And after a long spell, another collection of songs that are seldom heard in stereo, with yet another variation on the same cover art. As before, this includes rather a lot of DES — “Digitally Extracted Stereo” — which is essentially fakery, but often really good fakery. A couple of these are sync mixes: the original 45 and a karaoke track fused into a single sort-of-stereo whole.

Note: “Paperback Writer” is routinely available in stereo, but the canonical mix is none too good; this is a remix. And the Doors track is an attempt at duplicating the 45 mix, by cutting, pieceing, and retiming the stereo LP version. I didn’t do either of these myself, so don’t ask me how it was done.

Track listing for 111147-2:

1. The Dave Clark Five: Do You Love Me
2. Wayne Fontana and the Mindbenders: Game of Love
3. The Skyliners: Since I Don’t Have You
4. Martha and the Vandellas: Jimmy Mack
5. The Beatles: Paperback Writer
6. Chubby Checker: Hooka Tooka
7. Preston Epps: Bongo Bongo Bongo
8. Sagittarius: My World Fell Down
9. The Yardbirds: I’m a Man
10. The Shocking Blue: Venus
11. The Beach Boys: Heroes and Villains
12. Them: Baby Please Don’t Go
13. Sonny and Cher: Baby Don’t Go
14. The 13th Floor Elevators: You’re Gonna Miss Me
15. Wilson Pickett: Funky Broadway
16. The Animals: We Gotta Get Out of This Place
17. The Crystals: Da Doo Ron Ron (When He Walked Me Home)
18. Sly and the Family Stone: Hot Fun in the Summertime
19. King Harvest: Dancing in the Moonlight
20. The Doors: Light My Fire
21. The Temptations: Papa Was a Rolling Stone
22. The Rivieras: California Sun
23. Edwin Starr: Agent Double-O-Soul
24. Eddie Cochran: Summertime Blues
25. The Murmaids: Popsicles and Icicles
26. Bobby Darin: Splish Splash
27. The Soul Survivors: Expressway to Your Heart

Because I can, again yet another collection of songs that are seldom heard in stereo, with yet another variation on the same cover art. This includes rather a lot of DES — “Digitally Extracted Stereo” — which is essentially fakery, but often really good fakery. One such (no points for guessing which one) actually made it to a commercial release.

Track listing for 111129-2:

1. The Surfaris: Wipe Out
2. Dave Dee, Dozy, Beaky, Mick & Tich: Save Me
3. The Crystals: He’s Sure the Boy I Love
4. The Beach Boys: Help Me, Rhonda
5. The Essex: A Walkin’ Miracle
6. Procol Harum: A Whiter Shade of Pale
7. Bill Justis: Raunchy
8. The Zombies: She’s Not There
9. The Dave Clark Five: Because
10. Diane Renay: Kiss Me, Sailor
11. The Marvelows: I Do
12. Georgie Fame and the Blue Flames: Yeh, Yeh
13. Jerry Butler and Betty Everett: Let It Be Me
14. Leapy Lee: Little Arrows
15. The Dixie Cups: Iko Iko
16. Jimmy Reed: Big Boss Man
17. Spencer Davis Group: I’m a Man
18. Terry Stafford: Suspicion
19. Senators Bobby and McKinley: Mellow Yellow
20. Neil Diamond: You Got to Me
21. Sam Cooke: Wonderful World
22. Manfred Mann: Mighty Quinn (Quinn the Eskimo)
23. Jorgen Ingmann: Apache
24. The Ronettes: Do I Love You
25. Herman’s Hermits: A Must to Avoid
26. Ritchie Valens: Donna
27. The Nashville Teens: Tobacco Road
28. Thurston Harris: Little Bitty Pretty One
29. The Champs: Tequila

A customer wrote to a record company and sent me a drop copy, which I reproduce herein:

I recently bought the subject cd and found that many of the tracks were in mono. many of these mono tracks were played on the radio in stereo. can you explain why in this high tech age these tracks are in mono instead of stereo? I would have preferred to hear this in stereo as much as possible. I understand that recordings originally done in mono can not be made into stereo, but what of those that I’ve heard on radio in stereo?

I should point out here that the “subject cd” was a compilation by the Beach Boys, much of whose recorded oeuvre was released in mono or in (gag) “Duophonic” phonus-bolognus simulated stereo — because, we are reminded, Brian Wilson was deaf in one ear and mixed this stuff to mono because that’s all he could hear.

In the 1990s, for whatever reason, the group, or Brian himself, relented, and allowed some of these tracks to be remixed into stereo. The obvious place to begin was Pet Sounds, and a yummy box set was issued with both mono and remixed stereo versions, plus bits and pieces from the stage tapes. It was successful enough, decided Capitol, to allow further expeditions into the vaults, and the results have been generally successful — because they have the session tapes and therefore the capacity to remix them into proper stereo.

The operative word here is “proper,” keeping in mind that a good mono mix is always to be preferred to a bad stereo mix. I wrote about this at length some years ago and cited some examples of the latter. (Among the worst stereo mixes extant is the overechoed, ping-pongy “I Love You” by People — on Capitol, by coincidence — which becomes unlistenable long before the 4:35 running time is over.)

Still, if Capitol does have fresh new Beach Boys mixes available, why don’t they use them on all Beach Boys product? The answer, of course, can be found at the cash register: the number of people who can be sold any old Beach Boys compilation is far greater than the number of people who insist on hearing “Heroes and Villains” in stereo for once. And they’re not going to go back and remaster a CD that sold well just to punch in new tracks that Joe and Susan Sixpack may not recognize as new.

As for myself, I have accumulated a fair amount of uncommon (if not always “rare”) stereo, and I use it on my personal compilations most of the time, though there are reasons why I might not. Often it’s a question of length: staying with the Beach Boys for the moment, the stereo mix of “Fun, Fun, Fun” fades out almost 20 seconds earlier than the mono 45 version. And sometimes the stereo mix just rubs me the wrong way: Capitol redid the Outsiders (the US band) material for a compilation, and the vintage mixes, despite dubious placement — the lead vocal on “Time Won’t Let Me” falls hard left — somehow sounded more forceful than the more-conventionally-placed remix.

That said, though, I still get something of a kick when I hear something in stereo that I never thought I would. And to that extent, I have to sympathize with my (once-removed) correspondent.

And yet another collection of songs that are seldom heard in stereo, with yet another variation on the same cover art. (Actually, a few of these are seldom heard in any configuration these days.)

Track listing for 111075-2:

1. The Kingsmen: Louie, Louie
2. The Chiffons: He’s So Fine
3. Dobie Gray: The “In” Crowd
4. Vanity Fare: Early in the Morning
5. Gene Chandler: Duke of Earl
6. The Shangri-Las: Remember (Walkin’ in the Sand)
7. Wilson Pickett: Mustang Sally
8. Shades of Blue: Oh How Happy
9. The Jive Five: My True Story
10. Lorne Greene: Ringo
11. Los Bravos: Bring a Little Lovin’
12. Marcie Blane: Bobby’s Girl
13. Arthur Alexander: Anna
14. The Raindrops: The Boy You Can’t Forget
15. Creedence Clearwater Revival: Proud Mary *
16. Tommy James and the Shondells: I Think We’re Alone Now
17. Gene and Debbe: Playboy
18. Dusty Springfield: I Only Want to Be with You
19. Ronnie Dove: Say You
20. Bubble Puppy: Hot Smoke and Sasafrass
21. The Marvelettes: BEechwood 4-5789
22. The Beach Boys: God Only Knows
23. Norma Tanega: Walking My Cat Named Dog
24. Aaron Neville: Tell It Like It Is
25. The McCoys: Hang On Sloopy
26. Bernadette Carroll: Party Girl
27. The Byrds: Mr. Tambourine Man
28. The Jaynetts: Sally Go ‘Round the Roses
29. The Rolling Stones: 19th Nervous Breakdown

* The original LP mix is stereo, but just barely; this mix is from the short-lived quadraphonic LP issue of Creedence Gold, folded down to two tracks by, um, me.

Yet another collection of songs that are seldom heard in stereo, with yet another variation on the same cover art.

Track listing for 111065-2:

1. The Ronettes: Baby I Love You
2. Donovan: Mellow Yellow
3. Dion: Donna the Prima Donna
4. The Beatles: I Should Have Known Better
5. Nino Tempo and April Stevens: All Strung Out
6. Three Dog Night: Joy to the World *
7. The Hollies: I’m Alive
8. The Fireballs: Bottle of Wine
9. The Beach Boys: Wouldn’t It Be Nice
10. Perez Prado and His Orchestra: Patricia
11. Peter and Gordon: Woman
12. Raspberries: Go All the Way
13. The Rose Garden: Next Plane to London
14. The Dave Clark Five: Glad All Over
15. The Reflections: (Just Like) Romeo and Juliet
16. Kyu Sakamoto: Sukiyaki
17. Jimmy Soul: If You Wanna Be Happy
18. Ritchie Valens: La Bamba
19. Freddie and the Dreamers: Do the Freddie
20. The Vogues: Five O’Clock World
21. The Miracles: You’ve Really Got a Hold on Me
22. Paul Revere and the Raiders: Kicks
23. The Shangri-Las: Give Him a Great Big Kiss
24. Whistling Jack Smith: I Was Kaiser Bill’s Batman
25. The Halos: “Nag”
26. Del Shannon: Little Town Flirt
27. Martha and the Vandellas: Heat Wave

* With the proper guitar solo during the break, as on the 45.

Obviously a sequel to the first Two Ears disc, with the colors of the cover picture transmogrified. At the time, it seemed like stuff like this would be the bulk of my CD-R production.

Track listing for 111054-2:

1. Dion and the Belmonts: I Wonder Why
2. The Beatles: Boys
3. Skip and Flip: Cherry Pie
4. The Ronettes: Be My Baby
5. Peter Sarstedt: Where Do You Go To My Lovely
6. The Rolling Stones: Heart of Stone
7. Brook Benton: Hit Record
8. Tony Orlando: Bless You
9. The Dave Clark Five: Can’t You See That She’s Mine
10. The 4 Seasons: Dawn (Go Away)
11. The Beatles: Please Please Me
12. Chubby Checker: Loddy Lo
13. David McWilliams: The Days of Pearly Spencer
14. Charles Randolph Grean Sounde: Quentin’s Theme
15. The Beach Boys: Kiss Me, Baby
16. Zager and Evans: Mr. Turnkey *
17. The Four Preps: More Money for You and Me
18. Elvis Presley: Love Me Tender
19. Les Cooper and the Soul Rockers: Wiggle Wobble
20. The Rolling Stones: The Last Time
21. The Brotherhood of Man: Where Are You Going To My Love
22. Frankie Lymon and the Teenagers: I’m Not a Juvenile Delinquent
23. Thee Prophets: Playgirl
24. Lonnie Donegan: Does Your Chewing Gum Lose Its Flavor
25. Tom Jones: What’s New Pussycat?
26. The Beatles: Twist and Shout

* The followup to “In the Year 2525,” this is amazingly creepy. Further discussion here.

This is the first CD-R I ever produced and decided to keep. The title indicates that all these tracks are in stereo; this matters because most of them are most commonly found in mono, when they’re found at all. The cover art is a mostly-unchanged template from Adaptec (later Roxio) Easy CD Creator, which I used for my earliest burns before switching to Nero; I added both the Wendex logo and a copy of the old 1960s Liberty Records “Visual Sound Stereo” tag.

Track listing for 111051-2:

1. The Beatles: I Saw Her Standing There
2. The Ronettes: Walking in the Rain
3. The Rolling Stones: Time Is On My Side
4. The Dave Clark Five: Bits and Pieces
5. Bobby Darin: Dream Lover
6. Simon and Garfunkel: You Don’t Know Where Your Interest Lies *
7. Jackie DeShannon: What the World Needs Now Is Love
8. The Beatles: Anna
9. The Strangeloves: Cara-Lin
10. The Marvelettes: Please, Mr. Postman
11. Strawberry Alarm Clock: Sit with the Guru
12. The Tempos: See You In September
13. The Dave Clark Five: Try Too Hard
14. The Beach Boys: California Girls
15. Sandy Posey: I Take It Back
16. The Rolling Stones: (I Can’t Get No) Satisfaction
17. The Beatles: Do You Want to Know a Secret
18. The Crickets: Oh, Boy!
19. The Troggs: Love Is All Around
20. The Crystals: Then He Kissed Me
21. The 4 Seasons: Let’s Hang On!
22. The Bell Notes: I’ve Had It
23. The Dave Clark Five: Catch Us If You Can
24. Elvis Presley: Jailhouse Rock **
25. The Tremeloes: Suddenly You Love Me
26. The Beatles: I’m Happy Just to Dance with You
27. The Byrds: Turn! Turn! Turn!

* B-side of “Fakin’ It,” never on an LP.
** From the motion-picture soundtrack as issued in stereo.