100 Greatest Songs of the 70’s #78 The Chiffons – He’s So Fine

Released: 1963

Barbara Lee, Patricia Bennett and Judy Craig were all born in The Bronx and met at James Monroe high school. Still in their early teens they had a minor hit in 1960 with a cover of the Shirelles’ ‘Tonight’s the Night’, but real success was to come after they began working with manager and songwriter Ronnie Mack.

Mack had formerly been a member of The Tops with Syliva Peterson, whom he added to the trio and renamed then the Chiffons. After he contacted producers The Tokens He’s So Fine was rejected by a number of different labels until, with an erstwhile Carole King on piano, a re-recorded version of it rose to the top of the Billboard charts.

Further recogniton came from none other than former Beatle George Harrison, whose first solo single My Sweet Lord contained similar threads, to the extent that he was found in breach of copyright several years later. Mack had died tragically early in 1963, but his legacy was such that on hearing a eulogy for him Lamont Dozier and Eddie Holland were moved to write Jimmy Mack in his honour, a Northern Soul classic made famous four years later by Martha Reeves and The Vandellas.