Unchained Melody is probably one of the most 
covered songs ever.  This 1965 Righteous Brothers' 
version was the first of the best.  Their version omits 
the 2nd bridge. My version has a semitone key change 
for the last verse (at Lenono's request!).

They weren't brothers, but Bill Medley and Bobby 
Hatfield (both born in 1941) were most definitely 
righteous, defining (and perhaps even inspiring) the 
term "blue-eyed soul" in the mid-'60s. The white 
Southern California duo were an established 
journeyman doo wop/R&B act before an association 
with Phil Spector produced one of the most memorable 
hits of the 1960s, "You've Lost That Lovin' Feelin'." 
The collaboration soon fell apart, though, and while 
the singers had some other excellent hit singles in a 
similar style, they proved unable to sustain their 
momentum after just a year or two at the top. 
When Medley and Hatfield combined forces in 1962, 
they emerged from regional groups the Paramours and 
the Variations; in fact, they kept the Paramours billing 
for their first single. By 1963, they were calling 
themselves the Righteous Brothers, Medley taking the 
low parts with his smoky baritone, Hatfield taking the 
higher tenor and falsetto lines. For the next couple of 
years they did quite a few energetic R&B tunes on the 
Moonglow label that bore similarity to the 
gospel/soul/rock style of Ray Charles, copping their 
greatest success with "Little Latin Lupe Lu," which 
became a garage-band favorite covered by Mitch 
Ryder, the Kingsmen, and others. 

Even on the Moonglow recordings, Bill Medley acted 
as producer and principal songwriter, but the duo 
wouldn't break out nationally until they put themselves 
at the services of Phil Spector. Spector gave the Wall 
of Sound treatment to "You've Lost That Lovin' 
Feelin'," a grandiose ballad penned by himself, Barry 
Mann, and Cynthia Weil. At nearly four minutes, the 
song was pushing the limits of what could be played 
on radio in the mid-'60s, and some listeners thought 
they were hearing a 45 single played at 33 rpm due to 
Medley's low, blurry lead vocal. No matter; the song 
had a power that couldn't be denied, and went all the 
way to number one. 

The Righteous Brothers had three more big hits in 
1965 on Spector's Philles label ("Just Once in My 
Life," "Unchained Melody," and "Ebb Tide"), all 
employing similar dense orchestral arrangements and 
swelling vocal crescendos. Yet the Righteous 
Brothers-Spector partnership wasn't a smooth one, and 
by 1966 the duo had left Philles for a lucrative deal 
with Verve. Medley, already an experienced hand in 
the producer's booth, reclaimed the producer's chair, 
and the Righteous Brothers had another number one 
hit with their first Verve outing, "(You're My) Soul and 
Inspiration." Its success must have been a particularly 
bitter blow for Spector, given that Medley successfully 
emulated the Wall of Sound orchestral ambience of 
the Righteous Brothers' Philles singles down to the 
smallest detail, even employing the same Mann-Weil 
writing team that had contributed to "You've Lost That 
Lovin' Feelin'." It's a bit of a mystery as to why the 
Righteous Brothers never came close to duplicating 
that success during the rest of their tenure at Verve. 
But they would only have a couple of other Top 40 hits 
in the 1960s ("He" and "Go Ahead and Cry," both in 
1966), even with the aid of occasional compositions by 
the formidable Goffin-King team. In 1968 Medley left for 
a solo career; Hatfield, the less talented of the pair (at 
least from a songwriting and production standpoint), 
kept the Righteous Brothers going with Jimmy Walker 
(who had been in the Knickerbockers). 

Medley had a couple of small hits in the late '60s as a 
solo act, but unsurprisingly neither "brother" was worth 
half as much on their own as they were together. In 
1974 they reunited and had a number three hit with 
"Rock and Roll Heaven," a tribute to dead rock stars 
that some found tacky. A couple of smaller hits 
followed before Medley retired from performing for five 
years in 1976. The Righteous Brothers continued to 
tour the oldies circuit off and on in the 1980s and 
1990s. It was while on one of these tours that Bobby 
Hatfield died suddenly on November 5, 2003.