Equals-"Baby, Come Back"
Printed From: Top 40 Music on CD
Category: Top 40 Music On Compact Disc
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URL: https://top40musiconcd.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?TID=3882
Printed Date: 19 April 2025 at 1:46am
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Topic: Equals-"Baby, Come Back"
Posted By: jimct
Subject: Equals-"Baby, Come Back"
Date Posted: 14 July 2008 at 11:26am
| My commercial 45, which is mono and confirmed as RCA 9583, has a listed time of (2:37), but an actual time of (2:32). FYI, we would hear from this group's lead singer, Eddy Grant, 15 years later, with his big solo hit, "Electric Avenue". |
Replies:
Posted By: Yah Shure
Date Posted: 14 July 2008 at 4:54pm
According to Alan Clayson's notes in the booklet included with the 1993 CD The Very Best Of The Equals (See For Miles 374) Eddie was the lead guitarist and Dervin Gordon was the lead singer. |
jimct wrote:Posted By: eriejwg
Date Posted: 14 July 2008 at 7:21pm
|
Wikipedia states:
Eddy Grant had his first number-one hit in 1968, when he was the lead guitarist and main songwriter of the multiracial group The Equals, with his self-penned song "Baby Come Back." |
Posted By: TomDiehl1
Date Posted: 14 July 2008 at 10:50pm
|
My promotional copy, the first release of the tune as RCA Victor 47-9186, contains the exact same matrix numbers as found on the "hit" release, so I assume, without playing, that it would match Jim's timing. ------------- Live in stereo. |
Posted By: Hykker
Date Posted: 15 July 2008 at 6:29am
Typical Wikipedia (in)accuracy. Don't have my Whitburn book handy, but the song was a mid-charter at best. |
Posted By: Paul Haney
Date Posted: 15 July 2008 at 7:02am
Well, it did hit #1 for three weeks on the British charts. Hit #32 on the Hot 100. |
Posted By: eriejwg
Date Posted: 15 July 2008 at 8:01am
|
I never said Wikipedia was correct.
;) |
Posted By: jimct
Date Posted: 15 July 2008 at 2:21pm
| Thanks for the "lead singer Dervin Gordon" update, Yah Shure. You are really helping us fill in some of these extra 60's song details, and I truly appreciate it. I have a strict, one-hour library computer time limit these days, and I am have been typing in VERY quickly of late, simply trying to post all of my new 1968 findings (I've actually finished the entire year already). To my ears, though, Eddy Grant's and Dervin Gordon's voices sound extremely similar. At the last second, I just decided to throw that quick nugget in, simply as a courtesy to younger Board members who may not have known of the Eddy Grant/Equals link. |
Posted By: Yah Shure
Date Posted: 16 July 2008 at 6:57pm
|
Jim, I - like most people, perhaps - had assumed that Eddie had sung lead on "Baby Come Back" once "Electric Avenue" made him a household name, so those liner notes were news to me.
I e-mailed XM's Phlash Phelps when he made the Grant/lead singer/Equals connection on the '60s channel. He's usually really good about wanting to be accurate, but the next time I heard him play "Baby Come Back," he made the same Grant-lead singer reference. Oh, well. |
Posted By: davidclark
Date Posted: 27 August 2014 at 3:13am
|
Bringing this forward as the database entries for this track run 2:39, was that
the U.S. "Baby, Come Back" LP running time, and, does it simply fade a bit later? ------------- dc1 |
Posted By: Hykker
Date Posted: 27 August 2014 at 5:04am
|
I have 2 copies of this single, a stock copy of RCA 9583,
and promo on RCA 9186. A little cross-referencing of catalog numbers shows the promo was likely released in late May/early June 1967. I don't hear any glaring differences between the two, but the dead wax info is slightly different between them...UPKM-4056-14S (which could be a 5) on RCA 9583 and UPKM-4056-10S (or 5) on RCA 9186. The promo has a white label, RCA went with yellow labels for promos in late '67. There is no "plug side" designation on the promo, though they both have the same B side. |
Posted By: Ringmaster_D
Date Posted: 05 May 2016 at 11:58am
|
I noticed that all copies of this song in the database
run about 7 seconds longer than the 45 versions. Does anyone have the original 45 to compare if this is due to speed or fade? Also, does this song exist anywhere in good sound quality, or is that just a symptom of the master tape? |
Posted By: AndrewChouffi
Date Posted: 06 May 2016 at 8:18am
|
To Ringmaster_D:
I'm pretty sure "Baby Come Back" has always had a lo-fi sound. I never owned the mono 45, but I remember on the AM radio the sound came through grungy with distorted, poorly compressed bass & hiss. My take on this is somewhere along the line, whether in the recording stage, the mixing stage or the transfer stage, there is undecoded Dolby (or inaccurately decoded Dolby). At least in all of the stereo versions on CD & vinyl that I own those Dolby artifacts are present. On an unrelated note while Dervin Gordon sings the lead vocal, it sure sounds like Eddy Grant is doing the "alright, okay" yelps in the record. Andy |
Posted By: Yah Shure
Date Posted: 06 May 2016 at 7:54pm
Jim mentioned in his original post that his copy runs 2:32, and my stock RCA 9583 matches that. I only have the track on a See For Miles import CD, so I can't speak for what's on the domestic issues. "Baby Come Back" was a President Records, UK production, so RCA would have gotten a tape copy for US release. If you think the RCA single's sound quality leaves something to be desired, it's of downright audiophile caliber, compared to the Zodiac label 45 one of my high school classmates bought in Greece. Talk about Shrill City! There wasn't any improvement on "Softly, Softly," the Equals' only other US charter (#94 in Record World.) The American issue on the Laurie-distributed President label of the already-grungy recording was something of an endurance test, having been cut very hot (at least for the Monarch pressing.) |
Posted By: Ringmaster_D
Date Posted: 07 May 2016 at 11:46am
|
I did a little digging to learn a bit more about this
song and found that it was originally recorded in 1966 (originally intended to be a b-side). It was released in 1967 but did not chart. Only after it charted in Germany in 1967 was it re-released in the UK and the US in 1968--two years after it was originally recorded. |
Posted By: Bill Cahill
Date Posted: 25 July 2023 at 11:40am
|
My stock 45 on "Baby Come Back" has some differences than the stereo version on CDs. My 45, in mono, runs
about 1.3% faster than the stereo CD issues, and also has an edit from 2:21-2:24.5. I don't have an Equals album so I don't know if the longer stereo version is from the album, but Discogs lists the song as 2:39 on the RCA Album. My best guess is that all stereo versions are "LP version". |
Posted By: mjb50
Date Posted: 25 July 2023 at 10:13pm
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The song was omitted from the 1967 Unequalled album in the US, but did come out a year later on the Baby, Come Back compilation.
The stereo version on that Baby, Come Back LP has vocal echo that's not present on https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DssD7QKb1ro - the mono 45 . The lead and backing vocals on the 45 are pretty dry. The stereo version on the Equals' 1996 Greatest Hits CD matches the LP. |
Posted By: Santi Paradoa
Date Posted: 26 July 2023 at 4:41pm
|
I'm amazed that LP/45 differences are still being uncovered
after all these years. Thanks Bill and MJB for this info. ------------- Santi Paradoa Miami, Florida |
Posted By: davidclark
Date Posted: 23 August 2023 at 1:06am
|
still more....seems the UK 45 does not have that short edit that the US 45
does. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6j2sps8BSyU - YouTube link ------------- dc1 |
Posted By: crapfromthepast
Date Posted: 23 August 2023 at 11:10am
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Just some mastering notes.
Simitar's Love Rocks - Tonight's The Night (1998) uses the same analog transfer (not a digital clone) as Varese's Dick Bartley The '60s (1996). Stardust Canada's Treasured Tunes 6 (1996) is digitally exactly 1.3 dB louder than Varese's Dick Bartley The '60s (1996). Rarities On Compact Disc Vol. 18 (1994?) has added noise reduction and is not based on the Varese mastering. Avoid for this track. All of the above are the stereo LP version. The mono 45 version (which includes less reverb than the stereo LP version) is still not on CD. ------------- There's a lot of crap on the radio, but there's only one http://www.crapfromthepast.com" rel="nofollow - Crap From The Past . |