Hi. Just sorting through a box of old bits+bobs, and i came across a note from Mick Smith, which states Gene Chandler-Bet You Never Thought-Constellation, enclosed, enjoy. Thinking back, i realised this was the first original label soul 45 i actually bought! I used to go record fairs in London in the late 80s, and first met Mick at one. I remember he also encouraged me to go to my first nighter at the 100 Club, so a double thankyou to Mr Smith! Anyway, back on topic, it would be interesting to hear what others first original label buys were? Cheers, Carl.

Bunny Sigler "Let the good times Roll"  Cameo Parkway, Doncaster market, 15 shilling

Get it on - t Rex  @ cowgills clitheroe 

Whatever any of you call "the first Soul record" would be the first Soul record I bought.

Time - Edwin Starr

I was buying soul records before i became aware of northern soul but i think the first one i got with some awareness would have been Barbara Mercer 'Hey!' on Golden World. Bought from Tudor House in Chester (alsogot a copy of 'Welcome to Dreamsville' on Stateside in there for a couple of quid around that time! Long gone now alas!)

First record I remember buying at an allnighter was Gil Scott Heron 'The Bottle (live version)' on US Arista 7. I looked through all these boxes and was kind of relieved to finally see something that I knew..Was disappointed that it was the live version when I got it home and it went at some point...but now realise it's a great veraion and seems to be quite an obscure release!

Edited February 5, 201510 yr by son of stan

Jay & the Techniques - Baby make your own sweet music" on UK Mercury, I guess about 1968 ?

Heard it through the Grapevine Marvin Gaye version

from Rock on Records in Camden Town 1979.

They said if you like that u might like these

and that was that 

 

Al H

A killer-diller Barry White production which I bought with my pocket money @ 12 years old in 1967. Still stands up today and I like it every bit as much as when I bought it. And long before the term 'Northern Soul' was coined.....here's a GREAT clip of her singing it on 'Beat Club' for German TV....

 

 

Ian D 

I think a lot of us I suspect bought motown records as good pop records as much as they were great soul records

I think from memory the first northern soul record I bought was much later than most around 1982 I bought dobie gray out on the floor on red charger records at a Morecambe pier all nighter I was working at in the bar in the main room

Great nights happy memories and records like this spencer davis keep on running len barry 123 were still getting plays and sounded great in such a large venue

My record buying started off with all the usual pressings and disco demands from Syd Booths in Mansfield around 74/5 but my first proper original was The Parliaments - Don't Be Sore At Me…………….. although for the life of me i can't remember where / who i bought it from………..

Brooks and Jerry "I Got What It Takes,part 1and2 and 3 if we got time" 6 shillings and 8pence from Nems Records in Whitechapel,Liverpool, Yes Brian Epstiens shop. he boasted he had or could get any vynil your hearts disired.he had every motown lp on the shelf [inow collect said LPs and remember rejecting all the Lavishly titled 16 Big Hits etc, as none of them wher remotely Chartbusters in my parochial world, First record /artist /group, I ever loved lists usually encourage  giant white lies,so beig painfully honest the first record purchased was "Speedy Gonzales by pat Boone!

Yep bought mine from Syd Booths as well - all pressings and reissues.

First 'proper' one for me was Marsha Brody - Right Combination on Hot shot - rubbish!

Cairos - One gold piece

Eddie Parker - Im Gone

Auther Willis - The hurting is over

 

Then I woke up

 

Epitome of sound  Palis alldayer 1976  £4.00

First proper soul records I acquired, if my memory serves me correctly, were:

 

Junior Walker & The All Stars - Road Runner (UK Tamla demo with Shotgun on the other side)

 

Billy Preston - Billy's Bag (UK President)

 

Wore the f***ers out!

Archie Bell Here I go again around 72. Loved it and still do, just bought a 1969 WDJ copy.

On Doncaster market in the sixties there was a record stall that sold ex juke box singles (somewhere where the outdoor toilets are now) and he must have bought a job lot of old blue stax uk issues  1 shilling and sixpence each or four for 5 bob i bought these at the same time:

 

Eddie Floyd Big Bird

Booker T   Chinese Checkers

Carla Thomas Pick up the pieces

Linda Lyndell Bring your love back to me

 

bought them all blind because i knew of Booker T and Eddie Floyd   turned out not to be too bad a choice,still have them all

Edited February 5, 201510 yr by smudger

I got into proper soul music quite late on in life compared to many on here - at school aged 16 (circa 1973) I had a brief flirtation with a Nazareth album (‘Razamanaz’) about the same time as me saying to a friend “why do I wanna watch lions and elephants juggling balls and stuff” when dismissing completely ‘Monty Pythons Flying Circus’ which was massive on TV at the time. When I did watch it I was too young to understand it.

 

Soon I’d started to listen and enjoy the various sweet pop soul releases by The Stylistics which were all over the radio at the time. My disco feet were starting to twitch.

 

I recall going to the pub one dinnertime with people from work possibly 1974 ish to celebrate somebody’s birthday or whatever and a girl kept putting this song on the jukebox. I even asked her what it was and the seed was planted.

Still sounds exceptionally cool today.

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=onTzLFJ14tA

 

By the time I was late 17 I’d started to drink in town with all the big boys and frequent all those places you were advised not to drink in. One of them was The Ring Bar a mainly black bar underneath a hotel at the top end of town. It was 1975 and I was 18 and this burnt a hole straight through my mind. One Christmas there was the first time I got threatened with a knife for spilling a drink. The bar later got fire bombed by some rough types from Shipley so I’m told.

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O78bo0uxf_Y

Remember starting work in 1970 in Goole and a lad started the same day and we were to become firm friends to this day. When I got my first wage packet he told me that an older lad was selling a great record which I should buy. It was an LP Darling Baby by the Elgins and I was hooked

I was buying vinyl from about 13/14 , mainly the jam and some Oi stuff but first soul record I ever bought was larry Houston - let's spend sometime together , July 1981, then it was Cheryl berdell - giving it all to you, I think I bought lady in red by ronnie dyson next but on that soul beat Boot with sister sledge on the flip..

JD Bryant - I won't be coming back, re-issue shrine for a tenner thinking it was original, until I checked with my father-in-law who knew the score. His reply was "why isn't anybody else bidding on it?"

Shows how much I knew then lol....

Edited February 5, 201510 yr by Soul Stew

One Christmas there was the first time I got threatened with a knife for spilling a drink.

 

 

 

The 'first time'?

How many other times were there Derek?

 

Sean

The 'first time'?

How many other times were there Derek?

 

Sean

Every weekend, Rum lad ar Derek

Jay and the techniques apples peaches pumpkin pie nottts palli I think early 70s

Tony Clarke - Landslide / white label thing from Reddingtons in Birmingham, when they were in the underpass by Moore st Station...

 

didn't keep it long as my mate Pogo wanted it, so back I went to get something else...dont remember that record, but Jelly beans blk label boot, and Lou Johnson Burgundy label boot came pretty fast after that... would be 81/2, the year I started secondary school..

 

mal.C

Edited February 5, 201510 yr by Mal C

Edwin Starr - Agent Double O Soul - Tamla Motown 

 

Frankie Valli -The Night - Tamla Motown . 

 

Bought both for a quid each on the same day when I was 16 and life would never be the same again , the intro's just sent shivers down my spine and I knew I'd discovered a type of music that was unlike anything I'd ever heard before . 

if i were a carpenter / the four tops , doncaster market , remember that stall well 

Can't remember which was first but it was one of the following

Darrell Banks - Open the Door - UK Stateside

Temptations- Ain't too Proud to Beg

Junior Walker- How Sweet it is

I had a brief flirtation with a Nazareth album (‘Razamanaz’)

Come on Derek, I bet you still like the title track - what a riff!!!! !  (don't tell anybody though!)

Did you have it on Mooncrest?

I think one of my first Soul records was Donnie Elbert - Little Piece of Leather and the Artistics - Hope We Have , well that was the side I played in the Art classes , didn't do any painting 

Bunny Sigler "Let the good times Roll"  Cameo Parkway, Doncaster market, 15 shilling

Donny was my first record buying place also.As a 14 year old in 1979 i trawled through Bradleys,Foxes,Angies,and the market to spend my pocket money.One of the first i bought was The Champion on uk London a big record at my local youthy

Alfie Khan. Law of the land, US Atlantic at Cleethorpes Winter Gardens All day er 1976

First time I spent more than the current price for a new single - 1968, 10/- for Edwin Starr "Headline news" from a local DJ in Bridgnorth. I suspect he knew it was about to be reissued in a couple of weeks, but it opened the floodgates for me. And I still have that copy

As a kid it was Big girls dont cry by the Four Seasons which my mum bought for me. Which I still have on Indian Stateside as we lived in Singapore. My first record with my own money was" Behind a painted smile"

Kev

The 1st Soul single I bought was Marvin Gaye's "Ain't That Peculiar" as an almost new release.

It was a cut out in a plastic bag-" 39 cents or 3 for $1.00".

  Don't have the copy but that song is still one of all time favorites.

Edited February 5, 201510 yr by the yank

first record i bought was war by edwin starr , very soon got fed up of it and flipped it over WOW !, still one of my favourite records

 

First for me, in 1968: Isley Bothers - This Old Heart of Mine, Edwin Starr - Stop Her On Sight, and Jackie Wilson - Higher And Higher.  

 

First "import" a couple of years later: Mamie Galore - It Ain't Necessary.

if i were a carpenter / the four tops , doncaster market , remember that stall well 

 

Ooh yeah Gogger, next to knickers&bra stall, i remember

My next door but one neighbour  had a Haberdashery stall opposite

Edited February 6, 201510 yr by Labeat

Mel & Tim "Backfield in motion" - still have it

Hey girl don't bother me and let your yeah be yeah in 1971/2... 

Begining of the end "funky nassau" 72/73 ish,still a class record!!!

Mel & Tim "Backfield in motion" - still have it

Ditto

I recall going to the pub one dinnertime with people from work possibly 1974 ish to celebrate somebody’s birthday or whatever and a girl kept putting this song on the jukebox. I even asked her what it was and the seed was planted.

Still sounds exceptionally cool today.

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=onTzLFJ14tA

 

A revolutionary record. Recorded on an organ for only $10 so legend has it. I was working at John Laing Men's clothes in Bradford when I heard this on the Dave Symonds Soul show late on a Saturday afternoon in 1972. "Why Can't We Live Together" was a major influence and is quite simply one of the coolest records ever pressed to plastic. It's incredible when a piece of music can take you right back to the exact time you heard it first isn't it?

 

Ian D   

my first record buys werent soul they were trex solid gold easy action and elton john crocodile rock.About the same time i aquired my uncles record collection when he got married and moved out of my nans.Full of motown spencer davis etc,then started buying motown lps motown chart hits run etc.

Edited February 5, 201510 yr by Soultown andy

As a teenager and not a soul fan   I was dragged to a northern soul night by a mate and that was it I was hooked  . The next day I went out and bought my first soul record Where is the love by Betty Wright

Temps - ain't too proud to beg and

Isley's - take some time out....73 from Ma Dobbs I think (big sister took me in her Mk 1 mini)

First Northern Mitch Ryder- Breakout....from the Golden Disc in Oldham.

Remember rushing out and buying Timmy Thomas when it came out with O'jays - love train

Temptations - Just my imagination..........new release at the time........fantastic 

1969 first record I ever bought Tears of a Clown Smokey Robinson and the Miracles Tamla Motown from Elys in Castleford when I was 11. Can't remember the price.

 

Fast forward to 1975 just got into Northern Soul and went to Jumbo Records in Leeds and I think the first import single I purchased was on Red Coach -Universal Mind -Something Fishy a Going On from the bargain box on the counter. 

 

Same year remember going downstairs in Virgin Records in Leeds where they sold soul imports and a lot of Northern and coming out with a 'big tune' at the time George Benson Supership on CTI.

Dorothy Moore misty blue possibly my first soul purchase or candi staton young hearts run free.

Probably Joe Simon "Step by Step",Jackie wilson "Sweetest",dished that by carrying a hot family sized pork pie from the butchers on it.!! Had a Jamo Thomas "i Spy" on polydor - dont know where that came from.

Oh and "Automatically sunshine" - Supremes.......

Edited February 6, 201510 yr by KevH

First soul records (3) on the same day  James Bounty- Prove Yourself....  The Furys Iam Satisfied With You - Keyman   and Edwin Star- S O S /Headline News