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The Righteous Brothers: reaction video

The New Neo Posted on by

Sometimes when I need some relaxing down time, I surf YouTube. A while back in my YouTube explorations, I came across what are known as “reaction videos.” They’re a strange genre in which people often rack up biggish view counts by listening to music (pop singers in particular) and reacting to them in real time, videoing themselves doing so.

It may sound odd—and it is indeed odd. But some of these videos can be hugely entertaining, and many of the practitioners have large followings.

One particular type of reaction video features someone relatively young (young to my way of thinking, anyway) listening to older pop recordings or watching older pop videos for the first time, and reacting to them. Often they seem very pleasantly surprised at the quality of the older music, or something about the singer.

Here’s a guy listening to the Righteous Brothers singing “You’ve Lost That Lovin’ Feeling,” an old favorite of mine. During the song’s heyday, I never thought about the race of the Brothers, but now I can see what this guy means in his startled reaction. And boy, were the Righteous Brothers ever great!

Enjoy:

A little background on the Righteous Brothers:

Their emotive vocal style is sometimes dubbed “blue-eyed soul”…

…According to Medley [the bass-baritone of the duo], they then adopted the name “The Righteous Brothers” for the duo because black Marines from the El Toro Marine base started calling them “righteous brothers”. At the end of a performance, a black U.S. Marine in the audience would shout, “That was righteous, brothers!”, and would greet them with “Hey righteous brothers, how you doin’?” on meeting them.

Phil Spector was their producer, and they were his first non-black act:

Spector commissioned Barry Mann and Cynthia Weil to write a song for them, which turned out to be “You’ve Lost That Lovin’ Feelin'”. The song, released in late 1964, became their first major hit single and reached No. 1 in February 1965. Produced by Phil Spector, the record is often cited as one of the finest expressions of Spector’s Wall of Sound production techniques. It is one of the most successful pop singles of its time, despite exceeding the then-standard length for radio play. Indeed, according to BMI, “You’ve Lost That Lovin’ Feelin'” became the most-played song on American radio and television of the 20th century, with more than eight million airplays by the end of 1999.

Until I read that, I hadn’t known about the extreme popularity of the song. All I knew was that it was very popular with me.

Comments

The Righteous Brothers: reaction video — 64 Comments

  1. I like these types of things also. I just saw another one featuring a couple of youngish black guys reacting to ‘Foreplay/ Long Time’ by Boston from 1976.

    They rightfully love it as that entire Boston debut album is awesome.

    One of the things that bug me about this current younger generation is they seem to have very little interest in older music, movies, tv shows. I’m sure every generation says this but my personal experience is it’s far more pronounced now.

    These guys go by “Lost In Vegas’ on YouTube.

  2. Like most people from the relatively younger generations I learned about this song from top gun.
    The righteous brothers enjoyed a resurgence of popularity in the late 80s and early 90s thanks to movies like top gun and ghost. I guess they are obscure again among people even younger than I am.

  3. Another thing I have got into is watching Rick Beato videos on YouTube. I’m not a musician but I still find his breakdowns of songs really interesting. He has about 50 or so ‘What Makes This Song Great’ videos up and a bunch of others also.

  5. Mike K,

    Don’t know about that but it worked for Demi Moore and Patrick Swayze in ‘Ghost’.
    Led to the song recharting and becoming a huge deal again in 1990 decades after it’s original release.

  6. Always liked the Righteous Brothers! And it’s fun to watch the guy in the video beginning to move with the beat.

    Y’know, some music from the 50s and 60s was dumb, but some of it was great, and it was still music. I have a hard time listening to anything rap, no matter the words, because it all sounds like shouting to me.

  7. YLTLF came out when I was in high school and I remember being really surprised to find out the Righteous Brothers were white. Another great song by them from that time that has been overshadowed by YLTLF as well as “Unchained Melody” is “Just Once In My Life”, written by Gerry Goffin and Carole King along with Spector.

  8. FOAF,

    I believe the term mentioned above ‘blue-eyed soul’ was actually first used to describe the Righteous Brothers.

  9. Don’t know about that but it worked for Demi Moore and Patrick Swayze in ‘Ghost’.<

    I had forgotten about that. That was a favorite movie. My wife is convinced she could sense ghosts and she loved it. Several times, we have been somewhere and she is convinced there is a ghost. She asks the proprietor and has been correct. Once was in an Elizabethan restaurant in England next to Warwick Castle.

  10. Rick Beato knows a ridiculously massive amount about music. His channel is quite entertaining. That’s funny that a post about reaction videos popped up. I have seen almost none of those, but yesterday one caught my attention and I ended watching a few. My favorite was a guy listening to Pink Floyd’s “Great Gig in the Sky” and Queen’s “Bohemian Rhapsody.”

    If you’re interested:

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tbb-7LffF6k&t=16s

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5j4BFTlRQUI&t=30s

  11. Trivia not entirely unrelated to neo’s reaction video post:

    Shortly before his death, Bobby Hatfield sang back-up for Bruce Springsteen on Springsteen’s studio recording of “I Wish I Were Blind”, a wistful, bittersweet, romantic slow-dance song I think you (neo-, and perhaps a few others) might actually take to. Even if you’re not a Bruce fan per-se. Lots of live versions on you tube as well as the studio take. (And, no, generally speaking I don’t care for Mr. Springsteen’s politics.)

    For a while, there was an interview with Clarence Clemons (RIP) posted somewhere on the internet, about how he got himself into the E Street Band. Clemons’ story is a sort of twist on the not uncommon first-person account of the white musician who, determined to meet his (black) musician-hero face to face (and perhaps even pull an audition!) strides into a bar where he’s quite conspicuously the only white face in the room, yet nevertheless plows his way (via one “excuse me” after the other) all the way across the floor to the foot of the stage where he now finds himself, for better or worse, the center of attention. Of course, Clemons probably wasn’t scared at all when he walked into the New Jersey bar where Springsteen was playing: he was (I believe this is the case; I might be wrong) a military vet at the time, and had already gotten himself a local reputation as a fine sax player. But he was about to confront Springsteen about his desire to play in Springsteen’s band come what may, and the look of bemused disbelief on his (Clemons’) face as he talks about how he, a black man, actually strode into, and then all the way up to the front of “this all-white New Jersey bar” (or something to that effect) with saxophone in hand, unannounced and unsolicited, is priceless.

  12. Yeah, Bro. White Men Can Sing. I have always like the Blues and a lot Rhythm and Blues. I was youngster in Memphis when Elvis was starting (my brother actually when to same HS, a few yr later). Always thought Elvis could have been the King of the Blues Singer. Right now listening to Denver Radio station playing Blues then on to R&B. Love it.

  13. So, I have a Saturday night to kill – she’s put dinner out off till tomorrow – and I check in to your site and see this.

    I was a not-even-ten year old kid being tossed around the back seat of an older cousin’s GTO, as he and his GF’s (liked that fruit gum those girls offered) and pals sped around, and this kind of music played on the radio. And I never thought it was black guys. In fact, they sounded southern to me. Not every guy with a deep baritone or even bass voice is black.

    Here’s one that was out when I must have been in junior high. And it sounded like some Stevie Wonder type.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YuqHlv1YPe0

    and another famous one

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=An1-ntyBcz8

    And finally, the best one of all which I have linked to before … Spencer Davis Group https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=POCUgBSVENQ

  14. DNW,

    Yep, Steve Winwood is criminally underrated. Not only Spencer Davis but Traffic and Blind Faith. ‘Can,t Find My Way Home’ is brilliant. His solo stuff is pretty good too. ‘Back In The High Life Again’ is great song and album.

  16. Winwood is underestimated. Great musician, singer, and song writer. Low Spark of High Heeled Boys, 40,000 Head Men, Dear Mr Fantasy, and the list goes on and on. Master of the keyboard, as good a guitarist as Clapton, and a unique vocal style. What’s not to like?

  17. I was so surprised The Commodores, Lionel Richie’s group, were black. Maybe they were sort of country or a bit sappy. I liked them enough, it was really quite awhile before I found out.

  18. There must be more than one list of the most played, as I have read that the Association’s “Cherish” was number one. Both are worthy songs, so it doesn’t really matter.

  19. Yes Winwood. I have a video of him from some British pop show I think even earlier than “I’m a Man”. His older brother was Spencer Davis’ bassist, Stevie was in his mid-teens and already sounding like Ray Charles as well as a superb keyboard player. An amazing talent, he’s done all right but really should have more recognition as the rest of you say.

    DNW – Len Barry (your second link) was the lead singer for the Dovells, an early 60s vocal group that had a number of hits including “Bristol Stomp”, “You Can’t Sit Down”, “Do the New Continental”. Although there may be some dispute whether Barry was the lead singer on “Bristol”.

  20. The real white soul music is country. Just for starters George Jones, Merle Haggard and Lefty Frizzell are/were all incredible singers, not to mention the songwriting of Hank Williams. Of course there is a close connection between soul and country music. The Muscle Shoals band that played on the hits that vaulted Aretha Franklin to stardom were white guys from the backwoods of Alabama. And Ray Charles surprised a lot of people when he recorded a number of country tunes in the early ’60s like “I Can’t Stop Loving You” and “Born to Lose” but those were some of his biggest hits.

  21. I also should have included some of the great female country singers like Tammy Wynette and Loretta Lynn.

  22. Brit blue eyed soul? The sadly late Mike Smith, lead singer of the Dave Clark Five. They did a few sappy ones in the 1960s (Because, Everybody Knows) but mostly straight ahead rock. And the guy could play keyboards. As could Alan Price of the early Animals, his own Set, and multiple iterations since including soundtracks (O Lucky Man!).

  23. 1. One of the greatest cultural tragedies is how Blacks moved away from the Motown sound to rap and hip hop. Some of the current performers might be talented musicians, but the style, form and content of the music sure hides it. The only exception is “Hamilton.” Check out Obama’s top songs of 2018 to hear how terrible the music is today.

    2. I agree with FOAF that country music is now America’s soul music. I frequently go to Buck’s bar in Venice, Nebraska. Friday night I saw Lloyd McCarter and his Honky Tonk Revival band. Great voice! Great show! And Lloyd is from Nebraska. I thought he was from Texas. Listen on Spotify.

  24. My kids enjoy the Reaction videos but I have to confess I just don’t get them. And not for lack of trying. They often try to get me to watch them with them.

    If I am in the mood to get away from politics and relax, and I want something other than reading Bernard Cornwell or hiking (my usual go-to activities), I watch Chef John of Food Wishes on Youtube.

    Cooking is a hobby of mine. I find watching cooking videos and the actual act of making a somewhat complicated dish very soothing. And eating it is fun too.

    Chef John has an odd speech pattern in his videos that drives some people nuts but I like it and he places emphasis on the food and the cooking, rather than himself.

    His Coq au Vin recipe is damned amazing. We love it here at the Fractal Rabbit Warren. He has thousands of 5-10 minute videos, ranging from complicated to simple but all have been delicious.

  25. One of the greatest cultural tragedies is how Blacks moved away from the Motown sound to rap and hip hop.

    Boy is that true ! My youngest daughter, when in college, used to listen to rap. I had to leave the room. I didn’t like Rock when I was a teen but country has been my favorite since adulthood.

    My younger son loves Jimmy Buffet and I do, too. He met his wife at a Jimmy Buffet concert. They celebrated 20 years last year. They were tailgating with two different parties in the parking lot before the concert. He looked over at her and said, “come here,” and crooked his finger at her.

  26. I will never forget hearing the Righteous Brothers live in concert about 30 years ago up at Lake Tahoe. They were indeed “Righteous”.

    Thanks, Neo, for this great post.

  27. True story. The Righteous Brothers were my ex-husband’s favorite performers. When we planned our wedding in 1974, he made sure to tell the band that the first song we would dance to would be their “Soul and Inspiration”. Imagine our surprise when we took the floor and they played “You Lost That Lovin’ Feeling”. The band members were Italian immigrants and I guess it got lost in translation. They did do a bang up job of a medley of Italian love songs and the theme from “The Godfather “, though.

  28. A colleague of mine once told me a story about his then thirteen-year-old daughter. She came home one day, very excited, and told him that she and her friends had discovered a new musical group. She said, “Actually, Dad, they’re not really new. In fact, you might have heard of them. They’re called The Beatles.”

  29. The author says “Sometimes when I need zome relaxing downtime I surf YouTube”…

    I do the same thing and call it “Musicating”

    Its better than any medication

  30. Remarkable soul sound for a couple of white boys from Orange County! Medley went to Santa Ana HS and Hatfield attended Anaheim HS.

  31. That was enjoyable indeed! I hate to sound crotchety, but I can’t imagine rap hits surviving the way 60s classics (inevitably) will.

    As for C&W, sorry. I can’t abide that twang-twang, the violins, the melodies. It all hurts my ears.

  32. Its packaging the feeling you have when showing a friend something your interested in… easy to see if ya got (almost) no friends…

  33. This is the BETTER video (same guy)

    because if he thought loving feeling was bad, then unchained melody is a whole new level, and he was curious enough to find it on his own

    [as an aside Ray from Dr hook and the medicine show died]

    Righteous Brothers-Unchained Melody-Reaction
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NqPsYFWuNF0

  34. Pingback:Sunday Brunch: Discovering the Blue Eyed Soul of the Righteous Brothers - American Digest

  35. I love Rick Beato. I need to get back to watching him. Coming from Gerard’s site, after watching the video of the guys cutting down the two trees, it’s so satisfying watching people who know what they’re doing. Competence is marvelously expressive.

    50 years from now, people will still be listening to pop music from the 50s, 60s, and 70s because they put real effort into making music. Melody, lyrics, refrains, hooks that are embedded and not endlessly repeated, everything from the writing, recording and production done by professionals who took pride in craftsmanship. What we have now is cheap knock-offs.

  36. Regarding the song length: I’ve always heard that Spector had a false, shorter, timing listed on the pressed single because he knew DJs wouldn’t play it if he put the real time.

  37. Rick Beato is the best. I got so into his videos that I listened to his take on songs that I don’t even like – and now I appreciate the creativity and work that went into those songs! Start with binging “Rick Beato” or “what makes this song great” and sample Episode 3, then go from there.

    This is a cute video and a sweet guy but it’s sad that singing – like everything else – got so racially balkanized, like whites are supposed to sing one way and blacks another. I grew up in the 70s/early 80s and we simply did not have the choice to just listen to just one kind of music. Radio was a shallow medium but it was also wide – all kinds of music got played. Maybe we’re coming round the other side?

  39. Remarkable soul sound for a couple of white boys from Orange County! Medley went to Santa Ana HS and Hatfield attended Anaheim HS.

    An old girlfriend of mine went to HS with Medley at SA High.

  40. Tangentially…

    I really was disappointed that in the movie “Reposessed” with Leslie Nielsen, they did not use the Vito and The Salutations version of “Unchained Melody”.

  42. So I just sat here watching a young black guy watching the Righteous Bros

    He was getting educated and appreciated it

    Happy New Year

  43. @Griffin: “One of the things that bug me about this current younger generation is they seem to have very little interest in older music, movies, tv shows. I’m sure every generation says this but my personal experience is it’s far more pronounced now.”

    I listened half-heartedly to my father (1924-2017) in the ’60’s make comments about the music he grew up with, Gene Krupa’s drumming and Benny Goodman’s (among others) swing bands. So, finally, in the mid 90’s I got curious and got Duke Ellington’s Live at Newport and then Goodman’s Live at Carnegie Hall. I still place “Diminuendo and Crescendo in Blue” and “Swing, Swing, Swing” as two of the best rock and roll songs of all time.

  44. Someone needs to remind y’all of Roy Head. “Treat Her Right,” “Just a Little Bit,” and more. Roy was sort of a blue-eyed James Brown, back in the 60’s, and a mainstay of Carolina “beach” music (not “surf” music, like the Beach Boys).

    George Thorogood covered “Treat Her Right,” and Roy had a cameo in the video, at the end. It’s on YouTube somewhere.

  45. I saw the Righteous Brothers at a small club ( the Peppermint Lounge) in Toledo, Ohio in the mid 60’s. Full capacity was about 200 people. My buddies and I were able to talk with them for awhile.

    Saw Jerry Lee Lewis there when he was still blacklisted and couldn’t get work….now there was crazy man! One of the best shows I ever saw.

  47. Great post. I was 16 in 64, and thus have likely heard about half of those record setting airplays. It’s still a great song.

  49. It was in the late 1960s in Fairmont, NC that the Righteous Brothers song “Soul and Inspiration” was played as the hymn for the day. It seems that the station engineer for 860 WFMO knew absolutely nothing about music, especially current pop music, so it was the job of the DJ who signed off the previous day to lay out the music for the engineer, who worked sign-on until 9 a.m. Well, the DJ dropped the ball, didn’t lay out the records and when it was time for the hymn of the day, he had nothing. During a commercial the engineer madly searched for an appropriate sounding hymn, coming up with Soul and Inspriation. Within 15 seconds of starting that song the switchboard lit up. Multiple listeners called to say that Soul and Inspiration wasn’t a hymn. The station manager almost drove up a telephone pole trying to get to the nearest phone to stop the record.

    When asked about the incident, the engineer said “Look, I needed a hymn quickly. What sounded more religious than Soul and Inspiration by a group named the Righteous Brothers?”

    This was the talk of our small town for a few days, but the story has been retold for 50 years or more.

  50. There was a fabulously popular group, sixties and seventies. The Lettermen. Their thing was close harmony, slow dance songs. Went forever on campuses. They were trying to break in to the doo wop niche and had a slow song on the B side of their first record. JP McCarthy, legendary DJ at WJR Detroit, played the latter, and off they went.

  51. Born at the end of WWII, when I was in high school and college age, the late 50’s and early 60’s we had incredible music, Buddy Holly and the Crickets who had been booked as black singers. We had great slow songs to get close and touch bellies and crazy Twist and Shake a Tail Feather songs to wiggle around and the girls were ever so beautiful and you had to work hard to even feel a bit of a breast or something. Some pretty good folk music with Peter, Paul and Mary and and that stuff and then it started to change. Even the damn super shit was fun and then it started to change.

  54. You Winwood fans should check out his appearance at one of Clapton’s Crossroads festivals. I can’t remember which year but that would probably be easy to find out, and very much worth your while. I saw it on dvd via Netflix but it may well be on YouTube. I’ve run across a number of Crossroads clips there.

  56. I’m a 76 year young white, inactive physician and surgeon. Worked as a Doc in the bush in Vietnam. Some of my closet friends/ protectors/ medics and honest grunts who looked out for me 24/7 were black men. I loved and respected them 100% plus. They set up my protective screen at nite, helped me in First aid surgery, cried with me at our hideous injuries a/o death. They cleaned my poersonal weapons, taught me basic skills, fixed C-rats with tobacco sauce and rolled my joints on quiet nites. God, I loved them all like the brothers they were to me. Let’s cut this hate shit out,..please,..please.

  57. Thanks for a GREAT video, Neo … but now I’ve been sucked into the Great Rock YouTube endless offerings …

    I truly think most Rap songs popular last year won’t be known in 5 years; just like almost nothing from 5 year old rap or hip hop is popular today. Tho rap-ish mixes on top of originals can be OK — they almost always drive me to want to hear the original.

    Too much rhythm, not enough blues, almost no melody. 🙁

  58. re: Curtis McGirt @0714

    Don’t know if you have decamped from SENC or not…if so, you might get on the intertubes and tune in WZCO 89.9 FM, the Columbus County Schools community radio station. The yoots (and presumably their advisors) have found lots and lots of music just like this to play commercial free. It’s always great, when transiting US 74 betwixt the coast and 95, to have 30-40 minutes of great tunes of the sort you rarely hear anymore.

  61. Huxley,

    I’m not sure how Beato gets the individual tracks but I heard him mention a couple times that he doesn’t have them for some song so maybe it’s some kind of inside production thing not available to the general public. I started watching when he was on about #20 and I went back and watched them all and now watch them all even when I don’t really care for an act as I find it really interesting

    Plays into my interest in how things work and come together. I’ve always been someone that loves the inside behind the scenes stuff.

  62. Griffin: Sounds right. Thanks. I can’t imagine how it would be done that well with filters.

  64. How, in a discussion this long about Blue-Eyed Soul, have Hall & Oates not been mentioned yet? Particularly since they covered YLTLF!

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