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jono
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| Posted: 26 September 2007 at 11:26am | IP Logged
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My Liberty 45 for "Alvin's Harmonica" has a different beginning than (at least) the Curb Greatest Hits cd. The harmonica part at 4 seconds is short and quick on the 45 (only from 4-5 seconds, followed by no harmonica until the 8 second mark), but on the cd it goes upscale followed by the downscale from 4-8 seconds. The running time is about the same (2:41, give or take 1 second), so I'm wondering if there was a different, LP version of this song? My 45 is (obviously) mono. Thanks.
Jon
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davidclark
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| Posted: 26 September 2007 at 1:01pm | IP Logged
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This track was issued as a stereo 45 (Liberty 77250) and features a mono basic track with a different harmonica, panned left to right, from the mono 45.
It's the stereo 45 version on the Curb CD.
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Pat Downey
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| Posted: 26 September 2007 at 2:53pm | IP Logged
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Whitburn does not list a catalog number of 77250 for this single so I am wondering if you have a Canadian pressing with the stereo 45 version.
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davidclark
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| Posted: 26 September 2007 at 4:59pm | IP Logged
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I found this at a friend's here in Canada who has 1,000s of singles (that need a proper sort btw). Next time I'm over there, I'll have a look for it again.
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jono
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| Posted: 26 September 2007 at 8:44pm | IP Logged
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My 45 is Liberty 55179, with a time of 2:39 listed. The flip is "Mediocre" by "The Music of David Seville". It's the dark bluish-green color that Liberty used then (at least they used it on a couple other Liberty 45's I have). I bought this at a used shop in Milwaukee about 20-25 years ago. This is the 45 I was referring to in my original comments.
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Pat Downey
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| Posted: 27 February 2008 at 9:09pm | IP Logged
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I am still not convinced that there was a stereo US 45 issue of this song but there is definitely a difference between the stereo LP version and the mono 45 version. I have yet to track down a mono LP to see which version appears on there.
Edited by Pat Downey on 27 February 2008 at 9:19pm
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Robert
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Pat, I'm inclined to agree with davidclark, since there is also a stereo 45 of "Ragtime Cowboy Joe" (Liberty S-77200); the difference being a different mix of the FX gunshots in the middle; also the dialog is inserted differently. I don't know the story on these stereo versions but they were definitely 45's. Maybe a jukebox issue? "Harmonica" came out before "Ragtime," yet the numbers would indicate the opposite. Perhaps they were all released as a group, along with others. Can anybody fill in the releases with the other numbers? There might be a whole bunch of stereo stuff out there.
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Pat Downey
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| Posted: 28 February 2008 at 8:32pm | IP Logged
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Let's see if we can get Paul Haney to comment on this series of mysterious stereo 45's on Liberty.
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Yah Shure
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I have one of these Liberty first generation commercial stereo 45s: 77188, "Come Softly To Me" by The Fleetwoods, released in 1959.
As was the case with some other labels with the 1959-60 stereo 45s, Liberty used a different catalog number series (77xxx) to distinguish these from their mono counterparts (55xxx.) In Liberty's case, the last three digits were the same; the mono Fleetwoods on Liberty is 55188. The mono version reached #1 on Dolphin 1.
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MCT1
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Around 1959-60, several U.S. record labels briefly experimented with stereo 45s, issuing select titles in a second, parallel, more expensive stereo line. These were sold in addition to, not in place of, regular mono 45s (similar to the way mono and stereo LPs were marketed). The stereo 45s did not sell well and did not stay on the market for long. I have no first-hand information about the Chipmunks titles under discussion, but some singles from this period definitely do exist in stereo variants, as Yah Shure's Fleetwoods 45 illustrates. The best-documented examples are probably the four Elvis Presley singles issued in stereo by RCA around this time ("Stuck On You", "It's Now Or Never", "Are You Lonesome Tonight", and "Surrender"). All of the Elvis titles are much scarcer, and much more valuable, than their garden-variety mono counterparts. RCA's stereo 45s have the prefix 61 before the catalog number instead of the 47 found on normal mono releases from that era.
It's not hard to see why these didn't sell. When stereo LPs first came on the market (around 1958), upgrading to stereo meant a significant expense. For this reason, stereo LPs caught on quicker among fans of more highbrow, audiophile-oriented music styles like jazz and classical. Fans of those styles of music tended to be heavy LP buyers in the first place. It took longer for stereo to gain widespread popularity with fans of more 45-oriented styles like pop and rock. In the end, the people who had upgraded to stereo didn't have much interest in buying 45s, and the people who bought the bulk of 45s generally didn't have the means or the interest to upgrade to stereo. I don't know whether the labels thought there might be a jukebox market for these that just didn't materilaize.
Edited by MCT1 on 29 February 2008 at 6:32am
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Paul Haney
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Beginning with the Hot 100 chart of 5/18/1959, Billboard showed which singles were issued in stereo and there were quite a few. By 1961 there was just a handful and the feature was totally dropped from the chart on 8/17/1963.
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MCT1
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| Posted: 21 April 2014 at 2:45pm | IP Logged
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The Both Sides Now web site recently posted a comprehensive history and discography of these short-lived stereo 45s from the late '50s and early '60s, as well as other stereo 7-inch oddities like Columbia Records' 7-inch 33 1/3 rpm stereo singles and various types of stereo 7-inch singles and EPs intended for jukeboxes.
It looks like there is a planned article on the "Re-introduction of stereo on 45s (1968-1972)", but it hasn't been posted yet.
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Topic: Chipmunks - Alvin’s Harmonica
