Many years ago I bought The Nice's Autumn To Spring on vinyl. It was my first exposure to the band, and I loved the album. It was all demos and outtakes ... to this day I can't listen to the true versions of those songs without thinking that they sound "wrong".

Do you have any favourite songs or albums where you were first exposed to alternate versions (demos, remixes, live versions, acoustic), and those became the definitive versions in your mind to the point where you prefer them to the "real" versions?

Lots of live versions from when I was a teenager fall under that for me. James Gang In Concert is one that immeadiately comes to mind. Another is Bowie's 1980 Floor Show versions of Pinups material. Joe Cocker Mad Dogs & Englishmen...........

CSNY's 4-way Street is the first place I heard Neil's On the Way Home and Crosby's The Leeshore and Triad. They still sound "right" to me, although On the Way Home from Neil's Live at Massey Hall 1971 and The Leeshore from Crosby's Voyage box set are better actually better performances (very similar) and recordings, and I do prefer them now. When I first heard the studio version of On the Way Home from Buffalo Springfield's Last Time Around, I couldn't believe it -- it's much faster, and Richie Furay is singing! So, so wrong. Triad first appeared as a studio cut on Jefferson Airplane's Crown of Creation, which is just as wrong -- nice try, but I don't think so.

Greg's entire post is also true for me, except I do like the JA's version of Triad. The since released studio version of Lee Shore sounds weird to me also by comparison

i'm pretty sure the airplane does wooden ships also.

paul kantner was a co-writer.

renny

As one who first heard "On the Way Home" on "Last Time Around", i feel the opposite to Greg's position. As likely the best track on that LP, God knows i must've played it a hundred times. So when the first Neil version came out on Four Way Street, for me, it was just a real nice bonus to hear Neil's stripped down acoustic rendition, and hear him singing it. But the Richie studio vocal version will always be the definitive rendition for me. I don't usually make posts purely to counter someone else's opinion, but this is one of my favorite songs of all time, so i had to get the other perspective on the table here. Nothing personal, Greg. I guess we both won here; you got another version of your favorite rendition on Massey Hall, and i got a nice treat with the Richie vocal alt mix on the Springfield box set. Hooray for us both! Of course, Richie is one of my all time favorite vocalists anyways.

1973's The Beach Boys in Concert was my introduction to many late-60s/early-70s BB songs. I still prefer these recordings of "The Trader," "Darlin'," "Heroes & Villains," and a few others.

"Turn the Page" by Bob Seger - i, like i'm sure many, was only familiar with the version from the Live Bullet set. It was only recently i heard the original studio version from "Back In '72". I wouldn't go so far as to say it sounds "wrong", but it sure sounds different (as to be expected i suppose).

And J.A.'s version of "Wooden Ships" was from "Volunteers". The quad mix is cool to hear also, but neither hold up to the CSN take.

I love the alt version of "Suite: Judy Blue Eyes" from the CSNY box or the Aussie 2-cd anthology, with the drums on the intro and other differences, and prefer it to the "right" version i'd enjoyed for so many years.

"Rock and Roll Hoochie Coo" - first heard the version on "Johnny Winter And", and to this day perfer it hands down to the Rick Derringer hit single version.

Edgar Winter's epic live version of "Tobacco Road" from "Roadwork", the most widely heard version, versus the original studio version on "Entrance" (which i never heard until about 25 years later). The studio version is great, but how could anything compare with that killer live version?

"Keep Playing That Rock and Roll", the original studio version with the smokin' vocal trade-offs between Edgar Winter and Jerry LaCroix (from "Edgar Winter's White Trash"), versus the later single version by Johnny.

Prefer the alt mix of Poco's "A Good Feeling to Know" from "The Forgotten Trail" over the original version (i know, this and "Suite" are taking the reverse of Linda's premise; where the "wrong" becomes the "right" - sorry!)

Above i should've said - where the "right" becomes the "wrong" - duh.

"Keep Playing That Rock and Roll", the original studio version with the smokin' vocal trade-offs between Edgar Winter and Jerry LaCroix (from "Edgar Winter's White Trash"), versus the later single version by Johnny.



Sorry. i'll have to plead temporary insanity on this one. Could've sworn there was a subsequent version of this after "Edgar Winter's White Trash", but after double-checking at AMG it seems the ol' synapses are misfiring (again). Ooops....

I heard the Budukan version of Cheap Trick's Surrender before I heard the studio version. For me, the energy of the live version blows away the original.

The Beach Boys stuff I grew up listening to was an 8-track of "Endless Summer." So they could advertise the comp as being the original recordings, they had to use, well, the original recordings. Even if the hit version was a later re-recording.

As a result, I prefer the original "Help me Ronda" off of "Today" over the single "Help Me Rhonda" which was also on "Summer Days (and Summer Nights)!!"

I didn't mean to imply that I don't like the Buffalo Springfield version of On The Way Home or the Jefferson Airplane version of Triad -- I like both (I should have been clearer about that). They just sounded really wrong to me at first, and I do think they're inferior to the versions on 4-Way Street. I feel the same way about JA's version of Wooden Ships -- nice, but no CSN. And I meant no insult to Richie Furay -- he's a great singer. I remember being exited to hear the Springfield's version, and very confused when Neil wasn't even singing it.

And Rick -- don't every worry about disagreeing with my opinions. Bring it on! That's what makes these threads interesting.

Sorry, I had problems posting that reply. Can somebody delete the extra posts? Thanks.

Done!

I just had another thought on this topic. I realized that I used to fix on one favorite version of a song, and other versions would kind of bother me when I heard them. More and more I'm interested to hear new and different versions of the same song, and I really enjoy listening for the differences. I think of a song as a sort of absract thing that, in a way, is the sum total of all the versions of it that have ever been done. Even when I think there's a definitive version of a song, I love hearing other interpretations. It's one of the great things about CD reissues with extra tracks.

Thanks, Jimbo. Man, you guys are quick.

I heard the 1972 reworking of "Surf's Up" by The Beach Boys before I heard the 1967 original and I prefer the 1972 reworking by far with that gorgeous "Child is Father of the Man" coda. It was this version that made me a Beach Boys fan back in 1989, I think it was. I'd say it's one of their top five masterpieces. Was it Brian who got the idea of adding the coda?

The first couple of hundred times I ever heard "Sister Disco" as a kid was the live version from the "Concerts For The People Of Kampuchea" album. Defintely one of the very few times in which one of Keith Moon's replacements (in this case, Kenny Jones) was able to outdo Moon's original studio performance.

The initial version of Heart's "Magazine, issued in Holland as Arista SPARTY 1024 with the disclaimer "Mushroom Records regrets that a contractual dispute made it necessary to complete this record without the cooperation or endorsement of the group Heart, etc." Different mixes and a different track order than what ultimately was released officially. Still the definitive, shimmering version of "Heartless" to me, although I understand why most people -- Ann and Nancy included -- would prefer the later version that became the hit.

Chris Blackwell apparently thought the version of Catch A Fire that Bob Marley turned into him wasn't "right", so he employed "Rabbit" Bundrick to add keyboards and the track listing was tinkered with.

Then I heard the original mix on the Deluxe Edition, and realized that an album I loved in its original form was in fact crap compared to this unadorned version.