Who Discovered What ?

[Sheldonsoul]

On 26/12/2009 at 14:42, Ian Dewhirst said:

 

 

Huh, typical that after all this time I never realised you were from Bradford originally Dave. Now that I think about it, it probably makes sense as Bradford was always prime vinyl-sniffing territory with a generation of vinyl hounds and a high percentage of sinus-deblocking discoveries LOL....

 

You're absolutely right about Bostocks stock leaching into everywhere around Yorkshire. You could find it in local market stalls, local junk shops and basically almost anywhere that did 2nd hand records. Often, a second-hand record shop would spring up in the weirdest of places - Cleckheaton, Bartley, Morley, Armley, Halifax, Huddersfield etc, etc and a large proportion of their stock would obviously be from Bostocks. We didn't always realise the connection at the time because frankly, West Yorkshire was packed to the gills with U.S. cut-out 45's. For a start, Bostocks had stalls in Bradford, Leeds, Wakefield and Huddersfield Markets and Paul or his Mum would sometimes be depping at those stalls. They got sick of seeing me everywhere - sometimes I'd hit all 4 Bostocks stalls in the same day. An Alice Clark or two, a couple of Tymes, couple of Shalimars @ Leeds, some oddball looking 45's from Bradford like Ronnie & Robyn on Sidra or Lenny Curtis on End, some Dottie Cambridges, Righteous Brothers Band, Ambers and Triumphs from Huddersfield and finish off in Wakefield with a Howard Guyton, Spiral Staircase, a Webs and a couple of Billy Woods to round off the day. Not bad considering that all of these were within 30 minutes of where I lived. It was like Christmas every week but we never realised it at the time......

 

......and you'd often go to a visiting funfair and see the Bostocks stock as prizes. I won a Don Gardner "I Can't Help Myself" and Mongo Santamaria's "The Now Generation" by honing my dart-throwing skills!

 

I don't recall any of us locals managing to get into the legendary Bostocks warehouse at the time pre '76 although I think Julian Bentley may have had access for some reason (can you confirm Julian?). I didn't get into it until well after John Anderson had re-plundered it maybe around '77 or thereabouts (or so the story went). By this point they'd probably got rid of most of their early stock from House Of Sounds 'cos there was a lot of relatively new 70's releases by the time I got there but I did snag just about everything on Buddah that was any good at the time - Charisma Band, Tony Owens, Mel Williams etc, etc so not a total bust.......

 

......around the same time a couple of us had a decent hit at some place in Telford (can't remember the name unfortunately). I think Colin Curtis and Keith Minshull had been there as well. This was where I left a 100 count box of Lew Kirton "Heaven In The Afternoon" because frankly I couldn't stand it (and stil can't) but also every other shop you went in seemed to have the 12" in!

 

I actually think that some credit has to go to people like the Bostocks, Global, Robinsons, Soul Bowl etc, etc who actually brought in such huge loads of U.S. 45's in the early 70's that they unknowingly stoked the Northern Soul fire at exactly the correct time. It was an embarassment of riches when you think about it. Simply staggering the amount of stuff which came from these sources and others between 1970-80. They probably account for a good 30-40% of the key discoveries in the early 70's and certainly made our lives easier finding 'em.

 

Just to put things in perspective, even the Leeds branch of Virgin had a box of U.S. 45's in! That's where the 2nd or 3rd copy of Candi Staton "Now You've Got The Upper Hand" came from for 10p!

 

Happy thoughts.

 

Merry Christmas All!

 

Ian D

The place in Telford was it oldies unlimited?

[Roburt]

5 hours ago, Sheldonsoul said:

The place in Telford was it oldies unlimited?

Yes it was OLDIES UNLIMITED. The thing to do was to get the owner to lock you in the Old Chapel for the day, so that you could go thru all the remains of their old 45 stock. It was a pity when the place shut up shop.

[Sheldonsoul]

20 hours ago, Roburt said:

Yes it was OLDIES UNLIMITED. The thing to do was to get the owner to lock you in the Old Chapel for the day, so that you could go thru all the remains of their old 45 stock. It was a pity when the place shut up shop.

Was the much stuff found there

[Roburt]

10 hours ago, Sheldonsoul said:

Was the much stuff found there

There was but you had to be lucky enough to visit at the right time & get access to the 'back stock'.

We've had tales on here of Shrine 45's being found there (I was never THAT lucky). But the Oldies team (working in the ex working mans club building) would be seated at tables with boxes of import 45's strewn about in front of them. They'd pick 1 single from each box till they had say 10 or 100 soul 45's & make that up into a package to sell. When there was just oddments from each box left in the middle, those would all be pushed into a big pile & taken away. New boxes would replace those remnants & the whole process would start over. Those 'remnants' would then be dumped in the old chapel for future use. The thing was, new stuff (all nicely boxed up in 10 / 20 single packs) would arrive weekly, so they very rarely got around to sorting out the old remnants. When we'd get into the chapel (a lock-in session) we'd just wade thru the huge piles & find allsorts that Oldies had received up to a few years earlier. Lots of TK label stuff was the more modern but as you found the older piles there'd be Detroit / Chicago / LA label items. Most Motown 45's would be picked out by the Oldies team as soon as they received them (to sell as individual priced 45's) but you could find obscure artist Motown label stuff dumped in the chapel piles.  It was very much 'hit or miss' though.

ANOTHER decent place to get well priced stuff from (in the early 70's), was B&S / Contempo. Being from Yorkshire, I never actually got to their Hanway St shop but always ordered stuff via B&S ads or from the Contempo club record catalogues ...   . 

Edited November 15, 2023 by Roburt

[Roburt]

If I'd known about Way Out stuff (from Cleveland) back in 1971, I'd have bought a copy of this un ... it seems that it's not a 45 that's around in quantity ... it's by James McCants & his family

Edited November 15, 2023 by Roburt

[Roburt]

Back in the late 60's, I followed what was released by the likes of Motown, Stax, Amy /Mala /Bell & many other labels in the hope of discovering a new fave track. I also (as stated above) would bid low on unknown stuff on those labels and a good few others (ABC, Audio Arts, Original Sound, etc). I'd bid on unknown tracks by groups I'd got 45 by or had heard on other songs that I already liked.

JUST WISH I'd also looked who was writing / producing songs on a more regular basis too. Anything with Alan Toussaint's name associated with it was always worth bidding on IMO in the 60's. Wish I'd done the same with the likes of Sandy Linzer, who I knew from stuff like "What's Wrong With Me Baby", "Pushin A Good Thing Too Far" and more. If I'd followed what she was up to more closely back then, I might have been aware that she ran the Oliver label. 

I few years later, after I'd cottoned on, I did buy Soupy Sales HMV 45 "The Mouse" but she's done a lot better than that.

Edited November 17, 2023 by Roburt

[Ssmall]

Regarding F L Moore's in Leighton Buzzard. I remember them clearing out all their old stock around 82/83. I wasn't very knowledgeable back then so have no idea what I missed out on!!! I think Gav Page got more from them as he had a proper job back then, I was only on a YTS scheme. I do remember the bloke who owned it had a really bad wig.

[Peter99]

On 08/12/2009 at 08:13, Guest jkw said:

Steve 'Brad' Bradley and Barrie Waddington are my choices.. ..

Really old thread this. But does anyone whose still on the site know if Steve Bradley, named here was the Steve from Boston (0riginally)

Thanks.

Peter

Edited April 15 by Peter99
error

[Djack]

Anyone remember the soul import shop in Lincoln  near the cathedral . I went there a few times  early 1983 when i was based at RAF Swinderby.

[Torch56]

I do recall the Contempo catalogue and some of the first records I bought were a a result of perusing its pages.

In late '71 I sent off for Please Let Me In and The way You Been Acing Lately, both listed for 70p, but was told they'd gone. I did manage to get Check Yourself (Intruders) and Oh, I've Been Blessed. ( 35p each)

Flaming Embers' vocal version of Let's Have a Love In, and Shades Down (Detroit Emeralds) also were cheap and available. In fact, I don't recall anything being more than 75p. There were hundreds of records listed, all mint, unplayed, copies but my knowledge was limited as was my budget, and so a potential Aladdin's cave remained largely undisturbed, at least by me.

I was told that Alan S, who worked for British Rail in the early 70s, took advantage of his free travel pass to frequent the Hanway Street shop on a regular basis and picked up some of his big ticket items from there.

[Quinvy]

22 hours ago, Peter99 said:

Really old thread this. But does anyone whose still on the site know if Steve Bradley, named here was the Steve from Boston (0riginally)

Thanks.

Peter

No it isn’t. Brad is from Colne Lancashire.