Mono questions


I have a couple of mono questions on a stereo system:
1.  Will playing a mono recording be the same as engaging mono on the preamp?  For example, if I played the Beach Boys "Pet Sounds" stereo, with the mono button engaged, would it sound the same as playing the mono version of "Pet Sounds."

2. I have read that while playing a mono record, I should also engage mono on the preamp?  Is this true?  Why?  If the source is mono, the preamp should reproduce what is fed into it regardless of mono setting on the preamp.  Thanks for helping out a mono newbie.
128x128philcrocetti

Great comments fellas, but allow me to make one correction. What studios did in the 60’s (and not just the early 60’s, but all the way through the decade, stereo LP’s not becoming standard until ’68 or so), was not record two separate sessions, one for monaural and one for stereo, but rather simultaneously recorded each session on both a monaural recorder and a multi-track (whether 2, 3, 4, or 8). Doubling the recording time would have been far too expensive to do otherwise. The best studio musicians are paid up to triple scale, and a room full of them adds up to a lot of money! Not to mention the studio time itself (even in the 60's, more per hour than most people made in an 8-hour day), as well as the engineer, assistant engineer, and the recording tape itself, which ain’t cheap. A 10-1/2" roll of tape running at 15ips (the standard in the 60's) records only about a half hour of music, at 30 ips half that.

The resulting monaural and stereo LP’s in some cases can sound like different takes, as the stereo mix may contain parts not included in the monaural mix (mono mixes are done "on-the-fly", not in post-production). Even the mono and stereo versions of the same recording of some Beatles songs contain different guitar parts, making them sound as if they are different takes. They aren’t. Now, some of the 1960’s "live-in-the-studio" Jazz albums DID contain different versions of some songs on the monaural and stereo editions of the albums, but that was a result not of mono/stereo sessions, but only of different takes from the same session.

Odd. I wonder why I have original Capitol issues of "Something Cool" with June Christy, both the mono and stereo versions.  It takes 5 minutes of listening to know that these are two entirely different recording sessions.  She doesn't even attempt to sing the tunes exactly the same on the two versions (at least in most cases).  These are circa 1960 recordings.  Granted, I don't know how common this was, because I don't own enough mono and stereo pairs to judge.  But it certainly must have been done with some regularity, because June Christy was a very successful artist but no Sarah or Ella. Perhaps, as you say, these are admixtures of "different takes from the same session".  That would also explain what I hear, but why choose one take for the mono version and another for the stereo?  Does that not imply that in one case they set up the mikes for mono, etc?  I am not claiming to know the answers to those questions.
The answer is simple , Lew. Mistakes! The guy who is sent to the tape vault to retrieve the master when it is time to press the LP may or may not grab the correct reel for both the mono and stereo pressings. Those kinds of mistakes are more common than you might imagine. The original 7" 45 RPM pressing of Bob Dylan’s "Positively 4th Street" actually contains "Can You Please Crawl Out Your Window"---a different song! The 45 was immediately recalled when the mistake was discovered, making it an expensive collectors item. The song "Can You Please Crawl Out Your Window" was later released as a 45 on it's own, but the version on that 45 is a different one than the one on the mis-pressing! Dylans band on that song, by the way, is The Hawks, later known as The Band. Great song, with a blistering guitar solo.
BACK TO MONO said the mad genius. Who am I to disagree. Playing mono records on a stereo system? Another way to go is a Tru Mono cable. Google it. It's an ear opener!
onlyqualityhifi, how is the Tru Mono cable different than 2 into 1 connected to 1 into 2 RCA cables which have been available for decades, although for a bit less money?

I suspect that is the same as an "internally strapped" mono cartridge such as Lew mentioned, or most configurations with a stereo/mono switch on a preamp.