I Got You Babe

"I Got You Babe" is a song performed by American pop and entertainment duo Sonny & Cher and written by Sonny Bono. It was the first single taken from their debut studio album, Look at Us (1965). It first charted on July 10, 1965, and spent three weeks at number one on the Billboard Hot 100 in August 1965. It sold more than one million copies and was certified gold by the RIAA. It also reached number one in the United Kingdom and Canada.

In 1968, R&B singer Etta James released a cover version, which peaked at number 69 on the Billboard singles chart for that year.

In 1985, a cover version of "I Got You Babe" by British reggae-pop band UB40 featuring American singer Chrissie Hynde peaked at number one on the UK Singles Chart and reached number 28 on the US Billboard Hot 100 chart. In 1993, Cher re-recorded the song as a duet with American animated characters Beavis and Butt-Head; this peaked at number 35 in the UK and became a top 10 hit in the Netherlands.

Sonny Bono, a songwriter and record producer for Phil Spector, wrote the lyrics and composed the music of the song for himself and his then-wife, Cher, late at night in their basement. When Cher was woken up to sing the lyrics, she hated the song, not thinking it would be a hit, and immediately went back to bed. "I Got You Babe" became the duo Sonny & Cher's biggest single, their signature song, and a defining recording of the early hippie countercultural movement.^{[citation needed]} Billboard said of the song "using the successful combination of folk and rock, this one has the performance and production of a smash." Record World called it "a meandering, funky piece of rock that will hit the top."

AllMusic critic William Ruhlmann praised the song:

Recalling Dylan's bitter 1964 song "It Ain't Me Babe" (soon to be a folk-rock hit for the Turtles), Bono wrote his own opposite sentiment: "I Got You Babe." Where Dylan was lyrically complex, Bono was simple: His lyrics began with the ominous youth-versus-grownups theme of "they" who set up barriers to romance, but soon gave way to a dialogue of teenage romantic platitudes. Where Dylan was musically simple, however, Bono, without fully rebuilding Spector's Wall of Sound, was more structurally ambitious, following the song's standard verse-chorus-verse-chorus-bridge-verse-chorus form with an ascending coda that built to a climax, then started building again before the fadeout, all in only a little over three minutes. Set to waltz time, the tune retained a light feel despite the sometimes busy instrumentation, led by a prominent ocarina [in fact an oboe – see below], and the alternating vocals of the two singers. If neither were interesting singers, their plodding, matter-of-fact performances gave the song a common-man appeal.

The recording session for the song was held on June 7, 1965, at Gold Star Studios in Hollywood and lasted between 2 and 5 PM. Harold Battiste provided the instrumental arrangement, and session musicians The Wrecking Crew performed the instrumental track. Richard Niles quotes Battiste as saying the prominent instrumental figure in the song is actually played on an oboe rather than an ocarina.

In the United States, the song had sold more than 1 million copies in 1965, being certified Gold by the RIAA. As of November 2011, Billboard reported the digital sales of "I Got You Babe" to be 372,000 in the US.