Believe this may be a South African release? Any info. appreciated.

Yep, it's South African.

. . . . TMJ123 was Marvin & Kim's "IT TAKES TWO"

with TMJ162 being Marvin & Tammi's "AIN'T NOTHING LIKE THE REAL THING".

Sth Africa had releases on Tamla Motown from around 1966 till at least 1975.

Edited October 26, 20177 yr by Roburt

Cheers Roburt. 

Edited October 22, 20177 yr by Soulgalore

Have a look here chaps:

Dx

https://www.45cat.com/label/tamla-motown-za

Thanks Derek.  Also got a Martha Reeves & Vandellas, Honey Chile/Show Me The Way. Need to dig it out and check catalogue number.

Brilliant thanks Derek but could be costly for me!!  The best ain't no mountain is the Australian ep IMHO but looking at the various country labels it's great to compare them. The black TM label is the most common and boring but in the uk we did have both great eps and rnw and gnw demos to make up. Argentina is my favourite - great yellow design and some equally good pics. France probably had the most quality pics and universal recently reissued a great box set of Their eps  Brazil and Italian labels are also very attractive. 

A great reference point for us Detroit-Motown nutters. 

Paul T 

Martha Reeves & THe Vandellas - Honey Chile/Show Me The Way - TMJ 146

On 22/10/2017 at 17:10, Rictic66 said:

 Argentina is my favourite - great yellow design and some equally good pics. France probably had the most quality pics and universal recently reissued a great box set of their eps.

Paul T 

Hey up Paul - when I was younger I often casually wondered why so many European released soul 45s came with really attractive picture sleeves whilst we in the UK got palmed off with a basic paper company sleeve if we were lucky.

One day I dreamt up a very loose theory - broadly speaking there was an established market as such for soul/R&B 45s in the UK at the time via various youth subcultures so there was no need for the record companies to spend extra money dressing up their 45s with picture sleeves to make them more attractive, as they knew that (hopefull) the demand from the UK specialist record buying public meant they would buy the 45s anyway. And I guess a plain paper sleeve would help to keep the retail selling price down as well which would please most people I imagine?

Whereas broadly speaking the soul/R&B 45 market across Europe was so much smaller numbers wise so the record companies had to work so much harder to sell their specialist 45s - hence the addition of an attractive eye catching picture sleeve.

Bear in mind I don't collect British or European 45s per say so there's a good chance I'm probably talking complete ball bag.

What say you?

Dx

Hi Derek, I don't particularly collect British / European 45s either.  In my time I've had 45s from countries far and wide and in the main they've come with company sleeves.  The two TMJ 45s mentioned previously came with orange Tamla Motown sleeves (the quality of which makes me uncertain they're authentic!) Perhaps record companies saw potential in the European arena that they couldn't see in places like Australia, South Africa, Philippines, Argentina etc. etc.  Just an afterthought, but 45s I've had from Japan have come with picture sleeves??

I always struggled to understand the Tamla-Motown strategy in Portugal. Many record companies there, pressed their own records & printed their own sleeves ... but lots of T/Mot 45's sold there were just the UK single packaged in a locally printed picture sleeve .... I guess the picture sleeve (rather than the UK made label sleeve) was to tie in with the local practise of other companie's single releases.

This is a Taiwanese Motown LP from 1969/70. The sleeve is actually thin paper with a plastic inner and outer bag rather than being laminated, terribly printed as well.

How this ended up in a car boot in north wales I do not know!!?

I wand you back . . . . even sounds Chinese

1 hour ago, Soulgalore said:

I wand you back . . . . even sounds Chinese

By The Jackson Vol. 5!! 

18 hours ago, The Zodiac Club said:

How this ended up in a car boot in north wales I do not know!!?

Who knows? But I'm sure you're glad it did hahaha smile.

Dx