll come a runnin, I ain’t lyin’(I ain’t lyin’)And oh what you wantLittle boy you know you got itI’d deny my own selfBefore I see you without it‘Cause I love you(Baby, baby, baby I love you)Ain’t no doubt about it baby I love you(Baby, baby, baby I love you)I love you, I love you, I love youI love you, baby I love you

Someday ya might wanna run awayAnd leave me sittin’ here to cryBut if it’s all the same to ya babyI’m gonna stop you from sayin’ goodbye(Goodbye)Baby I love ya (baby, baby, I love ya)Baby I need ya (baby, baby I need ya)Said I want ya (baby baby I want ya)Getcha have ya baby (baby baby I love ya)Don’t let your neighbors tell ya I don’t want ya(Baby, baby I want ya)Don’t let your lowdown friends(Baby, baby I want ya)

Ronettes – Baby, I Love You

This was the follow-up to The Ronettes hugely successful debut single “Be My Baby.” Like “Be My Baby,” this was written by Jeff Barry and Ellie Greenwich, and produced by Phil Spector using his famous “Wall Of Sound” technique. Be My Baby is hard to beat but Ronnie is fantastic in this one also.

The song was released not long after the assassination of US President John F. Kennedy, which put a damper on sales of upbeat singles. The Ronettes were never able to match the success of “Be My Baby.”

The song peaked at #24 in the Billboard 100 in 1964.

From Songfacts

Cher sang backup on The Ronettes version, and later recorded it on her own in a much slower, more dramatic style. Her version was produced by Phil Spector, and was released as the B-side of “A Woman’s Story,” which was Spector’s first production for Warner-Spector Records, his collaboration with Warner Brothers.

Twice, covers of this song peaked at #8 in the UK chart, bettering The Ronettes’ version. The first came in 1973 when the Welsh singer/guitarist Dave Edmunds recorded it as a homage to Phil Spector. Then in 1980, the American rock group the Ramones had their only UK Top 20 hit when their cover, which was produced by Spector, also reached #8. Edmunds’ version was the first single released on the Rockfield label, available through RCA.

Jeff Barry’s protégé Andy Kim took this song to #9 in the US with this 1969 version. Kim, who co-wrote the massive Archies hit “Sugar, Sugar” with Barry, grew up in Montreal and had never heard the song when he stumbled across it in Barry’s office and started playing it. “I see this sheet music and the chords,” Kim said in a Songfacts interview. “I pick up the guitar and I’m playing this song, and I’m singing this song that I had never heard of. Jeff walks in, and he says, ‘Hey man, I heard you through the door. I love what you’re playing, but that’s not how the song goes.'”

“We went in the studio and the idea was for us to make this record together, because it really sounded great in the office,” he continued. “To work with Jeff that way was the magic of it all. We went to A&R Studios – Studio A or 1, whatever they called it at the time. A huge room. Sat in the middle of this huge recording space with a microphone next to the guitar. Jeff went into the booth, and was kind of the metronome. He just clapped and hummed along the way – what he needed from me was to get one guitar down from beginning to end. I was able to do that five more times on separate tracks, and it would bounce back and forth. And if you do that, there are overtones and there is a sound without drums or anything. So that’s how the song was built – one instrument at a time. Drums were played by hand, percussion. Then Chuck Rainey came in to put bass on the song, and everything just glued together.”

Kim’s version was #1 for two weeks in his native Canada and earned him a Juno Award as his country’s Top Male Vocalist.

 

Baby, I Love You

Woa-oh, woa-oh oh oh
Have I ever told you
How good it feels to hold you?
It isn’t easy to explian
And though I’m really trying
I think I may start crying
My heart can’t wait another day
When you kiss me I’ve just got to say

(Baby, I love you) come on, baby
(Baby, I love you) ooh-ee baby
(Baby, I love only you)

Woa-oh, woa-oh oh oh

I can’t live without you
I love everything about you
I can’t help it if I feel this way
Oh, I’m so glad I found you
I want my arms around you
I love to hear you call my name
Oh, tell me that you feel the same

(Baby, I love you) come on, baby
(Baby, I love you) ooh-ee baby
(Baby, I love only you)

Woa-oh, woa-oh oh oh

Come on, baby (baby, I love you) come on, baby
(Baby, I love you) ooh-ee baby
(Baby, I love you) come on, baby
(Baby, I love you) ooh-ee baby
(Baby, I love you) oh, oh
(Baby, I love you) oh, oh
(Baby, I love you) oh, oh