Jack Nitzsche

Scoring Success 1987

Jack Nitzsche, LA 1987

What was it like working with Phil Spector?

I think Phil is the best record producer—no, I mean he is the only artist/record producer. He was firstly an artist. He knew what he wanted from me every time, and gave me lots of input for the arrangements. We had a way of working together that was easy and fun, because we were friends on top of everything.

Is there one record that established the famous “Wall of Sound”?

I think it happened gradually, and I can’t remember when Phil started using that term. The sound just kept getting bigger and bigger. “Zip-a-dee-do-dah” was bigger than the one before, and “Then He Kissed Me” was bigger still. There was one record I remember with The Crystals, “Little Girl.” When it was recorded, Phil used more echo than usual. Sonny Bono and others said that it had too much echo—it wouldn’t get played on the radio. Phil said, “What’s too much echo? What does that mean?” When does it become distasteful or offensive? I’ve always felt the same way myself. It hadn’t been done before and people in the promotional side of the record industry felt that it was too different. But echo is like garlic. You can’t get too much.