stevie wonder living in the city

LP version (7:22, plus or minus a second or two)

The Innervisions album segues "Living For The City" into "Golden Lady", so it's hard to say exactly where one ends and the other begins. I've gotten used to the last note of the choir being the end of "Living For The City", and the piano intro being the beginning of "Golden Lady". The 2012 Audio Fidelity reissue of Innervisions tacks the piano onto the end of "Living For The City", which feels a little odd to me. (The Audio Fidelity disc uses the same analog transfers as the 1980s-era Motown release of Innervisions, so I'd vote for the 1980s-era Motown release over the Audio Fidelity, if given a choice between the two. If you can afford it, I've heard that the MFSL release of Innervisions uses lower-generation source tapes than any other CD release, and sounds phenomenal. I don't have one myself.)

For the LP version of "Living For The City", I think the 1980s-era Motown release of Innervisions sounds good, the 2012 Audio Fidelity of Innervisions sounds about the same as the 1980s-era Motown (and isn't worth the higher price tag), and the 4-CD Stevie Wonder anthology At The Close Of A Century (1999) sounds a little better than either of those. (Can't rate the MFSL because I don't have it.)

Finally, there's one weird outlier - Motown's 2-CD Original Musiquarium Vols. 1 And 2 (copyright 1982). The singing and instrumentation match the others, so the track is about the same length. But the whole "bus for New York City" talk/sound effects breakdown starts and ends about 4 seconds earlier on Musiquarium than on the other discs. It's as if the entire talk/sound effects breakdown was recorded separately from the rest of the track, and mixed in at the mastering phase. Only on Musiquarium, it starts and ends a little sooner than it should. Very odd.

45 version (3:40)

The 45 cuts off the first four notes of the LP version (starting on the first bass note), and fades early.

If you want to make your own 45 version from the LP version on At The Close Of A Century (1999), delete the first 1.2 seconds to start on the first bass note, and insert a fade from 3:31 to 3:40 on what's left. This might be a better-sounding option than the others I've heard.

The version on Motown Year By Year 1973 (1995) sounds OK, with a nice dynamic range, OK source tapes, a reasonable EQ, and no evidence of noise reduction. There's a differently-EQ'd digital clone on Time-Life's Gold And Platinum Vol. 2 (1997).

The version on Motown's 2-CD Song Review (1996) runs the right length, but seems to have added a little compression/limiting and boosted high end to the song.