A Giant Stands 5 Ft. 7 In.

ROCK 'N' ROLL

You never close your eyes any more when I kiss your lips.

There's no tenderness like before in your fingertips . . .

You've lost that lovin' feelin'.

"Kids don't think like that," admits Phil Spector. "But when they hear those lyrics with our sound, they respond, baby, they respond." And how. For the past three weeks they have made Spector's You've Lost That Lovin' Feelin' the top-selling record in the U.S. Since founding Philles Records in 1962, Spector--as songwriter, arranger, producer and distributor--has turned out 24 catchy, tear-drenched rock 'n' roll songs that have sold a fantastic total of 20 million copies, making Phil a millionaire at 24.

In the fickle pop market, most other record makers operate on a scatter-platter basis, indiscriminately grinding out some 100 new records each week on a hit-and-nearly-always-miss basis. Spector, by contrast, has shown an uncanny knack for catching adolescent ears with nearly every record he produces. Almost all of them celebrate post-pubescent passion: Be My Baby, Then He Kissed Me, Wait Til' My Bobby Gets Home. Spector has already made bigtime teen-market recording stars of a succession of singers and vocal groups such as the Ronettes, Bobb B. Soxx and the Blue Jeans, Darlene Love, the Crystals.

Karate, in Case. Spector Sound, as it's called in the industry, is marked by a throbbing, sledgehammer beat, intensified by multiplying the usual number of rhythm instruments and boosting the volume. Spectral orchestration, undulating with shimmering climaxes, is far more polished, varied and broadly rooted than the general run of rock 'n' roll. In Lovin' Feelin', Spector used two basses, three electric guitars, three pianos, a harpsichord, twelve violins, a ten-voice chorus and four brawny percussionists. His vocalists, a pair of 23-year-old white Californians who call themselves the Righteous Brothers, imitate the Negro gospel wail, a sound that Spector prizes as the "soulful yearning that every teen-ager understands."

Spector, who is 5 ft. 7 in. and weighs 131 Ibs., personifies the bizarre, make-believe world that he dominates. "I've always wanted to stay in the background," he insists, primping his scraggly, Prince Valiant locks. But his attire could hardly be called a camouflage. Standard costume: stiletto-pointed boots with three-inch Cuban heels, tight pants, cloth cap, Davy Crockett pullover. He ignores the rude hoots that greet his progress down the street, confides that "in case of real trouble I could literally kill a guy. I've studied karate for years."

Teen Pan Alley. Born in The Bronx and raised in Los Angeles, Spector (his real name) played jazz guitar in nightclubs during his high school years. At 17, inspired by the inscription on his father's tombstone, he wrote his first song, To Know Him, Is to Love Him. It sold 1,200,000 copies and has become an alltime teen classic. Phil marked time for two years working as a court stenotypist. Then, at 19, he moved to Manhattan and tried to crash "Teen Pan Alley" only to discover that "95% of the music business is heavily infiltrated by morons. If they hadn't been so greedy and vicious, I wouldn't have tried to control them." Fortunately, as Phil puts it, "I function well in a world of hostility."

This month Phil Spector moved from a Manhattan penthouse to a rambling 21-room mansion in Beverly Hills, Calif., to be near his recording studio and Mother Bertha Productions, a subsidiary corporation that publishes sheet music. His mother Bertha is a bookkeeper there. The move was delayed by Phil's reluctance to leave his $600-a-month Manhattan psychoanalyst. Now, however, he figures that he can "keep my equilibrium" by calling the analyst long-distance any time he needs instant therapy.

Nonacceptance. His maladjustment seems to stem from a feeling of nonacceptance by the adult world. "I'm affecting millions of people's lives in some way," he complains, "but I'm not supposed to be human. We're the only ones communicating with the teenagers. They are so prone to anxiety and destruction, and they can't intellectualize their wounds. Breaking up with a boy friend is just as realistic to them as it is to a 30-year-old. Our music helps them to understand. If we're not what's happening today, then what is? Maybe I'm living in an America that doesn't exist?"

It exists, all right. To make doubly sure, Entrepreneur Spector has co-founded a new company to make TV documentary films. The first production, starring Spector, will be called A Giant Stands 5 Ft. 7 In.

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