|
 Spector produced 20 top 40 hits
between 1961 and 1965 and went on to work with
the Beatles on "Let It Be," as well as Leonard
Cohen, the Righteous Brothers and Ike and Tina
Turner.
He was diagnosed with COVID-19 four weeks ago
and transferred to a hospital from his prison
cell, where he had been serving a 19
years-to-life sentence for the murder of actress
Lana Clarkson, the Daily Mail newspaper said.
In a brief statement, the California Department
of Corrections and Rehabilitation said Spector
died of natural causes at an outside hospital,
and that his official cause of death will be
determined by the medical examiner in the San
Joaquin County Sheriff's Office.
Clarkson, 40, was killed by a shot to the mouth,
fired from Spector’s gun in the foyer of his
mock castle home outside Los Angeles on Feb. 3,
2003. The two met hours earlier at a Hollywood
nightclub.
Spector was convicted of second-degree murder in
a second trial, after the first trial deadlocked
in 2007. The case drew worldwide interest
because Spector was widely known as a rock music
pioneer. In 1989, he was inducted into the Rock
and Roll Hall of Fame.
He began his career as a performer, recording a
hit single as a teen with his band the Teddy
Bears, but found his true calling as the
producing genius behind 1960s girl groups such
as Crystals and the Ronettes.
His signature production technique was the "Wall
of Sound," which layered pop and even classical
instruments into a full, lush sound that was new
to pop records. He called it "a Wagnerian
approach to rock & roll: little symphonies for
the kids."
By the late 1970s Spector, who once said he had
"devils that fight inside me," had become
something of a recluse, retreating behind the
walls of his 33-room hilltop mansion near Los
Angeles where Clarkson was killed years later.
Prosecutors charged Spector with murder despite
his assertions that Clarkson, star of such films
as "Barbarian Queen" and "Amazon Women on the
Moon," had shot herself for reasons he could not
grasp.
He told Esquire magazine in an interview that
Clarkson had "kissed the gun" in a bizarre
suicide.
Spector had a troubled early life. His father
committed suicide, his sister spent time in
mental institutions and Spector suffered bouts
of severe depression.
Spector had a long-standing reputation for
gunplay. He carried a pistol and a biographer
said he often placed it on the recording console
as he worked. He reportedly fired a shot in the
studio during an acrimonious recording session
with John Lennon.
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 WALL OF SOUND
Born Harvey Phillip Spector on Dec. 26, 1939, he
grew up in New York City and formed the Teddy
Bears with three high school friends. They
scored a hit single in 1958 with a song titled
after the inscription on his father's headstone:
"To Know Him Is to Love Him."
The Teddy Bears had little other chart success
and disbanded the following year, allowing
Spector to shift from performing to working
behind the scenes at the dawn of the '60s. He
teamed with songwriters Jerry Leiber and Mike
Stoller, co-writing the Ben E. King hit "Spanish
Harlem," playing guitar on the Drifters' "On
Broadway" and producing several top 10 hits.
In 1961 Spector and promoter Lester Sill formed
Philles Records, issuing singles with what was
becoming his trademark sound but also albums
such as the perennial holiday favorite, "A
Christmas Gift for You."
Spector signed Ike and Tina Turner in 1966 and
released what he considered one of his
masterpieces - the powerful "River Deep,
Mountain High" - but it reached only No. 88 on
the U.S. charts.
For a time, Spector turned his back on the
record business, marrying Ronettes singer
Veronica "Ronnie" Bennett, who would later say
he was abusive, possessive and made her a
virtual captive in their home.
Spector returned in 1969, signing a production
deal with A&M Records and working with Lennon on
his hit single "Instant Karma" and with the
Beatles on the "Let It Be" album.
"Let it Be" was considered a major comeback for
Spector, but Paul McCartney was so unhappy with
it that in 2003 he oversaw the release of "Let
It Be ... Naked," which removed most of
Spector's work.
Spector returned to the studio in the mid-1970s
to work on records by Cher and others but by the
end of the decade he had become increasingly
reclusive and worked rarely after that.
(Reporting by Dan Whitcomb in Los Angeles;
Editing by Nick Zieminski and Daniel Wallis)
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