Sometimes curiosity gets the best of me... This LP came to me in a collection of Elvis LPs that was given to me by my wife's mother after her sister passed away. I wasn't much of a collector of Elvis LPs... But I do own a few Elvis singles. The LPs are very clean, on the black label used by RCA in the late 70s- 80s.. keep them, right? Of course!
Haven't played this one, till today. For whatever reason played "Love Me"... What in the world?? What is with all the heavy reverb? All I can ask is... Why? Did Dave Dexter wander into RCA's studios, and say "Hey... I can fix that!" Good golly miss Molly.. To say I would appreciate the mono tracks in their original glory would be an understatement.. There's a reason I usually steer clear of electronically processed stereo LPs. Same goes for Capitol's Duophonic LPs...
I've got this (tan labels) and another Elvis album where the Indianapolis "I" is scratched out. I do see a hand scribed "WA". Since RCA Hollywood had closed by this time, any chance this stands for Waddell?
Added cover and label variations from 1977. I foolishly panicked and thought Elvis' albums would disappear when he died. These were what was in the record stores in August 1977.
The first character M in the matrix numbers suggests a release year of 1961 for this fake stereo version (or, mastered in 1961, but coupled with the comment below about the cover, a 1962 release).