Promo 45 of "Isn’t She Lovely"?

Yes, it is either a bootleg or fantasy item. Tamla wasn't
allowed to even service a promo 45. Catalog number prefix
on that 45 isn't Tamla's. If this had been serviced, the
station I worked at would have gotten copies. Motown was
very excellent about Promo 45 single service. Always got
them dependably, and major act LP discs from them.

Edited by KentT

There's no question it's a fantasy item. As Aaron says, the "6"s are different and the fonts don't match. I compared the scans to my promo 45s of "I Wish" and "Sir Duke", and the bogus mock-up was lifted directly from the latter. There are several additional giveaways:

* The title fonts on Nashville-pressed promos on both "I Wish" and "Sir Duke" are the same font and same size as the artist fonts. The "ISN'T SHE LOVELY" is in a smaller font size than the artist.

* The quotation mark fonts around the song titles of the above two promos match. The ones on the fantasy item are entirely different.

* The "SINGLE VERSION 3:26" and "ALBUM VERSION 5:00" designations are conveniently right where the matrix numbers and listed times would be on the "Sir Duke" promo. I have also never seen the numeral "5" in a font like that on any legit 1976 or 1977 Tamla promo 45 pressed in Nashville.

* Ditto for the "LOVELY 1" sitting right where the "T 54281F" catalog number would be.

* The discogs label scans are monochrome, which obscures any definition in the playing area, thus making it even more difficult, if not impossible, to distinguish between a legit promo pressing and a photoshopped paste job.

* The fact that the fantasy item appears on a typeset Tamla promo label at all. Even if Motown ever did arrange to have a promo 45 sent or hand-delivered to a very, very select number of key reporting stations, it would never have gotten to the typesetting stage for the labels. You'd have been looking either at acetate copies or plain white-label (test pressing) copies with handwritten title and artist. No way would an independent like Motown have spent the additional bucks to have the facility in Nashville do typesetting for a pressing run of only a handful of copies.

I worked for a major independent distributor in Minneapolis at the time all of the singles from Songs In The Key Of Life were issued. We got every promo item Motown sent out, including 45s, LPs, posters and other in-store display items, all of which were delivered to my office. An "Isn't She Lovely" promo 45 was never among them.

Edited by Yah Shure

Yah Shure wrote: * The "SINGLE VERSION 3:26" and "ALBUM VERSION 5:00" designations are conveniently right where the matrix numbers and listed times would be on the "Sir Duke" promo. I have also never seen the numeral "5" in a font like that on any legit 1976 or 1977 Tamla promo 45 pressed in Nashville.

What struck me as odd is I don't think I've ever seen the phrase "single
version" on a 45 RPM record, much less ever.

jebsib wrote: Never knew until the other day that "Isn't She Lovely" actually did earn a Billboard chart ranking back in 1977: AC #23. Was bowled over!

Billboard did allow album cuts on the AC charts.

"Love Song" by Elton John peaked at #18 in 1976 and "More
Than A Woman" by the Bee Gees peaked at #39 in 1978.

Edited by Paul Haney