Roburt

Some radio DJ picks back in August 1965 ........ the Contours were always a big live draw in Baltimore, so I guess it's no suprise that their latest 45 was being tipped in that city. Other cuts being tipped were from Edwin Starr, Barbara Mason, the Autographs, Roy C, the Olympics & Danny White.

The Jimmy Vick & the Victors 45 was played on radio station WALT out of Boston. The guys at Cherry Records were so proud of this fact that they gave the radio stn a namecheck in one of the ads they placed in Billboard magazine. ............. little did they know the following information .......... Walter DeVenne's first exposure over the radio airwaves came when he was just 12 years old on a makeshift radio station broadcasting from the cluttered basement of his parent's Medford (Boston) home. With his friends he initially ran his radio station from his bedroom, before moving the equipment to the basement. The lads would put together six hour long tapes to ensure something was on the air while they were in school. The little radio station was broadcasting over a four year period from when he was 12 up to 16. The call letters DeVenne choose for the station was WALT. Record promoters would send copies of records to WALT not realizing that a group of youths were operating the station. The lads were sent 100's of records and DeVenne would take many of the spare copies to the local record shops and sell them to make some extra pocket money. I wonder if they ever had more than a handful of listeners, I guess their signal only carried for a few hundred yards.

Job done then. CHEERS

Anyone here got a copy of Arctic #127 ??? Frank Lipsius is looking for WAV file copies of the Kenny Gamble cuts "Keep on Smilin" and "Chains of Love". I'm sure that he will show his appreciation to anyone who can help him out. If you can help, drop me a personal message & I'll pass along his contact details. ....... CHEERS JOHN

Sebastion, many thanx for posting those scans. I really like the 45's picture cover; very atmospheric.

The air fare from Sweden to the UK can't be that much Ady !!! Get him on to support Bettye Swann at Cleggy.

My son works for a Danish company & is always over there ...... ..... but the chances of him agreeing to go looking for a copy of this 45 whilst in Copenhagen are between zero & 0%. Wouldn't mind getting a look at the 45's picture cover ......... anyone know of a scan of it anywhere on the net ?

King George's Swedish recorded cover of Don Gardner's "My Baby Likes To Boogaloo" .......... ............ now this MUST be a rare 45 ................

I left a UK 45 by Jackie Opel in a 2nd hand place outside Barnsley about 20 years back coz it had no centre. The shop had multiple copies of 1000's of UK / US soul / reggae 45's and I was sure that on my next visit, I'd find one with a centre in. Went back a couple of weeks later & didn't find either one with a centre or the one I had 'stashed away' without a centre .... I was daft as, if you bought 20+ 45's off the shop owner, he'd let you have em for just pence each. Next time I went, some dealer like Manship had poled up and bought every record in the place. Still chasing a copy of that Jackie Opel 45 at a decent price today !!!!

Many soul / reggae artists if told that a 45 of theirs gets lots of club plays and is sought after by collectors equate those facts to it being a 'hit'. Mind you, most of the time I can't understand much that goes on within the UK soul / NS / MS scenes, so I don't suppose we can expect an American or Jamaican to understand what takes place here.

Trailer for a documentary about him ............

King George from 4 years back ..........

I always assumed that the US King George & the guy who used that name in Sweden / Denmark were two different guys ............ ............... but it seems not from his web site ............. https://home.swipnet.se/~w-24657/bio.htm

I had the King George on UK but made the mistake of telling Paul Temple about it many moons ago. After months of nagging, I gave up and sold it on to him. Did manage to get a US copy to replace it though. Is it "Drive On James" that folk want it for now, coz back in the day it was "I'm Gonna Be Somebody Someday" that he wanted it for.

Post for me ............ loads of fascinating facts at your fingertips.

By 1970, Jerry O had obviously side-lined his Boogaloo stuff and was pushing covers of "Tramp" & "There Was A Time" as the highlight songs in his live act ................

Mention here of more stuff Rhetta was performing with Tennyson, this time in 1967 .......

Another live show review from the end of 1965; this time its for Rhetta Hughes & Tennyson Stephen ........... Here's the type of stuff they were recording at the time ............ We know her better for her straight soul cuts but in the mid 60's, she was still on a jazz kick.

I have always loved watching soul singers perform live. Many times the experience has been greatly uplifting; Sam & Dave @ Sheffield City Hall 1967, Edwin Starr @ the Wheel & Ritz, Maxine Brown @ the Nite Owl (& Cleggy), Garnett Mimms @ the Mojo & London's Saville Theatre, Ike & Tina @ the Wheel, Maze @ Rock City, Notts, Oliver Cheatham @ a Kirkcaldy club, Sam Dees @ Morecambe & Dingwalls + Jazz Cafe London, Glen Jones @ Southport, Anita Baker @ Hammy Apollo, Isley Bros @ MGM Grand Vegas + numerous weekender acts. On other ocassions things haven't been as great; Roy C @ the Mojo, Erma Franklin @ Intercon Dony, etc. But some artists seem to see themselves as a 'different animal' in a live context to their recorded output. Marvin Gaye always saw himself as the black Frank Sinatra (luckily BG stopped him turning his live shows into a MOR fest), Nina Simone often refused to sing her hits as she was always in dispute with record companies, Other acts went with the flow; if Motown, Stax or funk was selling that particular year, they would style their acts to reflect that fact rather than doing all their own material. Back in the Twisted Wheel's 'glory years', just about every act that played the club would perform "Knock On Wood" even if the song was streets away in style to their own recorded output. A couple of show reviews posted up in old copies of Billboard mag show the type of thing I'm talking about .................. This one is from late 1965 and illustrates the material that Arthur Prysock was performing in the heyday of the 60's soul boom .............

The book's officially out this week & 2nd hand copies are already up for sale on Amazon. Anyone got a copy yet ?? .... as I'm sure she had plenty to say about the UK NS scene in there (and not too complimentary stuff either knowing her views on the matter). Would guess Levine doesn't come out of it too well either.

This US ad placed by EMI in 1965 gives a strong clue as to the 'worldwide' reach of the company .......... ... it states they sold their product in the UK + 45 other countries. Some of these are easy to ID (Australia, NZ, Caribbean Islands, India, Sth Africa, Singapore, Malaysia, etc) but I'd guess it would prove a hard task to come up with the complete list.

You're wrong there Bob. The idea came to me last Thursday & so on Friday I sent a letter to the Director General of the BBC asking him when I could get acess to the BBC's record library as I needed a few of the 45's he had in there.

Well I'd guess that the picture sleeve only came with SOME copies of the 45 ..... .... but I'd have to agree that whoever paid over $140 for this was off their rocker.

This song is one of the most beautiful Motown songs ever cut. Liz Lands had been signed to Motown for a moment around 1963, though she first attracted the attention of record companies as early as 1959. She was near the end of her recording career when she cut her version of this song (ignoring her much later Motorcity efforts), when she was acting as lead singer with Bohannon's band. Her voice was still fully intact and just as fine as ever back in 1980 and she really does the song justice ............ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KIZCaWFGoNA She had a distinctive voice ..... and in the 60's ..... she also had a distinctive hair style ........ ENJOY ....

Until the mid 60's & the Pirate radio stns, there was only the BBC (Light Programme, etc) in the UK. Of course, Brits listened to Radio Luxemburg & AFN Radio during those years. Many of the UK related Pirate Stn charts are up on the web (Radio Caroline; Radio London, etc).