The master of 'Rags To Riches' is Take 4
with a vocal repair on "cuss me" (changed to "kiss
me"), spliced with the line "tell me you're mine
ever more" from Take 3, along with a piano intro
overdub. The problem is, the version masquerading
as the master on the 70s Box, Japanese singles
collection box, and a lot of other releases, is just
the repaired Take 4, without the line from Take
3. Curiously it is also missing some backing vocal
overdubs and the piano. The stereo mix on the
Elvis Aron Presley silver box has the correct splice and piano and
all backing vocals are present. The original mono
single mix can be found on Hits Of The 70s LP
(UK, 1974) or the 1975 Reader's Digest 7LP Greatest
Hits box-set, among others.
A different splice ("...that I'm living
for, hold me and kiss me, and tell me you're mine
ever more" from Take 3) can be found on FTD's
Love Letters From Elvis and Hits Of The 70s classic albums, the 30 disc Complete Elvis Presley
Masters collection and the Sony/BMG release Elvis
75 as well as the Franklin Mint set. In fact this new splice is used on all new releases now.
Take 3 of 'Rags To Riches' on Essential
Elvis Volume 4 is edited (mixed) to take out
Elvis' falsetto voice at the end of the take -
This also appears on the Venus release Unedited
Masters - Nashville 1971 as a bonus track
where it's listed as being the undubbed master!
Take 3 is complete on FTD's Love Letters From
Elvis classic album, but strangely it also contains
backup vocal overdubs on this release too. It
seems Take 3 must have been considered to be the
master originally, and was overdubbed, before
it was decided to use Take 4 spliced with the
line "tell me you're mine ever more..."
from Take 3 as the master.
'Snowbird' on the bootlegs Pure Diamonds Volume 2 and Rough Cut Diamonds are both probably just the
left channel only (centred) of a stereo acetate
of the fully overdubbed master. By eliminating
the right channel on the same tracks on Elvis
Country and the 70's Box I was able to get
the exact same results. This is possible because
backing vocals (and occasionally strings) tend
to be panned 100% right on the original mixes
from these sessions, so you can often eliminate
them by cutting out the right channel, with no
discernable bleed.
Backup vocals were removed from 'Snowbird'
(September 23) before release.
Sessions III wrongly lists the undubbed
master (Take 6) of 'Snowbird' as being released
on Country (Time Life Elvis Presley Collection
Volume 4). It was actually Take 2 on that release,
the same take that appeared on the Today, Tomorrow
And Forever box-set, and later on FTD's Elvis Country classic album.
Sessions III lists the date as being October
28 when brass and strings were overdubbed to
'Snowbird' but there is no indication in
the session log of 'Snowbird' being overdubbed
on this date. There is however, a log listing
musicians for the unused horn overdubs for 'Whole
Lotta Shakin' Goin' On', that also shows 'Snowbird'
as having strings overdubbed by this date too.
At the bottom right hand corner of the session
log there is a hand written date "10/12"
indicating a date of October 12 1970 for this
overdub session.
Overdubbed horns were removed from 'Whole Lotta
Shakin' Goin' On', at Elvis' insistence, before
release.
In March of 2007, Sony decided to go through all of Elvis' masters. They retransferred everything and remastered all tracks including repairing as many clicks, pops, bad edits and dropouts as they could. They have used these newly mastered recordings on their new releases since 2007 including budget soundtracks, Legacy releases, the 30 disc Complete Elvis Presley Masters collection and the Franklin Mint package.
All outtakes and undubbed masters used on the Sony 4xCD
set From Elvis In Nashville have been completely remixed
and remastered from scratch.
Sample of Take 4 of 'Rags To Riches' with Elvis' original vocals in the left channel and his repaired vocals in the right channel.
Thanks to Erik Rasmussen.
