Presenting the Fabulous Ronettes Featuring Veronica
Presenting the Fabulous Ronettes Featuring Veronica is the only studio album of American girl groupthe Ronettes, released in 1964. Comprising numerous singles produced by Phil Spector since the previous year, it peaked at #96 on the Billboard 200 chart. Issued singles included "Be My Baby", "Walking in the Rain", "Baby, I Love You", "Do I Love You?", and " Breakin' Up". The track "So Young" had been released as a single credited to Veronica, although the other Ronettes, Estelle Bennett and Nedra Talley, appear on the record. The songs "Be My Baby" and "Walking in the Rain" are ranked #22 and #269, respectively, on Rolling Stones list of "The 500 Greatest Songs of All Time". The album ranked #422 also on their list of "The 500 Greatest Albums of All Time". Recording engineerLarry Levine was nominated for a Grammy Award for the rainstormspecial effect in "Walking in the Rain". The album was rated the 31st best album of the 1960s by Pitchfork.
Releases
Original vinyl copies of the album are rare and change hands for hundreds of dollars. There has been, however, a reissue on vinyl in 1975 on the Phil Spector International label. Featuring no bonus-tracks and extensive liner notes by New Musical Express author Roy Carr, it was Vol. 1 of the six volume "Phil Spector Wall of Sound" reissue series. Another 1975 compilation albumThe Ronettes Sing Their Greatest Hits released on the International label was actually a straight rerelease of Presenting the Fabulous Ronettes, with the same twelve tracks and running order. Nine of the tracks appeared on the Spector box set, Back to Mono , the omissions being "How Does It Feel?", "Chapel of Love", and their remake of the Ray Charles hit, "What'd I Say?". Presenting the Fabulous Ronettes was issued on CD for the first time in 2011, as part of the seven-disc Phil Spector Presents the Philles Album Collection, and was repressed on vinyl by Sundazed in 2012. The album was first available as a standalone CD only in 2015.
