The Wonder That Is “Do I Have To Dance All Night”
Ongoing readers may have already figured out that I am fond of “Do I Have To Dance All Night,” a Leonard Cohen song that has never been released on an album and hasn’t been publicly performed by Cohen, as far as I can determine, since 1980. One may be able to detect an indication of my feelings toward this piece from the title of my first post about it: The Best Leonard Cohen Song You’ve Never Heard (Probably)
Or, some might consider the fact that I constructed a music video for the semi-funky 1976 tune performed with Laura Branigan a clue to the degree of my interest in it.
Of course, there is also the other music video I put together for the 1980 more gypsy, less disco version of Do I Have To Dance All Night Video (1980 )
And then, there is … – well, you get the idea.
The Stereo Tweak
My affection for “Do I Have To Dance All Night” notwithstanding, the quality of the recordings, especially the 1976 version, have been problematic.
Consequently, I read with interest an email from a reader who had re-engineered the music.
As Drive-In-Freak explains,
Years a go a station I was working for went AM stereo (though I doubt many people had an AM stereo radio) so I developed s system to give older mono recordings a little separation to make better use of the (then) new system.
I use an open reel deck that’s been modified with three playback heads and variable speed. Head 1 is for the right channel and is before head 2 left and right channel the last in the chain (head 3) is the left channel. This gives a delay between right and left. The delay time is adjusted by tape speed. Mixing the left and right together with the center (left+right) is how I ajust the soundstange as well as amount of separation.
It’s a rather old tech way of doing things, but it works.
To my ears, this results is a significant improvement in the sound – but you can decide for yourself.
Listen: "Do I Have To Dance All Night"
Leonard Cohen – Do I Have To Dance All Night (1976 version – with Laura Branigan) with stereo tweak
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Download: "Do I Have To Dance All Night"
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Leonard Cohen & Laura Branigan – Do I Have To Dance All Night
Credit Due Department: Heck Of A Guy extends a tip of the Leonard Cohen fedora to Drive-In-Freak for his technical expertise and his generosity in sharing the results of his work.
