An impressive list of songs use the rhythmic underpinnings of “Be My Baby” to pay homage to and extend pop history. The iconic boom-ba-boom-pah drum intro often leads these works, as is the case with “Sowing Seeds” by The Jesus and Mary Chain (1985) and “No Dancing” by Elvis Costello (1977). The resultant songs are usually short (< 3 minutes long), melancholy, and with a tone of longing. In a way, it seems that the original song imprints itself on future models.
For the Ronette’s recording of “Be My Baby,” Hal Blaine, the session musician who played the drum part, commands the listener to attention while creating an element of suspense. After the intro, Phil Spector, the famed eccentric producer of the song, weaves in his signature Wall of Sound, a single, powerful background sound that comprises both melody and dense instrumentation. The vocals by Ronnie Spector express persistent interest in the perspective baby. Phil Spector, who famously would ask his production team when crafting pop, “Is it dumb enough”, must have sensed that the simplicity of the beat and lyrics acted as a fine counterpoint to the complexity of his Wall of Sound.
Regardless of the reasoning, Blaine’s drum part and Spector’s production tricks are endlessly recycled. The recent wave of 60s girl group nostalgia has brought with it a new crop of appropriators, from “Ghost Mouth” by Girls (2009) to “I Want To” by Best Coast (2010). And it seems that as long as musicians dig into the past for inspiration, “Be My Baby” will continue to live on.