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crapfromthepast MusicFan
Joined: 14 September 2006 Location: United States
Online Status: Offline Posts: 2237
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Posted: 17 August 2019 at 8:49pm | IP Logged
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A fine song written by Charles Fox and Norman Gimbel to be the theme for Laverne & Shirley. Released as a 45, the single peaked at US#25 in the summer of 1976. Unfortunately, it came out on Private Stock Records, so we won't ever get the song on CD from a tape source.
The song first appeared on CD on Rhino's Have A Nice Day Vol. 18 (1993). Here, it runs 2:28, and is mastered from vinyl. The top of the waveform in the left channel clips around -1.5 dB (insignificant).
The same analog transfer is used on Time-Life's Sounds Of The Seventies Vol. 34 Late '70s (1993), but the left/right channels are swapped, the attack of the opening note is cut off, and there may be added noise reduction. Avoid.
There's a new analog transfer on Rhino's Tube Tunes Vol. 1 The '70s (1995), which muffles the high end compared to Have A Nice Day.
There's a digital clone of Tube Tunes on Time-Life's Sounds Of The Seventies Vol. 40 TV Themes (1996; digitally exactly 0.9 dB louder).
The only other discs on which this song appears are Reader's Digest's Easy-Listening Hits Of The '60s & '70s, Rhino's Have A Nice Decade - The '70s Pop Culture Box, Definitive Records' A Year In Your Life - 70s Vol. 1, and Rhino's TV Land Presents Favorite TV Theme Songs. I don't have any of these, but I'd bet that all are based on one of the two Rhino masterings listed above. (I'll gladly do comparisons if you send me files.)
My recommendation: Go for Rhino's Have A Nice Day Vol. 18 (1993).
__________________ There's a lot of crap on the radio, but there's only one Crap From The Past.
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EdisonLite MusicFan
Joined: 18 October 2004 Location: United States
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Posted: 19 August 2019 at 1:19am | IP Logged
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I'd like to think/hope that Private Stock records like this, and "Rocky" by Austin Roberts, were released in (or licensed to) other countries where good tape sources exist. I believe "Rocky" went to #22 or so in the UK. And I have to believe that the Laverne & Shirley song was released in its full form somewhere outside the US.
Just because Larry Utall's son stopped paying storage bills in the early '80s, leading to throwing out all the US Private Stock masters, this wouldn't mean that other tape sources in other countries were thrown out as well.
Yet, every UK CD comp with "Rocky" uses a poorly sourced vinyl clean-up.
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Paul C MusicFan
Joined: 23 October 2006 Location: Canada
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Posted: 19 August 2019 at 6:31am | IP Logged
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A while back I managed to get my hands on a sealed copy of the
Making Our Dreams Come True album in the hope of making a
quality dub. Unfortunately, this recording just doesn’t sound very good.
The rest of the album sounds a bit better. Of the sixteen musicians and
background singers listed as appearing on the single, only two appear
anywhere else on the album.
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Paul C MusicFan
Joined: 23 October 2006 Location: Canada
Online Status: Offline Posts: 789
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Posted: 19 August 2019 at 6:40am | IP Logged
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EdisonLite wrote:
I'd like to think/hope that Private Stock records
like this, and "Rocky" by Austin Roberts, were released in (or licensed
to) other countries where good tape sources exist. I believe "Rocky"
went to #22 or so in the UK. And I have to believe that the Laverne &
Shirley song was released in its full form somewhere outside the US.
Just because Larry Utall's son stopped paying storage bills in the early
'80s, leading to throwing out all the US Private Stock masters, this
wouldn't mean that other tape sources in other countries were thrown
out as well.
Yet, every UK CD comp with "Rocky" uses a poorly sourced vinyl clean-
up. |
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A similar fate befell the Sussex masters (although some sources claim
the tapes were lost in a fire instead of being abandoned in a storage
locker). In Canada, the Sussex label was “manufactured and
distributed” by CBS. Fortunately, CBS Canada had held onto their
copies of the Bill Withers tapes (but apparently not for any other
Sussex artist). That’s why whenever you see Bill Withers material on
CD it’s from a tape source, but unfortunately not for any other Sussex
artist.
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MMathews MusicFan
Joined: 18 August 2005 Location: United States
Online Status: Offline Posts: 978
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Posted: 13 January 2020 at 8:19pm | IP Logged
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I do remember this: I owned a mint copy of the 45 and
had bought a sealed copy of the album. The album sounded
terrible, but the 45 sounded perfect.
If I were going to do a restoration for this song I'd
seek out another mint 45.
Funny, for Austin Roberts' "Rocky" I found the opposite.
My 45 didn't sound great but my LP sounded perfect.
MM
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PopArchivist MusicFan
Joined: 30 June 2018 Location: United States
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Posted: 14 January 2020 at 10:09am | IP Logged
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MMathews wrote:
I do remember this: I owned a mint copy of the 45 and
had bought a sealed copy of the album. The album sounded
terrible, but the 45 sounded perfect.
If I were going to do a restoration for this song I'd
seek out another mint 45.
Funny, for Austin Roberts' "Rocky" I found the opposite.
My 45 didn't sound great but my LP sounded perfect.
MM
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Mark,
Did you ever do a good dub of the 45 from the mint 45 for Make Our Dreams Come True?
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EdisonLite MusicFan
Joined: 18 October 2004 Location: United States
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Posted: 19 January 2020 at 7:51pm | IP Logged
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MMathews wrote:
Funny, for Austin Roberts' "Rocky" I found the opposite.
My 45 didn't sound great but my LP sounded perfect.
MM
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I found the same thing. I cleaned "Rocky" from LP, and got a version that I felt sounded like it came from master tape. Many times, however, that isn't the case because of the original vinyl sources.
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