Les Crane - "Desiderata"

After 10+ years of dormancy...

Not sure what the opening note of the actual 45 sounds like.

The 45 version on Varese Sarabande's Dick Bartley On The Radio Vol. 3 (1998) starts really cleanly. Same for Time-Life's AM Gold Vol. 31 Mellow Hits Of The '70s (2000), which is digitally exactly 2 dB quieter.

The corresponding location in the LP version (I have it on Reader's Digest's 4-CD American Pie (1998)) has the tail end of a long note held from the 18-second intro. The Varese 45 version can't be edited down from the LP version because of that note.

I'm not sure exactly what to do with that information.

As jrjr mentioned upthread, the 45 does start with an off-kilter edit, but it's because the vocals in the left and right channels aren't in sync at that exact spot. They begin in the right channel a hair before they do in the left, and if you trim both channels to where the left channel vocal kicks in, the result is a chopped-off intro. Consequently, there's a hanging chad of that album version note in the left channel's open, which, although it sounds a bit choppy, definitely sounds better than being Marie Antoinetted. In any case, the left channel does not begin with a clear harpsichord note (if that's what it is.)

It's the same on the mono side of the promo 45, but since the channels are summed together, it isn't all that obvious. Having only played the stereo side on mono AM back in the day, I never noticed that anything nefarious was underfoot.


The On The Radio Volume 3 CD track begins with a clear and distinct harpsichord note in the left channel, and both vocal tracks are in sync. Here's what the Varese folks did: they excised the initial "Desider..." from the 45's cold opening, then copied the next, similar "Desider..." segment that begins at about six seconds into the 45 (about 1.125 in length) and pasted it in place of the initial one. They did a seamless job, and it really does improve the edit.

However - as the official T40MOCD laws have long decreed - it ain't the 45.

"Desiderata" was released on a promo 45 with one side in English and one side in Spanish. Has anyone ever found the Spanish version on CD?

Ok I'll beat you to it. Why would anyone want to hear this is Spanish?

No idea why would anyone would want to hear "Desiderata"
in spanish (lol), but I can say the spanish version of it
was the only version played on the radio down here in
Argentina (and I have a copy of it).
This one: https://www.discogs.com/release/23232440
Makes sense. It's a spoken word single that was recorded
in english. People would not understand its words in a
spanish-speaking country so someone decided to record
someone else reading it in spanish. The choir though is
the original one, sung in english.
And I have never known of any CD featuring the spanish
version.

Amazing Cris. Many thanks amigo.