Cinnie said:

Ah, I knew I was wrong on the year, lol. Thanks.

Timmy84 said:

Dude you're not even thirty yet. You can't get them all right.
You the motown expert though.

A Life of Troubles Followed a Singer’s Burst of Fame



From left, Nedra Talley, Estelle Bennett, Phil Spector and Ronnie Bennett in a Los Angeles recording studio in 1963.

By BEN SISARIO
Published: February 16, 2009

She was the quiet Ronette, the one people called the prettiest, the one who was content to remain in the shadow of her younger sister, Ronnie, because even in the shadow there’s still some spotlight.

For a few years in the mid-1960s Estelle Bennett lived a girl-group fairy tale, posing for magazine covers with her fellow Ronettes and dating the likes of George Harrison and Mick Jagger. Along with her sister and their cousin Nedra Talley, she helped redefine rock ’n’ roll femininity.

The Ronettes delivered their songs’ promises of eternal puppy love in the guise of tough vamps from the streets of New York. Their heavy mascara, slit skirts and piles of teased hair suggested both sex and danger, an association revived most recently by Amy Winehouse.

But Ms. Bennett’s death last week at 67 revealed a post-fame life of illness and squalor that was little known even to many of the Ronettes’ biggest fans. In her decades away from the public eye she struggled with anorexia and schizophrenia, and at times she had also been homeless, said her daughter, Toyin Hunter.

“I want to know who my mother was,” Ms. Hunter, 37, said in an interview. “From the time I was born she suffered with mental illness; I never really got to know Estelle in a good mental state.”

Those who knew Ms. Bennett in her healthier days portray her as gentle and intelligent, and as playing a critical part in the development of the Ronettes’ style. The eldest of the group, she worked at Macy’s and attended the Fashion Institute of Technology, and the look she helped devise for the group was all superlatives: bigger, badder and sexier than anybody. Racial ambiguity lent an exotic element: the Bennett sisters had black, American Indian and Irish blood; Ms. Talley was black, Indian and Puerto Rican.

“We called them the bad girls of the ’60s,” said the singer Darlene Love, who met the Ronettes in 1962, a year before they became famous with “Be My Baby.” “They had the really, really short skirts and they had big, big, big hair. Most of the black entertainers of the ’60s didn’t look like that, but they wanted to be separate from everybody else.”

By the time they met Phil Spector and began recording with him in 1963, the Ronettes had their look precisely calibrated. That August “Be My Baby” went to No. 2, and the Ronettes were instant stars. When they toured Britain in 1964, the Rolling Stones were an opening act.

But even in the early days there were signs that Estelle was fragile. When their grandmother died in 1959, Estelle was shattered, said her cousin, now known as Nedra Talley Ross.

“She was going to buy Mama knee warmers,” Ms. Talley Ross said, “and I remember Estelle being so devastated — screaming, like she would never go on. Just screaming for this thing that would never get done.”

After the Ronettes broke up, in 1966, and Ronnie married Mr. Spector, in 1968, Estelle was lost, Ms. Talley Ross said. She made several failed attempts at a solo career, and when Ronnie Spector, who divorced Mr. Spector in 1974, formed a new version of the Ronettes in the early ’70s it did not include either of her former band mates. (Ms. Spector did not respond to messages left for her.)

Meanwhile, Ms. Bennett was gradually becoming more ill. When she brought her infant daughter to visit, Ms. Talley Ross said, she slept straight through the baby’s crying. Not long after, Ms. Bennett was hospitalized with anorexia, and her grip on reality continued to loosen. In recent years, Ms. Hunter said, she sometimes wandered the streets of New York, telling people that she would be singing with the Ronettes in a jazz club.

“Estelle had such an extraordinary life,” Ms. Talley Ross said. “To have the fame, and all that she had at an early age, and for it all to come to an end abruptly. Not everybody can let that go and then go on with life.”

In 1988 the Ronettes sued Mr. Spector for back royalties, and the suit dragged on for 14 years. Part of the case was dismissed, but the three women won the right to some royalties, and according to Jonathan Greenfield, Ms. Spector’s husband, they received “in excess of $1 million.” After lawyers’ fees, Ms. Hunter said, each woman took home about $100,000. Ms. Talley Ross said the figure was a little higher.

During the litigation Ms. Love was called as a witness, and one day at court she saw Estelle.

“She didn’t remember me,” Ms. Love said. “They cleaned her up and made her look as well as possible. She wore white gloves. She looked the best she could for somebody who lived on the street. It broke my heart.”

Her daughter and her cousin said they also helped her to look her best for the Ronettes’ induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame two years ago. They were worried that the ceremony would overwhelm her, so one of Ms. Spector’s current backup singers performed in Ms. Bennett’s stead. But before the concert Ms. Bennett did give a brief acceptance speech.

"I would just like to say thank you very much for giving us this award,” she said. “I’m Estelle of the Ronettes. Thank you.”
[Edited 2/18/09 13:55pm]