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Hi
Is the Passage Album not in print anymore?How will it eventually achieve Gold status if you can not buy it?.Same goes for Made in America.
One has but to see the lunacy of the marketing of the "Sweet, Sweet Smile" , Passage LP, single:
Here we have a Country #8 hit, backed in the USA by the song "I Have You" (Kind of Hush LP!) ....Uhm...Why not backed by
the Mac Davis' penned , country-tinged "Two Sides"?
Here is it, I didn't know about the reference to the city in Ecuador in the song, B'wana, did you?
Check out the promotion used inside Billboard Magazine for Passage Oct 08, 1977
See original full sheet here Page 13
http://www.americanradiohistory.com/Archive-Billboard/70s/1977/Billboard 1977-10-08.pdf
Also Jump to Page 99 for a full write up on this album by Paul Grein
Close Up Carpenters Passage
While we're on the subject of Passage, I was always puzzled how the singles 'All You Get From Love Is A Love Song' and 'Sweet Sweet Smile' (both released in the US) had the same B-side - 'I Have You'.
Might have been a royalties thing as it's a Carpenter/Bettis track and Passage didn't contain any Carpenter/Bettis compositions.
I recall a video interview, where Paul Williams commented
about his luck to be on the 'flip' side of a hit single.
Words to the effects that he got the same royalties as if his song were the 'B'-side being sold---
it is all the 'same' piece of vinyl. The other side is along for the ride and if the 'A' side
is a successfully selling single, then you get the same money from the other side.
That would have been a perfect scenario, James....I'm with you, Gary. "Two Sides" is one of my favorites, too. With Richard's comments, you would expect an appearance of "Two Sides" on compilations. But there are plenty of other great songs that haven't made the cut onto compilations...
I also think that this song was a missed opportunity. I like your idea of backing "Sweet Sweet Smile" with "Two Sides." Further, given the success (on the country charts especially) of "Sweet Sweet Smile," why not follow that up with a single release of "Two Sides?" They could easily have had two back-to-back country top 10 singles, which would have helped overall sales of both singles as well as Passage.
It's fun playing Monday morning quarterback... or, should I say, "38 years later quarterback?!"