Amsterdam Russ

Van Gogh's paintings are classic now, but were ignored at the time of their release, but no one in the world ever says 'stop - we don't want to learn any more.' And before anyone questions the comparison between Frank Wilson's tune and Van Gogh - the answer is public appeal. Fran Wilson's recording is now part of mainstream culture - and it has an intriguing and mysterious provenance. And worth that, people are prepared to pay excessive amounts - just as with Van Gogh's overlooked and obscure offerings. Just accept it - Frank Wilson's tune became iconic in the mainstream because it became perennial on the Northern scene. And when the Northern scene became mainstream, so the public embraced its most popular track - the one that came with its own ready made mythology. It's the stuff of legends - which is exactly why this track has legendary status. If you ever danced to it, you are part of, and partly responsible for, that legend.

I thought it was the other way around - about selling the house. After re-reading I reckoned it was records. Or was it both? So I played canny and offered up a reply that applied to each.

A Thursday afternoon visit to the seaside, in this case Zandvoort on the North Sea. A bit windy, a spattering of rain, but plenty of bright sunshine and blue skies when the clouds broke. Cobwebs were definitely blown. All told, not bad for late November, not bad at all.

I wouldn't sell if you're only going away for six months.

A cracker!

Not sure it's a 'top northern soul offering', although I think it fab, but I'll point you and any other interested parties in the direction of my YouTube channel and you can work it out for yourself. https://www.youtube.com/user/lomaruss45s/videos

If the previous owner recorded it, I doubt they'd have sat on it for close to 10 years. Anyway, to get a decent carver you need a high quality soundfile, not just a bog standard mp3. I sent the carver company a high quality file, and in terms of sound quality, the 'dodgy' carver sounds the same as mine. I can't prove anything, of course, but really do believe the file I sent is the source.

A word of warning about getting carvers done - if you're looking to get a disc cut of something unreleased you have on an acetate. Maybe half a dozen years or more, I sent a file to a company in the UK that cut carvers. The reason I did it was because the acetate - carrying a brilliant unreleased track from Chicago - was in a very poor state. Anyway, I got my disc and was happy with it. Fast forward to late last year and I spot on Soul Source an interesting track on someone's latest listing. It's 'my' unreleased track. Obviously, I'm thinking someone's found a second copy, but in giving the Mix a listen I hear the sound file is exactly the same as my acetate. The ticks and pops are in exactly the same place. <added for clarity> I should point out here that I in no way blame or point a finger at the Soul Source member who got the carver and used the track in their mix. Any blame must lie elsewhere.</added> Now, I did upload the track to YouTube some years back, so thought someone had downloaded it, but on checking I was instantly reminded I'd uploaded an edited version that only ran for about one and a half minutes. So where did the soundfile used in the Mix come from? I asked the poster and they told me they had it on a carver, but couldn't remember where it came from. I racked my brains - had I sent a full-length copy of the file to a mate who had then done the dirty and shared it elsewhere? The answer was a definite no. I couldn't understand it. Some months later, it came to me. The only time I had ever shared the file was when I uploaded it to the company cutting the carvers. That surely had to be it - the company is cutting carvers of interesting material for their own use and then sharing the tracks with mates – whether for profit or not, I do not know. Thing is, and this is a downer, I've used maybe three carver cutters over the last 10 years, and I don't remember which one cut that particular track for me! So, just be warned.

Separate, please. Stuffing AATS with posts of people’s Mixclouds, podcasts and radio shows would completely and detrimentally change the dynamic of that forum. People wouldn’t be able to see the wood for the trees.

I would have thought 50 miles to be about right for most UK members as generally there are so many events.

Over the last couple of weeks the side road outside where we live has been dug up and the sewage pipes below replaced. This afternoon the workmen relaid the road surface, which is made up of bricks. These were originally laid in a herringbone pattern with all bricks being the same colour. Now they're not - and the pedestrian crossing is, well, like something out of an abstract nightmare. Oops!!

That's really good, Mike. Very impressive. Unfortunately no events were listed within a 50 mile radius. I changed that to 200 miles and seemingly the closest ones to me here in NL are in Norwich and Mablethorpe. Seriously though, it's a great feature.

Quarter of a century ago...

Come on - own up - how many years ago?

The OP says "...what the track is at 19:00 minutes." So is it the track that's 19 minutes in or the track that plays when the time stamp hits 19 minutes?

This is what I get when clicking on the link:

Nine quid a year might just be value for money, but being such an infrequent uploader I wouldn't even pay that - especially considering how few listeners I get.

That's a pain, but it was going to happen one day. Doesn't really affect me. I've only uploaded a meagre 25 mixes in 10 years and it wouldn't be a loss to anyone - myself included - if that number was whittled down to 10. By the same token though, many years ago photo sharing site Flickr introduced restrictions for free user accounts. When that happened, hundreds if not 1000s of users, myself included, left to go elsewhere. Move forward some years and Flickr not only lifts those restrictions, but also increases the limits to way above what was offered in the first place. Unsurprisingly, I went back to Flickr. Perhaps - if there's an exodus of users, or if there's very little uptake of the subscription model - Mixcloud will rethink its approach to free users.

Nicely said, Mike. And a job well done, James.

As Woodbutcher mentioned, hovering your computer mouse over your name brings up member details. But... that doesn't work if you're using a tablet or phone. Anyway, doing the hovering thing says you joined nearly seven years ago...

Joined September 2007, so that’s 15 years for me.

An excellent read.

I’m loving the counterintuitive logic there. It shouldn’t have been auctioned, and it achieved too much at auction.

Last Friday, apparently. Here's an item on his passing from Detroit News: https://eu.detroitnews.com/story/entertainment/music/2022/10/23/motown-artist-songwriter-producer-robert-gordy-dies-at-91/69583993007/

He was a wholesaler and retailer - shipping hundreds of thousands of records from the USA to the UK. What didn't sell, he bundled into affordable 'soul packs'. Sure, he tipped off people about rarities or potentially great unknowns at that time, but bear in mind he was doing this for the whole of the 'soul' community, not just the 'Northern Soul' aspect of it. What DJs, collectors and dealers did with the stuff they got from him was entirely down to themselves. He did what he did without ego. So many threads on here - and elsewhere - have commented on how vinyl rarities of recent years came out of his cheap stock - "Wow, I got this in a Soul Bowl soul pack for 20p back in blah, blah, blah..." That's entirely down to musical tastes, not JA's foresight - otherwise he wouldn't have lumped them into soul packs in the first place. Businessman first - soul music fan second. Regardless - an absolute legend for his commitment to bringing that music to the UK (Seems no one is aware he often used to go out on Stateside trips with an equally respected record dealer from Belgium. Guess who'd get the 'popcorn' - the stuff that later became popular as the 100 Club/Stafford beat ballads).