Meat Loaf - "Two Out Of Three..."

It would appear the 3:57 length of "Two Out of Three Ain't Bad" on the Super '70s CD (Razor & Tie 7076) is the short commercial 45 version, but can anyone confirm this for certain? If there's one thing I've learned over the years when it comes to collecting Top 40 hits on CD, it's never assume anything!

I can even go one step further for you, Todd. I just pulled out the Bat Out Of Hell CD, and I compared the short 45 dub, long promo 45 dub, LP version from Bat..., and short 45 version from Super 70s. The short 45 version is a unique mix!

The dead giveaway is the intro. On the LP version, Meat's mic sounds like it was left up in the mix during the soft piano part. You can hear some room ambiance and what sounds like jewelry jingling. The short 45 version does not have any of this in the mix.

After a closer listen, I don't hear any different instrumentation; however, the single version has some instruments brought forward (strings, for example), while others are farther back (some of the guitars). The bottom line is that the true short 45 version cannot be created from the LP version, so I'm very glad to have the Razor & Tie disc in my collection.

Now, the long promo 45 version is an edit of the LP version. You can hear the ambiance and jingling noise during the intro, so this version was created from the LP. I'll report back with the edit points shortly.

Thanks very much for all the detailed info, Aaron! When I tried to do a search for the "Super '70s" CD on several major retail websites, the search results produced hundreds of titles and none of them were the correct one. It's a pretty good bet the disc is now out-of-print, given that most Razor & Tie releases are discontinued after only a few years.

The oldest LP version on CD is probably Epic's Bat Out Of Hell (CD released 1984 according to Discogs). This version has left/right tape alignment problems, so that it sounds really swishy when summed to mono. These discs use the same analog transfer as Bat, and all suffer from the same l/r alignment problems:

• Time-Life's Sounds Of The Seventies Vol. 10 1978 (1990; differently-EQ'd digital clone)
• Razor & Tie's 2-CD Those Rocking '70s (1991; differently-EQ'd digital clone)
• Time-Life's 2-CD Rock Dreams (1993)

There's a different analog transfer on Sony's 2-CD Feel The Love (1994), which has proper left/right tape alignment and sounds better than Bat. I'm confident that this comes from a single-artist Meat Loaf disc (a best-of or a remaster of Bat, but I can't confirm.) There are digital clones, both digitally exactly 1 dB quieter, on:

• Time-Life's 2-CD Body Talk Vol. 16 Sweet Nothings (1997)
• Time-Life's Body Talk The Language Of Love (1998)

All three of the above sound quite good.

One outlier that isn't based on any of the above - Realm's 3-CD Ultimate Love Classics Vol. 1 (2002), which also has proper left/right tape alignment.

The commercial 45 mix is available on Starland Music/Warner Special Products' 2-CD Lost In Love (1994). The same analog transfer is used for:

• Razor & Tie's 2-CD Super '70s (1995; absolute polarity inverted, which doesn't affect sound quality)

Both of the above CDs are pretty uncommon. The R&T disc is likely crazy-expensive, due to the fanaticism of the Steve Hoffman forum members. Super '70s doesn't sound any better than other comparable Time-Life and Warner Special Products compilations, but the Hoffmanites will pay $$$$ for the Steve Hoffman mastering credit.

Finally, there's a remix of the track on the 2-CD Very Best Of (1998), which sounds great, but isn't the original mix.

Edited by crapfromthepast