As the developer of a style of production so lush it was dubbed "the wall of sound," Phil Spector was arguably the most influential record producer in the history of popular music. From the late 1950s through the early 1960s, Spector, along with his arranger, Jack Nitzsche, produced a sound characterized by complex arrangements of strings, horns, and percussion. Although that sound is most evident in pop songs by the Ronettes, Crystals, and Righteous Brothers, all of whom recorded for Spector's label, he also produced a variety of other performers. The Beatles enlisted his skills in the studio, and Spector also produced solo efforts by John Lennon and George Harrison. Acts as diverse as the Ramones and Leonard Cohen worked with him, and Bruce Springsteen cited him as a major influence on his own music.

When he was seventeen, Spector wrote "To Know Him...