Comment by Candy O on July 25, 2013 at 9:48pm

From YouTube -

"I Saw Her Again", a true story of marital infidelity, was the third single release by The Mamas & The Papas and also the third of six Billboard Top 5 singles they would record. The song was included on their self-titled second album, "The Mamas & The Papas" in 1966 and peaked in July of that year at the #5 spot on the Billboard Hot Top 100. It was on the charts for a total of nine weeks.

Mamas & Papas leader, John Phillips revealed in an interview that the "I Saw Her Again" was composed after he learned that Michelle Phillips (John's wife and fellow group member) and Denny Doherty (also a group member) were having an affair while the group was on tour. He laughingly told Dick Bartley that he wrote the song "so Denny would have to sing it on stage every night and feel guilty". Ironically enough, Doherty received a songwriting credit.

The original mono single heard here differs from the more familiar album stereo version sometimes heard on radio today in two important areas. One, the background and lead vocals are distinctly upfront in this version much more so than the stereo version. Two, the song runs around 2:55 minutes omitting the orchestra instrumental section heard at about the 1:50 mark on the original stereo mix and is roughly 20 seconds shorter than the album version. There's also a shorter stereo LP mix. 

Lou Adler produced this song, and Bones Howe was the engineer for the session. According to Bones, the part around the 2:15 mark where "I saw her" is repeated twice was a happy accident. Said Bones: "We were punching vocals in, and when we came to that part where the rhythm stops and the group goes, 'I saw her again last night,' I just punched in early. They came in early, and so we stopped. And then we went back and started again, and I punched in at the beginning of the vocal, they started two bars later or whatever it was. And when I played it back, the vocal went, 'I saw her - I saw her again.' It was a mistaken punch. And Lou said, 'I love it! Leave it in.' It was an error, it was a mistake. But Lou was wise enough, it caught his ear and he left it. And I learned something from that. You go with your gut. If something catches - they could be - there are wonderful mistakes that happen in the studio and you have to learn to catch those when they happen and use them."

Comment by BeatleBob on July 26, 2013 at 11:07am

Nice Find!! Interesting Notes about it! "He laughingly told Dick Bartley that he wrote the song "so Denny would have to sing it on stage every night and feel guilty". Ironically enough, Doherty received a songwriting credit."

OUCH! LOL!

Michelle and Denny had a short affair which hurt all four members. Cass wanted to be "more than friends" with Denny! The affair really hurt her! Things got so bad, John fired Michelle in the summer of '66 and she was replaced by Jill Gibson (a lookalike who was dating Lou Adler). But the public didn't want a substitute and Michelle was brought back and her and John's relationship was repaired.

Was interesting to know that John wrote the Summer of Love anthem for Scott McKenzie, "San Fransisco".

The Summer of Love really began with the "Monterey Pop Festival", which was organized by Lou Adler, John and Michelle.  

I Love many of the songs by The Mamas and the Papas!! :-))

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