Billy Ocean - Get Outta My Dreams AC Edit

The promo CD single (Jive JSCD 9678, copyright 1988) has two tracks:

1 - Single Version, printed 4:43, actual 4:43
2 - Extended Version, printed 8:59, actual 8:59

The version on Billy Ocean's Jive Greatest Hits (1989) is a differently-EQ'd digital clone of the Single Version from the promo CD single, and is far less expensive nowadays. This is a well-chosen and excellent-sounding disc overall, and I highly recommend it.

The same analog transfer as GH is used on:

• Priority's Eighties Greatest Rock Hits Vol. 10 Dance All Night (1994) - digitally exactly 2 dB louder; note that this disc is mostly (entirely?) made up of digital clones of existing discs without any added EQ, noise reduction, or compression/limiting, and therefore avoids the sonic shortcomings of most of the other Priority discs
• Time-Life's Sounds Of The Eighties Vol. 21 1986-1989 (1997) - differently-EQ'd digital clone

There's a new analog transfer (I think) on Rhino's Billboard Top Hits 1988 (1994), which sounds basically like all of the above, but a little bit louder; there is a small amount of clipping. The same analog transfer is used on:

• Warner Special Products' 2-CD Rockin' USA (1994)

All of the above discs extend out to the full ending of the song, with the line "...want you to be my baby" then the words "whoa I" at the end of the fade.

There are a few that fade before the final words:

• EMI Virgin PolyGram's UK 2-CD Now That's What I Call Music UK Vol. 11 (1988)
• EMI Virgin PolyGram's UK 2-CD Now That's What I Call Music UK 1988 (1993) - digitally exactly 0.287 dB quieter than Now 11 and additionally hastens the fade
• EMI Virgin PolyGram's UK 2-CD Now The Millennium Series 1988 (1999) - sounds similar to Greatest Hits, but hastens the fade
• Quality Canada's This Is Music 5 (1989) - not based on any of the other masterings and fades almost 10 seconds early; avoid

And finally, there is swaitek's promo 50-CD The A-List Disc 45 (1994), which seems to use the TM Century in-house edit of the LP version.

My recommendation:

If you want the song on a single-artist disc, most definitely go with Jive's Greatest Hits (1989).

If you want the song on a compilation, Rhino's Billboard Top Hits 1988 (1994) is likely your least expensive option. Time-Life's Sounds Of The Eighties Vol. 21 1986-1989 (1997) is superb in every way, but likely fairly pricey nowadays.

Edited by crapfromthepast

eriejwg wrote: It's funny... when I first bought this 45 in 1988 for my bar gigs, I always cued past the car SFX and intro. Maybe TM thought that was a good spot to edit lol.

Was your bar gig in Dallas TX? lol!

I haven't looked for it on a HitDisc or a GoldDisc yet but, Aaron is probably right. I guess the folks at TM Century figured they could make a cut that would do well on an AC station, so they did it.
I know that as an event DJ, I did the same thing. I also think at the time this was popular, I was working for a local multi-DJ company who gave us dubs on cassette. I'm guessing here but DRM law would
have had a field day with this guy had they known of the way he was outfitting DJs in the area. 20 and sometimes 30 jocks out on a night with cassette dubs from one CD.

Good times though! Often groups of us would go out for 1am breakfast after getting done packing in on a Saturday night.

To Dave:

To the best of my knowledge the earlier TM Century discs
used an analog dynamic noise reduction unit - not sure
what brand.

Andy