Songs that sounded "better" on AM

[Tom Wells]

As heard today on the way home in the convertible, "Music to watch Girls by"...

And "I feel Fine" by the Beatles.

 

[nightfly61]

Show & Tell-Al Wilson
any Stylistics
Fool to Cry & Angie-Stones
Gerry & the Pacemakers-Don't Let the Sun...& Ferry....
Fool if You Think it's Over-Chris Rea
any John Denver, James Taylor or Simon & Garfunkel
...here's a real good one on A.M......Dreamboat Annie- Heart
...Midnight at the Oasis- Maria Muldar
...I Can Help-Billy Swan
Goodnight Tonight-Paul McCartney/Wings
Hold On-Santana

 

[robgrayson]

I have wondered about "You Didn't Have To Be So Nice" by Lovin' Spoonful. I wonder if the mono mix was different from the stereo you hear now, where the lead vocal is db's below the background vocal in places. I can't imagine a mix that wacky being a hit.

 

[Eli Polonsky]

I have wondered about "You Didn't Have To Be So Nice" by Lovin' Spoonful. I wonder if the mono mix was different from the stereo you hear now, where the lead vocal is db's below the background vocal in places. I can't imagine a mix that wacky being a hit.

The mono mix was different, with stronger vocals. The stereo mix has the vocals panned to one channel or the other (melody and harmony vocals separated), which in doing that effectively reduces (or can unbalance) the levels of the vocals.

 

[David67]

Satisfaction by the Rolling Stones and California Dreaming by the Mama and the Papas sounded much better on AM.

 

[nightfly61]

How about songs whose intros never sounded good on any kind of radio?

Roberta Flack: The First Time Ever I Sawed Your Face...

ouch.

Or "Fat Bottom Girls" by Queen-always sounds like a channel fryed out in stereo or dead air in mono.

 

[Mike Sheridan]

Nobody mentioned this one. When I saw the title of the thread it was the first song I thought of: Fontella Bass' Rescue me. On FM the Stereo mix doesn't have the same punch to it.

 

[DouglasB]

Here's my two: Rocky Mountain Way by Joe Walsh, and Radar Love by Golden Earring.

 

[WPPCProductions]

Most of the old songs from the 60's and 70's.I guess I'm use of hearing them through
a 2 1/2 inch speaker.

 

[4dude]

I have "Every breath you take" by the Police,recorded from WTIC and it sounds awesome!!

 

[firepoint525]

I now interrupt this thread to say that the songs that sounded "better" on AM sounded better on the AM radios that existed back in the heyday when those songs were hits! Not on the crappy, tinny AM radios that are out there now! :

I now return you to normal programming. ;D

 

[4dude]

Yes you are so correct!!

 

[nightfly61]

10CC-I'm Not In Love
Ace-How Long

 

[Tom Wells]

I now interrupt this thread to say that the songs that sounded "better" on AM sounded better on the AM radios that existed back in the heyday when those songs were hits! Not on the crappy, tinny AM radios that are out there now! :

I now return you to normal programming. ;D

Since I have only ever been using hifi AMs, I forget that most don't have this luxury.
But I take the hi-fi for granted.. Thank you for pointing this out. Generally the problem is too-narrow bandwidtrh on
the medium to expensive radios, making them muddy on AM. Cheapies have wideband (good high frequency) response but tiny speakers.

If you want to hear how songs can sound better on AM, you need to have the right radio.


Songs heard yesterday on AM which sound better on AM.

Somethin' Stupid by Frank and Nancy Sinatra.

Probably everything by Nancy Sinatra.

 

[nightfly61]

Probably everything by Nancy Sinatra.

including Some Velvet Morning w/ Lee Hazlewood...
White Bird-It's a Beautiful Day
I Wanna Get Next To You-Rose Royce
Day After Day-Badfinger
Blow Away-George Harrison
any Bread
any Carly Simon
any Joni Mitchell
Stand Tall-Burton Cummings
any 70's Wings

 

[The King Bee]

Berry Gordy of Motown had his house engineers (Mike Miller, et al) built replicas of AM car radio systems in-house to replicate the sound of an automotive sound system. Many Motown songs were then re-equalized, re-mixed and run through this system to assure punch and clarity in cars, which was of course, a primary outlet for music in the heyday of AM Soul and Top 40 radio.

I understand the most elaborate of these test setups even used a CBS Labs Volumax AM radio processor, the predominant station signal processor of the era for dead-on replication of what stations used. There is a striking difference between the hard-panned 3-track stereo studio master tapes of early Motown (Vandellas on the left with rhythm, the rest of the Funk Brothers on the right, and Martha Reeves' lead vocal dead in the center) and the mono single release mixes.

(The "Motown Remixed" project of a few years ago re-did these 3, 4, and 8-track studio masters for clarity, even to the point of releasing alternate takes of familiar hits that sounded better than the original release versions. For instance, The Temptations' "My Girl" in the new series is 16 bars longer than the original 1965 release version, has a much better full stereo mix, and the orchestra plays the song to conclusion instead of fading out.)

 

[billyg]

A lot of 50's-60's Hits that were cheaply and poorly recorded, like the O'Kaysons "Girl Watcher", Tommy James & The Shondells "Hanky Panky" and especially Gary U.S. Bonds "Quarter To Three" sound so much better on AM.
Listening to them on FM exposes all the noise and distortion those recordings had.

 

[billyg]

Berry Gordy of Motown had his house engineers (Mike Miller, et al) built replicas of AM car radio systems in-house to replicate the sound of an automotive sound system. Many Motown songs were then re-equalized, re-mixed and run through this system to assure punch and clarity in cars, which was of course, a primary outlet for music in the heyday of AM Soul and Top 40 radio.

I agree, Berry Gordy was one of the first rock producers along with Phil Spector, Bob Crewe (4 Seasons) & Joe Meek ("Telstar") to realize that their listening audience was mostly teenagers listening to their music on cheap AM radios and phonographs.

Those classic Motown mono mixes are really works of art.. and besides for AM radio they were deliberately mixed and mastered HOT to make up for the cheap and noisy vinyl and styrene they pressed 45's on. I bought "The Motown Box" last year, and while some of those remixes sound great, others suffer because they didn't use the extreme EQ and compression that the original recordings have.

 

[BobSacamano]

Let's not forget those gems from 3 dog night... I remember reading where 3 dog nights guitarist said their stuff was recorded on 8 tracks, and mixed through a 3-track console, which resulted in stereo mixes that were'nt much different than mono...plus they were compressed to hell and back

PS: All the Steppenwolf stuff was recorded in the same studio, same producer, same engineer..

 

[Oldbones]

Let's not forget those gems from 3 dog night... I remember reading where 3 dog nights guitarist said their stuff was recorded on 8 tracks, and mixed through a 3-track console, which resulted in stereo mixes that were'nt much different than mono...plus they were compressed to hell and back

PS: All the Steppenwolf stuff was recorded in the same studio, same producer, same engineer..

Most if not all of the mid-late 60s ABC/Dunhill stuff had totally different mixes for the 45 and album. A-B them sometime and you'll notice a big difference. Unfortunately, the masters for those 45 mixes got tossed many years ago.