Three Dog Night - Black And White

I figured I'd take the "edtop40" approach and just review all of the singles of a particular group. In this case, Three Dog Night. Don't worry. I'll be starting at Aaliyah and working my way to ZZ Top soon. :)

At any rate, there is an odd, small difference I noticed on "Black And White" when comparing the mono 45 to the stereo version. The second to last piano note, just before the vocal starts, is different between the two versions. On the stereo, that piano note is chopped in half, exactly at the point where the first drum starts. On the mono 45, the piano note is not cut short; rather, it carries over top of the first drum hit.

For those of us who are exact scientists when it comes to this stuff, that would mean the "45 version" on CD is technically an unsuccessful attempt at creating the 45 from the LP.

Bill Cahill also pointed out to me that the promo 45's stereo side has the intro in mono, while the rest of the song is stereo. Guess where it switches over. Right at the last piano note, so the stereo side does not have the halved second-to-last note like the actual stereo mix does. Makes no sense to me, but there you have it.

And if you're following along at home, the last six piano notes go like this:

STEREO VERSION
DaaaDaaaDaaaDaaaaDa Daaaa

MONO VERSION
DaaaDaaaDaaaDaaaaDaaDaaaa

Edited by aaronk

Something just occurred to me. I wonder if the 45 version on CD comes
from the actual stereo single master tape. If the person who discovered
that tape found that the intro was in mono, maybe he tried to "correct"
that mistake by splicing on the LP intro, which is in stereo.

This would also explain the strange tape splice glitch on CD copies with
the 45 version.

Edited by aaronk

Ha! Good one!

Anybody got a good quality needledrop or digital recreation?