"Sugar Baby Love", recorded in autumn 1973 and released in January 1974, is a bubblegum pop song, and the debut single of The Rubettes.
Written by Wayne Bickerton and Tony Waddington and produced by Bickerton, engineered by John Mackswith at Lansdowne Recording Studios, and with lead vocals by Paul Da Vinci, "Sugar Baby Love" was the band's one and only number one single in the UK Singles Chart, spending four weeks at the top of the chart in May 1974.
"Sugar Baby Love" became a UK No. 1 hit in 1974, also reaching No. 37 and No. 30 on the US Billboard Hot 100 and Cashbox charts, respectively. It also reached No. 1 in Germany, Switzerland, Sweden, the Netherlands, Austria and Belgium, and No. 2 in Australia, South Africa and Italy.
Bickerton said:
"We had Paul DaVinci singing in that incredibly high falsetto voice and then a vocal group sings 'Bop-shu-waddy' over and over for about 3 minutes."
Gerry Shury, who did the string arrangements, said, 'This is not going to work: you can't have a vocal group singing 'Bop-shu-waddy' non-stop.' A lot of people said the same thing to us and the more determined I became to release it.
The record was dormant for 6 or 7 weeks and then we got a break on Top of the Pops and it took off like a rocket and sold 6 million copies worldwide.
Gerry said to me, "I'm keeping my mouth shut and will concentrate on conducting the strings."