Carpenters-"I Need To Be In Love"

Jim, the stereo DJ 45 also lists 3:25, but runs 3:30. Unlike the commercial 45, this one is in glorious <cough, cough> CSG stereo. I wonder if Richard might consider a The Carpenters: The CSG Mixes project    ;) ;)

Ed, my friend, I'm no audiophile, but CSG stood for "Compatible Stereo Generator," and was known in audio circles as the "Haeco-CSG" process. A&M, Atlantic & WB were the primary "record label clients" of this processing, employed from the late 60's, and on through much of the early-to-mid 70's. As stereo stock 45s began to be made, many kids still had those cheap, portable mono turntables. The thinking here was to try to make these "new" stereo 45s "compatible for both mono & stereo turntables", by running the master audio through this CSG process. This was done to try to save the record labels the money, time & trouble that was required to produce a specific mono master for a 45, while still supposedly providing the "full range of sound" on the kids' cheap record players. It was roundly criticized by most audiophiles, who thought the music's sound clearly became distorted/altered going through the CSG audio process. CSG processing, thankfully, has long ago been abandoned. And audiophiles, please, feel free to jump in here - my info here is almost certainly incomplete!

Yah Shure wrote: By 1973-76, A & M had pretty much relegated CSG to the stereo side of DJ 45s.   In listening to both in stereo, the stock 45 would have a much fuller, more natural-sounding stereo mix than the CSG stereo.

That doesn't make much sense. You'd think AM stations could just play the mono side, and not have to worry about summing errors. By the early 70s many AM stations had installed stereo cartridges in their turntables & summed them to mono, supposedly minimizing the effect.
I don't think I have any A&M 45s in both promo and stock (most likely one or the other), but I'll have to give a listen.

I'm one who's usually pretty sensitive to processing artifacts, but I can't say I ever noticed anything bad-sounding about CSG-processed records, the one exception that comes to mind being "See" by the Rascals, which I always attributed to the song just being mixed that way intentionally.

Hykker, AM stations usually did play the mono side... until the cue burn necessitated a flip. It was the FM stereo listeners, listening in stereo - the very reason for the stereo DJ 45 in the first place - who ended up hearing a weird-sounding, altered stereo mix.      

The mono DJ 45 of "See" doesn't sound great, either; it's quite harsh, with not much bottom end.

Roscoe, yes, the "Please Mr. Postman" promo 45 got the CSG treatment. I don't have a stock copy of that one, so I can't say whether or not they got the same treatment. The stock stereo CSGs on A & M I have were from 1970 (Miguel Rios, Free) with the latest being a '72 Shawn Phillips Christmas 45. A & M used conventional stereo for the majority of the label's promo 45s; The Carpenters seem to be the one act that utilized CSG the most. Here's what I found from those that were handy:

CSG-Processed (on the stereo side) DJ 45s:

1446 "Yesterday Once More"
1468 "Top Of The World"
1646 "Please Mr. Postman"
1721 "Solitaire"
1800 "There's A Kind Of Hush"
1828 "I Need To Be In Love"
1859 "Goofus"
1940 "All You Get From Love Is A Love Song" (both the small-hole and normal-sized hole DJ 45s)


Conventional (Non-CSG-Processed) stereo DJ 45s:

1351 "It's Going To Take Some Time"
1521 "I Won't Last A Day Without You"
1677 "Only Yesterday"
2008 "Sweet Sweet Smile"

   

Andy, I don't have the 4:14 DJ 45 of A & M 1206. My copy is the mono/mono edit with the "2:70" stated running time (a warm-up, perhaps, to the 2:98 stated time on the group's 1973 non-charter "Wishing Well" [Island 1212].)

I also have the 1975 non-CSG stereo DJ 45 reissue (A & M 1720) from the Best Of Free LP with a stated time of 3:30.