A lot of people think the Shirelles version of this song is the original, but it was merely the first version to hit the charts. Written by Lowman Pauling of the “5” Royales (so billed because another band was also using the name Royales), it was released in 1957.
The Shirelles covered it in 1959 and it scraped the bottom of the charts, but it reached No. 3 when it was re-released in 1961.
The song reached its zenith in 1967, when John Phillips re-arranged it as a folk-rock tune for the four voices in the Mamas and the Papas. That version, the first song in the group’s repertoire to feature Michelle Phillips instead of Cass Elliott on lead vocals, reached No. 2.
