Surface - Shower Me With Your Love

The promo CD single is Columbia CSK 1535:

1 - 7" Version (actual 3:48)
2 - LP Version (actual 4:53)
3 - Instrumental (actual 4:23)

LP version (4:53)

I don't have the full-length Surface CD 2nd Wave, but I'd bet that it's a digital clone of Track 2 of the promo CD single.

There are plenty of CDs that use the same analog transfer as Track 2 of the promo CD single:

• Sony's Feel The Love (1994) - differently EQ'd digital clone
• Time-Life's 2-CD Body Talk Vol. 13 Just The Two Of Us (1997)
• Time-Life's 2-CD Body And Soul Vol. 1 Love Serenade (1998) - digitally exactly 1 dB louder than Body Talk Vol. 13 Just The Two Of Us
• Sony's Hits Of 1989 (1999) - differently EQ'd digital clone
• Time-Life's 2-CD Body Talk Vol. 21 Hearts On Fire (2000) - digitally exactly 1 dB quieter than Body Talk Vol. 13 Just The Two Of Us
• Sony's 3-CD Eighties Pop Hits (2001) - differently EQ'd digital clone
• Realm's 3-CD Ultimate Love Classics Vol. 2 (2002) - differently EQ'd digital clone
• Time-Life's 2-CD Body And Soul Vol. 28 Wedding Songs (2003) - digitally exactly 0.88 dB louder than Body Talk Vol. 13 Just The Two Of Us

All of the above sound just fine, with great dynamic range, reasonable EQ, no evidence of noise reduction, and a full length to the tail of the fade.

Others:

• Columbia's promo sampler More New Stuff (1988) runs 0.7% too slow
• Rhino's Billboard Hot R&B Hits 1989 (1995) runs 0.6% too fast, and slightly shortens the very end of the fade

45 version (3:48)

The 45 is an easy edit of the LP version:

Segment 1
Extends from 0:00 to 2:41 of the LP and 45 versions
At 2:40, there's a three-tom-tom fill, right before the downbeat, that starts on the end of the word "forever". The segment ends on the third tom-tom, right before the downbeat.

Delete the 72 beats from 2:41 to 3:46.

Segment 2
Extends from 3:46 to 4:53 (end) of the LP version
Extends from 2:41 to 3:48 (end) of the 45 version
Begins on the third tom-tom of a three tom-tom fill, just like the end of Segment 1.

Your mixdown will run 3:48 with an edit at 2:41. (Just edit on the third tom-tom of the three-tom-tom fill, for both ends of the edit; this one's easy.)

The 45 edit doesn't turn up anywhere on CD.

My recommendations

For the LP version, go with any of the discs in the big list above. They all sound about the same. I used Time-Life's 2-CD Body Talk Vol. 13 Just The Two Of Us (1997) in my library for years, before I got a rip of the promo CD single.

For the 45 version, follow the instructions and do your own edit. This one is easy.

crapfromthepast wrote: The 45 edit doesn't turn up anywhere on CD.

I have the Various Artists compilation Sealed With A Kiss, Vol. 3 from Europe (COL 483513) and the version of "Shower Me With
Your Love" that appears on there is specifically labelled as "7" Version" and seems to match the 45's running time. I don't have the
45 to compare it to, so I can't say if it's the exact 45 edit. I do have the cassette single, but I believe it has the album version.
That three-track promo is one of my most wanted, mostly for the instrumental version. It never seems to turn up on eBay or Discogs.

Edited by thecdguy