The year-end is a time for looking back as well as ahead. So let’s look waaaaaay back, all the way back to the 20th Century.

If you can remember that far back, set your mind to this task: What was the most-played song of the 20th Century?

First of all, which singer or group could it be?



Elvis ...


Or the Beatles?


Michael Jackson ....


Or Stevie Wonder?


Frank Sinatra ....


Or Bruce Springsteen?


Could it even be Aretha Franklin ...


Or (God forbid) Madonna?

Well, it’s none of the above, folks. Just had to get your memory banks churning — and also get far enough down the page that you wouldn’t see the answer right away and stop reading.

So here we are. The envelope, please.

(By the way, I should point out here that the results were tabulated by Broadcast Music Inc. (better known as BMI), a non-profit licensing organization founded in 1939 to track public performance of live and recorded music to ensure songwriters, composers and music publishers get their royalties. BMI released its list of the top 100 most-played songs of the 20th Century in December 1999, so you may have heard the answer before — but I guarantee you don’t remember it. If you want to see BMI’s announcement from the time, go to this link.)

And now the drumroll ...

Ladies and gentlemen, the most-played song of the 20th Century, with well over 8 million performances recorded by BMI, is...

YOU’VE LOST THAT LOVIN’ FEELIN’



Performed by the Righteous Brothers, produced by Phil Spector and co-written by Spector and the husband-wife writing team of Barry Mann and Cynthia Weil, You’ve Lost That Lovin’ Feelin’ was released in December 1964 and was No. 1 on both the U.S. and British pop charts by February 1965.

Here's a link to a YouTube clip of the Righteous Brothers performing You've Lost That Lovin' Feelin'.

It is the only song to enter the Top 10 on the British charts three separate times — in 1965, 1969 and again in 1990.

In the decades since its release, everybody from Elvis Presley and Joan Baez to Telly Savalas and David Hasselhoff have recorded the song — and a gazillion eardrums in a million karaoke bars have been irreparably harmed by screaming renditions.

So what’s happened to the principals since You’ve Lost That Lovin’ Feelin’ was released almost 45 years ago?



The Righteous Brothers — Bobby Hatfield, left, and Bill Medley —
in March 2003, a few months before Hatfield's death

RIGHTEOUS BROTHERS

Well, the duo of Bill Medley and Bobby Hatfield continued to have hits through the mid-’60s, some — Unchained Melody — with Spector, and others — (You’re My) Soul and Inspiration — on their own. They split up in 1968, with Medley pursuing a solo career and Hatfield teaming up briefly with another singer, Jimmy Walker (no, not that Jimmy Walker), as an ersatz Righteous Brothers.

In 1974, Medley and Hatfield reunited and had a few more middling hits, including Rock and Roll Heaven, and toured for another three decades while Medley also had several personal successes, including his 1987 duet with Jennifer Warnes, (I’ve Had) The Time of My Life.

While the Righteous Brothers were in Kalamazoo, Michigan, to perform at Western Michigan University, Bobby Hatfield was found dead in his hotel room on Nov. 5, 2003. An initial assessment of heart failure was later revised to confirm heart failure as a result of cocaine use.

Britain's Sun newspaper reported Hatfield's death with this front-page headline: You've Lost That Livin' Feelin'.

Medley resumed his solo career and is currently performing at Dick Clark’s American Bandstand Theater in Branson, Missouri, the Ozarks version of Las Vegas.



PHIL SPECTOR

As the creator of the Wall of Sound production technique, Spector’s musical mystique continued through the ‘60s and ‘70s and on into the current decade. He produced hits (and more than a few flops) for a wildly diverse group of artists, from the Beatles to Ike and Tina Tuner to Cher (who sang backup on Lovin’ Feelin’) to Bob Dylan to the Ramones to Leonard Cohen.

Spector’s behaviour became increasingly more eccentric and reclusive, exacerbated by a 1974 car accident in which he nearly died. Spector suffered major head injuries requiring extensive surgery with more than 700 stitches, 300 to his face alone. That surgery accounts, at least in part, for Spector’s rather bizarre facial expressions and penchant for wearing absurd wigs.

That strange behaviour came to a head in 2003, when Spector was charged with second-degree murder in the shooting death of Lana Clarkson, a 40-year-old actress and waitress, in his California mansion.

That trial finally opened in early 2007 and ended in a hung-jury mistrial (10 jurors thought him guilty and two thought him not guilty) on Sept. 26, 2007. The retrial began a week ago in Los Angeles.



BARRY MANN and CYNTHIA WEIL

The husband-and-wife writing team of Mann and Weil have created some of the greatest pop songs of the past half-century and are still writing music together and on solo film and recording projects.

Apart from You’ve Lost That Lovin’ Feelin’ and Soul & Inspiration for the Righteous Brothers, Mann-Weil wrote:

We Gotta Get Out of This Place for the Animals
(Walking) in the Rain for the Ronettes
On Broadway for the Drifters (a song on which, by the way, Phil Spector played the guitar solo)
Kicks for Paul Revere & the Raiders
Good Time Living for Three Dog Night
Blame It On The Bossa Nova for Eydie Gorme (really)
Somewhere Out There for James Ingram and Linda Ronstadt
None of Us Are Free for Ray Charles
Here You Come Again for Dolly Parton
Don’t Know Much for Aaron Neville and Linda Ronstadt
He’s So Shy for the Pointer Sisters

... and dozens more, including my personal favourite ...

Who Put The Bomp (in the Bomp, Bomp, Bomp)

Mann and Weil co-wrote Bomp in 1961 with Gerry Goffin, Carole King’s then-husband and writing partner. Mann sang the song ...

Who put the bomp in the bomp-a-bomp-a-bomp
Who put the ram in the ram-a-lam-a-ding-dong
Who put the bop in the bop-she-bop-she-bop
Who put the dip in the dip-de-dip-de-dip
Who was that man, I’d like to shake his hand
He made my baby fall in love with me

It went to No. 7 on the U.S. charts in mid-’61 and will live forever, or at least as long as Sha Na Na knockoff bands are still touring.

So there you have it, folks — more information than anyone could possibly need — or want — about the most-played song of the 20th Century.

Keep That Lovin’ Feelin’ in 2009.