The Grassroots-"The River Is Wide"

FYI, for some reason, this group released three 1969 database singles (The River Is Wide/Bella Linda/Lovin' Things) with their group name as one long word, before switching back to their traditional "The Grass Roots" spelling. My "The River Is Wide" commercial 45, which is mono and confirmed as Dunhill/ABC 4187, has a listed time of (2:30), but an actual time of (2:38). Pat, the only current database CD that you have notated as the "45 version" for this song runs :12 longer than my 45 does, at (2:50), while 3 of the 4 current database CDs that you have noted as "LP version" run (2:38), exactly the same as my 45 does. Are their any specific differences you hear that enabled you to distinguish between the 45 and LP versions of the song?

What's interesting is, that the Canadian RCA single of The River Is Wide does have the thunder at the start, suggesting it must be the LP version. I've this to be the case with at least a couple of other singles, where the Canadian release appears to be from the LP. For example, Neil Diamond's Red Red Wine appears to have been the album version, without the background singers.

Three Dog Night's Joy To The World canadian single on RCA Victor was a mono fold-down of the album version.

aaronk wrote: Bill, this must be a case of multiple 45 pressings. I have in front of me an original styrene Dunhill stock 45 with deadwax "01299" on one side of the runout groove and "(delta)75492" on the other side. The printed time is 2:30, and the actual time is 2:38.

(from the "Grass Roots The Complete Original Dunhill" thread)

My 45 matches Aaron's exactly.

Just to be clear...

At least in my case, the dead wax info that I referenced in Aaron's post
above was on the same side of the 45. That is, side A, or "The River Is
Wide", contains both the "01299" and the "(delta)75492" in the dead
wax, just on opposite sides across from each other...or at least 1/3 of a
turn. The flip side, "(You Gotta) Live For Love" has dead wax info of
"01300", and then "(delta)75492-X" about 1/4 turn away.

Jon O.