Bo Donaldson ... - Billy Don’t Be A Hero

Suddenly '70s contains a slightly different mix? Listen to the little guitar stabs during the verses. They are in the right channel in
on the Have a Nice Day CD but on the left in Suddenly '70s.

Edited by LunarLaugh

Interesting find! Much to my disappointment, however, it turns out that I don't currently have the 45 length on CD to compare to the LP length for making a closer examination. Just wondering, is the only detectable difference between the two recordings the channel panning of certain instruments? Or are there any additional instruments or perhaps mix differences, like reverb, that are unique to either version/length?

I'm assuming this isn't simply a case where the stereo cables were accidentally reversed when the 45 master was produced, is it? If not, then I'll be interested to see if Pat considers adding "45 mix/LP mix" comments next to the existing database CDs containing Bo Donaldson and the Heywoods' "Billy, Don't Be a Hero". Offhand, I can't recall a past instance where a song's 45 and LP recording differed only via right-left channel panning of certain instruments.

I suppose one litmus test to help determine this would be to consider the following question: Could an informed listener readily and realistically identify each mix of this song during a random listening test without having to resort to doing a direct A/B comparison? If the answer is "no" or "probably not", then I'd say that a database comment may not really be necessary here. After all, does this situation really differ from, say, all the '60s hits that have multiple dedicated stereo mixes/remixes available on CD but aren't typically distinguished from one other in the database (they're all simply marked with an "S" designation for stereo.) Anyone else have any thoughts on this?

Edited by Todd Ireland

I agree with Ron, this song deserves a mix distinction. The fact that no-one
noticed for 50 years is just that - no one did. I had the LP and then the
Rhino HAND CD, which I didn't scrutinize, but didn't notice a difference -
they are the same. Then, when I was pointed to the 45 mix via this thread, I
indeed noticed a difference in the mix. I never had the 45 to listen to it.

This has happened for a number of 45s, and it's likely only this group that
would uncover such a difference. I'm sure we'll find more.

In terms of "all the '60s hits that have multiple dedicated stereo
mixes/remixes available on CD...", yeah, Pat mostly does not indicate a
"remix" when a CD version differs from the original 60 mix. Sometimes,
however he does - seems he's doing it more recently than he did years ago.
Personally, I track ALL these remixes in my own database, and I label my
files accordingly. I began doing that in the late 80s (long before I discovered
Pat's book then the database), when I first started buying CDs and noticing
some mixes were different to those I had on LP. I had begun a thread on this
very topic a number of years back, but it didn't get too far...

An example, Chuck Berry - No Particular Place To Go. Vintage Music is a
"remix" - I noticed it was different from the mix on the "St. Louis To
Liverpool" stereo LP. Pat's database doesn't distinguish between the two. I
do. I just feel it's important. Of course, to each his own..

One of the more audible differences is the 45 has very
little center-channel reverb on the lead-flute opening,
while the LP version has audible right-panned reverb on it.

Andy