Songfacts®:

• Jett wrote this with Kenny Laguna, a producer and songwriter who worked with Tommy James, Jay & the Americans and Tony Orlando before helping Jett with her career as a solo artist. Here's what Kenny told us: "We were trying to say good music as opposed to hack music. The bells are from 'Rag Doll' by The Four Seasons - if you listen carefully, it's the exact same part. We took a bit from 'Take It Easy' by the Eagles. We had The Rolling Stones, we had 'Bang A Gong' by T-Rex. It was just a little homage, we'd take just a tiny bit, not long enough to get sued, but just little bits like the rhythms or melodies. We had 'Layla,' if you listen carefully you can hear a little bit of 'Layla' in the fade. We also had 'Lean On Me' in it."
• Kenny Laguna explained in a Songfacts interview: "We wanted the Beach Boys. We were getting very friendly with Carl Wilson of The Beach Boys, and I said to Carl, 'I want you to play the Sloop John B guitar in the second verse of the song.' He said he'd do it, we were in New York and he came over to the studio - The Record Plant on 44th Street. Carl comes over and says, 'Bruce Johnson's going to come over,' So he comes over. I'd been told by their agent that if you try to get all the Beach Boys, they will not be in the same room together, they don't even make their records in the studio together. So now we've got two of them, then their tour manager calls me in the studio and says, 'Mike [Love] is feeling left out, he's wondering why you didn't invite him.' I told him the story, that I heard if I invite all of them, nobody will come.
  
  So the next thing I know, all the Beach Boys are showing up. We worked on it and Bruce Johnson goes, 'We're going to show you how to make a Beach Boys record.' They were putting those beautiful 'oohs' on. I was managing Darlene Love, who never mentioned that she helped arrange 'Why Do Fools Fall In Love,' she sang on 'Fun, Fun, Fun,' sang on all those great Beach Boys records during their heyday, because she was one of Phil Spector's voices and she would sing in Brian's pool.
  
  So now I have Joan, Carl, Bruce Johnson and Darlene Love, and the four of them together sound like the Beach Boys, because there were always females on the Beach Boys records, but people didn't know that - like one girl and all those high voices. They're doing this and I hear, 'Hey, do I have to take a number to get on your record,' and it's Mike Love and he sings the low part. Eventually Al Jardine came and said, 'What are you doing, you're stealing our sound.' We finally called everybody down and made the record. It had all these beautiful Beach Boys parts with Darlene Love."
• Soon after this was released, the Beach Boys reunited and had a #1 hit with "Kokomo."