Dave, what does your research show about the differences between the versions of "Rock the Boat" that appear on Freedom for the Stallion and Rockin' Soul, respectively?
I delve in to this in the liner notes, but in a nutshell the song was originally recorded for
Freedom for the Stallion. After RCA put out the title track as a single (and it did OK) they pushed
Miracle Maker as a promo single, but it stiffed and they were ready to give up on promoting the album. However, in late '73 they started hearing from their A&R reps in New York that
Rock the Boat had become an underground sensation in the city's gay dance clubs. Disco wasn't really a 'thing' yet, but that's where it started, in the gay clubs of places like NYC and Philadelphia, and DJ's at these clubs were taking two copies of
Rock the Boat to loop the middle bars (the buuum-bah-dum - buumm-bah-dump piano/bass/drums part) so they could extend the song and make it more danceable, supposedly for up to 10 or 15 minutes at a time.
The guy that produced
Rock the Boat was John Florez, who RCA picked because he'd produced
Grazing in the Grass for the Friends of Distinction, and the first version of
Boat was very much along the lines of his work with the Friends, vocally driven soul pop that wasn't particularly heavy in the rhythm section. So when he heard about this club success, he took the track and mixed it a second time in early '74, presuming RCA would release it as a single thanks to what the song was doing in the clubs in New York. What he did was basically what we'd now call a disco mix, or a dance re-mix - he pumped up the bass and the rhythm section and created an altogether punchier mix. RCA released the remix as a single and it took a while, but by the summer of '74 disco was starting to happen in the mainstream, and
Rock the Boat was one of the first singles that was a big hit as a result, along with George McCrae's
Rock Your Baby, and then you start getting stuff like Barry White, KC & The Sunshine Band, etc.
So the single of
Rock the Boat, (which was the remix) sold more than 2 million copies by the end of the summer, and it was a hit nearly a year after
Freedom for the Stallion came out, so I guess RCA figured they'd put the remixed version on
Rockin' Soul (which came out in November), because basically, why not? It probably moved plenty more copies of that LP for them, and the remix version hadn't been on an LP yet. So effectively it's the same studio recording, original version is on
Stallion, remixed/hit version is on
Rockin' Soul.
John Florez actually has his own youtube channel where he does little video documentary/essay type things, and he did a good one about his time working with The Hues Corporation, which is where I got some of the information for my liner notes. If you're interested in the band, or the process of 'hit-making' back then, it's a pretty interesting watch.
look how happy they are! Rick Derringer is especially happy mixing (presumed his or an artist he produced?) music in Quad..!!
but hmm.. August 1974.. i'm curious which of the Blue Sky (or maybe some other label under the CBS umbrella) Quads that might be..!?
can't be "Spring Fever" since we now know that was mixed by Shelly Yakus (who did the amazing Edgar Winter "Jasmine Nightdreams" Quad mix) and it's not "Shock Treatment" (that was mixed by Don Young who also did the fabulous "All American Boy" Quad mix).. hmm.. any thoughts steelydave?
I looked in to this, and the only conclusion I can come to is that the photo was probably just staged for PR purposes - most likely Keyes is just playing back an already completed quad mix that another engineer did. As you say, we know who did the quad mixes of both of Derringer's solo albums, and the albums that Derringer produced during that period (EWG's
They Only Come Out At Night and
Shock Treatment, and Johnny Winter's
Still Alive and Well and
Saints & Sinners) all had their quad mixes done by Don Young. The photo must be from circa '74 because of that 'Columbia Quadraphonic Records and Tapes' poster in the background, it has far too many titles on it for it to be from '72 or before. And they can't be listening to the quad mix of
The Edgar Winter Group with Rick Derringer because work on that album didn't start until the summer of 1975, more than a year after the Derringer/Al Lawrence/Larry Keyes photos were published.
You can tell by looking at those scans/photo's of the backs of the 3 new quad 2-fers that care and thought were put into the layout and design of those backs. Not only do we see the front and backs of the original album graphics, but instead of just the song titles and copyright notices, there's a lot of in-depth info about the recordings themselves. And - - - it's cool as heck to have our own steelydave involved in the whole process to put that touch of authenticity to the whole thing.
Credit is very due here to Oliver Lomax, who does the co-ordination for these reissues, and D-V's graphic designer, Paul. Not only do they do a wonderful job (as you point out) they genuinely care about the quality of the end product, and have an interest in getting things right. They're also both really friendly, and open to some of the suggestions I've made - there are no puffed up egos put above getting things as perfect as they can be. I've really enjoyed the process of working with them, and with Mike, and look forward to continuing that in the future!
