"Who Do You Love" (E. McDaniel) - The Woolies; Dunhill/ABC label, # 95 Billboard Hot 100 - 1967. Inducted in 2008.
The Woolies' fabulous cover of Bo Diddley's "Who Do You Love" was the band's only charting hit. The original group was formed in Dearborn, Michigan. The story of how they got to make that recording is unusual. The Woolies had won a "Best Band in the World" contest sponsored by Vox amplifiers. The first prize was advertised to be a recording contract. Although that never materialized, the band did get plane tickets to Los Angeles.
They took their demo recording of "Who Do You Love", recorded with Dave Kalmbach at the Great Lakes Recording Studio in Sparta, Michigan, and several other songs to a number of record companies in L.A.; and they managed to land a recording deal with Lou Adler at ABC-Dunhill.
Originally released as the b-side to "Hey Girl", it was "Who Do You Love" that became the big hit in Detroit and later spread across the nation. The new version of the song was recorded at United Western Studio 3, the same studio where the Beach Boys, Frank Sinatra, and the Mamas and the Papas produced some of their biggest hits. The Woolies flew Ron English to California from Lansing to play lead guitar, and he joined together with Bob and Jeff Baldori, "Bee" Metros, and Stormy Rice to record a classic Michigan garage rock single.
