Ronnie Spector on Keith Richards, David Bowie and Life After Phil

Ronnie Spector is seated in the restaurant of a lavish midtown Manhattan hotel. She’s dressed in black, and her long, black hair is bouffant – though a far cry from the beehive she wore when she was making hits with the Ronettes over half a century ago. It’s a bright, sunny, late-March day – “It’s meant for us,” she beams giddily – and even though the woman born Veronica Bennett is now 72, she has the energy of a woman a third of her age. She laughs boisterously, she slaps her hand on the table for emphasis, and she seems to have no reservations about belting out the opening lines to “Be My Baby” at 2 p.m. mere feet away from a fancy hotel lounge.

Four decades ago, she was a prisoner in her own house. Now, years after escaping her marriage to producer Phil Spector – the mastermind behind the “Wall of Sound” and Ronnie’s biggest hits who is now serving a prison sentence for murder – she’s intent on enjoying her freedom. She’s been married to her manager, Jonathan Greenfield, for more than three decades, she lives in Connecticut and she’s the mother to two sons.

Ronnie has kept busy with music in recent years, sporadically performing live (her favorite thing to do) and putting out albums. Her latest LP, English Heart, which came out this month, finds her singing songs by the Beatles, Rolling Stones, Yardbirds, Bee Gees and others. Her inspiration for the record, however, is distinctly American. After reading that Bob Dylan had done an album of Frank Sinatra songs, she remembers saying, “If Bob can sing Frank Sinatra, who was known as a great singer, and Dylan’s known as not such a great singer, I could make a hell of an album.” She laughs. But the more she thought about it, Dylan was singing American songs, so she ought to do something different, and focused her project on Great Britain.

The record, helmed by producer Scott Jacoby (Vampire Weekend, Sia, Coldplay), couldn’t sound more different from her ex’s dense, claustrophobic signature sound – and that’s how she likes it. As she speaks with Rolling Stone about how the LP came together, along with her experiences and friendships with British artists, it’s clear she’s moved on from her past. And she couldn’t be happier.

Why did you want to do an album of cover songs by British artists?
When the Ronettes started out, our first big trip was to the U.K., where we met the Beatles before they even came to the States and the Rolling Stones were our opening act. Everybody was so innocent. Everybody just loved the music and the fun we had backstage; if it was somebody’s birthday, we got a cake and soda. We didn’t have all the stuff that came later on with rock & roll. We got to know Eric Clapton and the Yardbirds, the Kinks, all these groups. Later, I knew and dated David Bowie a few times.

But when we got to the U.K., we felt like real stars for the first time [laughs]. So I thought of the idea that I was over there in the Ronettes with the British Invasion when it was all happening for us. I was at the peak of my career when I was with the Kinks, the Beatles, and the Rolling Stones, and we were all so happy together. And then all of a sudden, I was taken away from it [because of Phil].