Steve G

Russ it was £170......not £70.

But there is no correlation.....a record that sold for £30 in 1990 may sell for thousands now......How many of us turned our snouts up at Eddie Parker when they were £35 for instance? I know at least two of us who did......too expensive we convinced ourselves..... Conversely a classic that sold for £100 in 1990 may sit languishing in dealers boxes for years now......unloved and unwanted.

Very true....As a kid I got skimmed £4 at Wigan with a Sam & Kitty early boot by one of these so called "older lad heroes" we're always hearing so many fond memories about - c**t. And a Mel Britt 2nd press too....was still in school at the time so had diddly squat money. Still it taught me a valuable lesson. Exactly......I mean why would a youngster want to buy the same standard records anyway? Plenty of other stuff out there and it's only the older generation that have this god given belief that their favourite records are the only good northern records.

Man if I had a dollar for every odd record I'd bought, I'd be quite wealthy.....anyone know if there is any real demand for a boot? As far as I know it's been a low level collectors record for many years and never been rare or anything.

Despite an informed response here, it's not good to see the "great and the good" still chanting "Boot" from the rooftops......

As a general rule of thumb most majors would have pressed up the issue stock at the same time as the demos. The overly optimistic idea was that all records would get played and released to the public.....it was only when they failed to take off that the issues were binned / left on the shelf. Remember record production was very cheap in the 60s and early 70s....the notion of an RCA or a Columbia pressing up demos and then going back a month later and ordering the issues from their pressing plants doesn't make sense. They'd have to reset the plates run off test / quality control copies all over again etc. When John talks about records being promoted in one area only this is also true, Scepter was a classic for that, especially in the rock field and New Jersey.

Yep mine is yellow too but that silver font style at least looks legit......why would anyone boot it? Not aware of it being particularly in demand on any scene.

Bootleg means something very different to a civilian…...

That was the last bit of info I had. In fact it was posted on here. Release date will be determined in part by what else the distributor has planned...but I distinctly remember reading April. If that's changed, more's the pity!

last I heard was they were hoping for April......you won't be disappointed!

Another over simplification from me…….? Rare soul scene - Built on an OVO policy Everything else - who cares……. Move along?

Can we keep this on licensed reissues / unlicensed reissues, not another OVO debate and all it's nuances…..purleez!!! It'll be 10 pages long by teatime…. So who does the unlicensed ones / boots? Who sells 'em? Or are they Tony Soprano types who you can only speak of generally without actually naming? without getting anyone into trouble?

Clear line for me between properly licensed reissues which I have no problem with, and just some pirate scuzzo pressing up records without the rights. They're the guys who should be "named and shamed".

Nah Mike, AMs liked mono. That's why you can trace the rise in FM stations and kind of link it to the double A sided demo.

In the US it varied and there are no hard and fast rules. With the larger companies demos were really for radio stations AM (mono) FM (stereo). When FM became popular, that's when you saw mono / stereo demos coming into vogue - AM stations would play the mono side, FM stations the stereo side. Apart from companies selling demos as a tax scam (O'Keh for example), generally you could assume that the demos were given out to DJs to play on radio. If there was negative or no reaction, sometimes the issue would be pulled from the release schedule, but more often than not with the larger labels the issues had already been pressed ready for the shops. This was because the record companies wanted to be ready to get the record out if it was starting to take off and not worry about scheduling another time with the pressing company. If they pulled the release they'd just skip the issue copies in the bin. Anyway that's why some issues are v rare while demos are plentiful. Sometimes they only went for a regional market, i.e. demo'd the record around a certain area and then only went national if they got a favourable reaction. That's where the "Regional breakouts" came from, Billboard etc would run lists of records that were getting played in different geographical areas. A record could be a "breakout" on radio in Baltimore, but be doing nothing in New York for example. As for timelines between demo and issue that really depended on the reaction, if something started to take off fast, then the issues would be out and in the distributors hands very quickly - within a week sometimes. Othertimes not could take up to two months before the issues got out. When you look at smaller labels where there wasn't the budget or standardised process, that isn't necessarily so, sometimes just demos or just issues were made. There is no hard and fast rule.

You must be lucky then Simon….there are a lot of people out there who claim they never received the record, or it was damaged etc.

It was def. before the Grapevine release. 100%.

Madera-White productions both aren't they…..

Very true. I'll ask john about it next time I see / speak to him.

Soul was more of a soul / black label i'd say after Gordy bought the name from carmen Murphy ooh 64 I think…..rare Earth was a white label for pop / rock…..VIP for lesser known acts….Other than that just a case of having several labels to get round suspicion of payola….DJs wouldn't play too many records on a single label in the 60s because the Feds would come and investigate whether they were being paid by the record company…..So to get more product played companies had more than one label….sorry a bit rushed but hopefully you'll get the drift.

The Grapevine release did not come out until August 1977. Grapevine didn't exist in 1976, that's probably the date the song was licensed.

Certainly played at Wigan some time before the Grapevine issue……but why would it be "pressed" anyway if on Grapevine? Doesn't make sense….

Yes blue eyes but by the 60's he had become part of the Philly white soul gang along with John Madara, Darrell Hall, John Oates etc etc….top guy.

Seriously is someone playing a version SAYING it's Millie Jackson.....As Mike says someone give em a slap.....

Fantastic piece of work Mark.