Seano

Great story. What a find. Nice that it's written up.

Ordered mine at the weekend, came Tuesday and played about half, and just listened through to the others just now. Thankfully all play fine, no skips or warps, and all labels correct too. I was lucky with the first set too, but more worried this time as the issues were coming through by the time I ordered this one, sorry to hear about other people's problems though. Price was still full when I ordered. Set number 000523. If a set 3 is to come out, especially as Richard comments on the notes that he held some class tracks back for set 2, maybe the key selling point could be that they are totally unreleased tracks? Never came out on 7", never an album track, no EP, and even no legal CD release either? This set is great, good variety, and great to have on 45's, but it's also great to hear stuff of this quality that never saw the light of day in any form.

Didn't know she recorded 'Compared to What', nor that it was written by Gene McDaniels.

Have a great night! Yes absolutely agree they show some really good stuff, obviously not all Soul but I suspect a lot of what I don't watch or record is much appreciated by people into different music as well.

Just spotted that on BBC4 at 9pm tonight there's a documentary "Killing Me Softly: The Roberta Flack Story".

Such important music for our scene, sad loss. Didn't hear the children's voices on the clip Ady posted - is there a different link?

Many thanks Andy - added to Amazon Wish List!

Hope you've had a great day in the sun! Looks like an interesting book, like the "I Love Vinyl" logo connected with it. Any idea on how much it will sell for and how to get hold of it?

Berwick Street in London is promoting itself as the "Golden Mile of Vinyl" with Sister Ray, Reckless, Music and Video Exchange all in Berwick St itself, and Sounds of The Universe, Phonica and BM Soho all very close by too. Obviously not the only record stores in London, just a handy concentration of them. The record shops themselves, but also a vinyl fair, street food market and all pretty easy to get to in terms of central London. Runs from 12 - 7pm. Berwickstreetlondon.co.uk Enjoy the day wherever you go!

Only watched the first few minutes so far but it looks a well made film and I'll watch the rest later. Thanks for posting this.

Still got mine. Flip for 'Heart Break' - well worth a listen.

Exciters "Blowing up my Mind" - again, towards the end of the record; "It's almost like eating beans by the pound, then wrapping up in adhesive tape from the waist down".

Fair comments both, I stand corrected! Reading Robb's correction I still thought it an off the wall lyric, but with Rodd's additional explanation of what a 'rash' meant then it's not so weird after all! Will dig out a few other lyrics if I can remember the tracks, and fingers crossed they'll be accurate! best Sean

And one I picked up today at the Record Fair in town, Sisters Love, 'Mr Fix-It Man' - "It's like being married to the meat man, and him only bringing home the balls"!

Contours, 'First I Look at the Purse' - "She can be quivering with a rash, long as she got some cash"(right at the end of the track).

Recorded it and hoping to watch it later. Great that documentaries of this sort get made and aired.

Thanks for the tip; watched Cadillac Records last week on BBC4, but from the comments above I think this will be much better.

Thanks for posting that Ady. Bridget used to edit our local paper in Banbury and was always supportive of the local soul scene. Good review. Personally I'm really looking forwards to seeing the film.

The only record I've got by him came in a soul pack "I'm at the Crossroad" - cracking southern flavour crossover:

It was a good film.

This bit is a quote from Ian, sorry but don't know why it changed: Whichever way you look at it, it's a very interesting phenomenon. The Brits thing was simply the cream on the top of a perfectly executed campaign which has resulted in the biggest selling international single of 2014. The exciting thing to me, is that there's still clearly a huge international audience for up-tempo Northern Soul-like music. Amy Winehouse, Duffy and now Pharrell Williams have all demonstrated that millions of people love this sound. So clearly there's a huge and enthusiastic international audience out there and hopefully from this a new fan-base will emerge and keep the music going. I've been listening, collecting and releasing this music for the last 50 years and, right now, I feel that this is one of those points where Northern Soul will catch the zeitgeist and attract a lot of new young fresh disciples at the very point when the scene needs a new generation to adopt it. In many ways this has simply proved the continuing appeal of the scene - genuine young Northern Soul dancers in the climax of the Brits, Pharrell Williams giving respect to Northern Soul to an audience of millions and a world-class film about Northern Soul about to launch. Arguably, for the first time in 38 years, Northern Soul will be setting the media agenda again and I think that's a good thing for the future of the scene. Ian D I agree Ian. There can't be many of us who got into it via the direct hit of seriously rare full on Soul 45s that you had to travel to hear. My route was everyday Motown and a thin stream of slightly more obscure tracks that our local dancehall (The Winter Gardens) played. A handful of older people (they must have been at least 17!) were already into the sound and sometimes brought records along that the DJ, Bob Boot, would play. Slowly but surely I got drawn in along with a few others. I've been into it ever since, and through some brilliant people, adventurous DJs and general record collecting I've widened my tastes and get great pleasure from the music. It may not have been the same route for everyone, but I think it's a fairly normal one and if Levanna's YouTube videos are anything to go by, she and a lot of the young people getting into the scene are already well on the way with that journey. Sean

Got this in a soul pack years back. Both sides are good. Can't recall if it was in the '70s or '80s, might have been a Soul Bowl pack, they tended to be the most interesting.

Long thread and I can't remember who said something about young people using modern tools and social media but good point. Lev and the other dancers were all taking an amazing opportunity to be involved in an event like this. I didn't watch it 'cos I wasn't interested but I can still appreciate the buzz of just being there and even being on stage. i think Lev's YouTube clips are a creative bit of fun and if we can't enjoy the fact that a younger generation are getting into Northern then god help us. Sure we can all be snobby and try to assert how many years we've been into the music but there's not going to be anyone who just appeared on the scene fully formed out of nowhere. We all began somewhere, we all learnt on the way, and hopefully we can all keep learning. For an event like The Brits it's not surprising that the dancers were styled with a fairly uniform set of clothes, and that they were choreographed as well. Would have been nice to see Lev and the others free to dress as they choose but then the show wasn't aimed at us was it?

Mine came from the same loft and the same friend.

Really atmospheric listening to that tape, many thanks for posting it! Along with the dancing, I remember that the synchronised patterns of clapping stunned me when I began to visit. I did take a tape recorder up twice. The only one I've still got was the 2nd Oldies Anniversary on 3.2.78. It's a C120 so dodgy quality, but at some point I'll try and copy it to digital and post it. Sadly the other tape, which was a normal nighter, got stolen back in the early 80's when I lived in a flat in Deptford. I'd left it in the music centre (remember them?), along with a Millie Jackson 'House for Sale' on the record deck, and the sods took the whole thing. I managed to talk up the value of the single but the insurance firm steadfastly refused to see the tape as having any value at all. Same thing happened in the late 90's when my wallet was stolen at work and the two things I most regretted losing were my Wigan membership card and one for the 6Ts Rhythm and Soul Club. Got the value of the wallet and cash that was in it, but nothing at all for the memories.