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the tamla motown uk releases have TMG serial numbers

does this mean tamla motown group or something else?

would these be original uk issues or reissues?

cheers

mick

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  • bobkayli
    bobkayli

    Just to add that the three letter reference for 45s and four letter reference for LPs beginning with TM tended to be used where EMI distributed. They seem to me to represent countries or regions where

  • bobkayli
    bobkayli

    Also to add that EMI were incredibly methodical in their approach to numbering their output as Beatles collectors would testify with EMIs system of matrix numbers and stamper and master references in

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the tamla motown uk releases have TMG serial numbers

does this mean tamla motown group or something else?

would these be original uk issues or reissues?

cheers

mick

According to Barrie Waddington all TMG's unless unreleased in the states as some were are reissues by definition although most people take them as original British-many of the early Motown releases in this country were on United Artists/Oriole/Fontana The TMG's started around the mid 60's some were re-released later you'd have to check most mid 60's originals have TMG 500 onwards.

If you want any indepth information pm Dave Moore (Hitsville soul club) on here as he used to have the entire lot. Also there's a good discogrophy in the Sharon Davis Motown -The History book if you can get your hands on one. Hope this helps.

Kev

According to Barrie Waddington all TMG's unless unreleased in the states as some were are reissues by definition although most people take them as original British-many of the early Motown releases in this country were on United Artists/Oriole/Fontana The TMG's started around the mid 60's some were re-released later you'd have to check most mid 60's originals have TMG 500 onwards.

If you want any indepth information pm Dave Moore (Hitsville soul club) on here as he used to have the entire lot. Also there's a good discogrophy in the Sharon Davis Motown -The History book if you can get your hands on one. Hope this helps.

Kev

A couple of things that are a little off the mark.

There are no UK United Artists 45s that were Motown Recordings. USA Motown recording released on USA United Artists were issued in England on UK London.

There is no TMG 500.. series started @TMG501. march 1965

There has alwas been a little specualtion as to what TMG stands for

1) Tamla Motown Great Britain has been suggested.

2) Tamla Motown Group is another speculation..

3) All EPs have TME prefix obviously denotes EP

The G I've never got a definitive answer to I'm sure someone on hear will have had EMI connections and give the right answer.

A couple of things that are a little off the mark.

There are no UK United Artists 45s that were Motown Recordings. USA Motown recording released on USA United Artists were issued in England on UK London.

There is no TMG 500.. series started @TMG501. march 1965

There has alwas been a little specualtion as to what TMG stands for

1) Tamla Motown Great Britain has been suggested.

2) Tamla Motown Group is another speculation..

3) All EPs have TME prefix obviously denotes EP

The G I've never got a definitive answer to I'm sure someone on hear will have had EMI connections and give the right answer.

Quite right John thanks for putting us straight.

Kev

I assumed "T"amla "M"otown "G"ordy?

Could have been TMGVMR then Tony eh?

T amla M otown G ordy V ip M iracle R are earth bloody 'ell lets take over the planet. :thumbsup:

Kev

I assumed "T"amla "M"otown "G"ordy?

Yep, correctomundo Tony. The TM stood for Tamla and Motown, the G for Gordy and the L for Latino according to Sharon Davis's book. Which begs the question: what Latino?

Ian D :thumbsup:

Yep, correctomundo Tony. The TM stood for Tamla and Motown, the G for Gordy and the L for Latino according to Sharon Davis's book. Which begs the question: what Latino?

Ian D :thumbsup:

Frank

Prefixs -

TML = Tamla Motown mono LP

STML = Tamla Motown stereo LP

Latino?

Frank

Prefixs -

TML = Tamla Motown mono LP

STML = Tamla Motown stereo LP

Latino?

LOL, I know John. I'm quoting verbatim from Sharon's book here but as you rightly point out, the explanation's b*llocks isn't it? I think your explanation is the one which makes most sense here......

Ian D :thumbsup:

I must confess, and agee with Tony, I've always been under the impression that the G stood for Gordy. Until 1964 Tamla, Motown and Gordy were the three MAJOR Motown subsidiary labels, it would make sense for this to be the explanation.

As for the rest John must be right regarding TME (Extended play) and TML (Long play). What would be interesting to discover from E.M.I. is the actual reasoning behind the numbering system beginning at 501.

It seemed quite significant at the time that the launch of Holland-Dozier-Holland's Invictus label in the U.K. in 1970 also started with 501, considering that TMG 501 was also an H-D-H production. As with the Motown 45's the Invictus numbers bear no relation to their U.S. releases.

As an aside the German Workers Party of which Hitler became a member in 1920 also began their numbering from 501 but that was because they wanted it to seem they had more members than was really the case.

Chris

I have copies for sale if anyone is interested.

post-7536-1228213454_thumb.jpg

An excellent reference book I may add

Lenny

What would be interesting to discover from E.M.I. is the actual reasoning behind the numbering system beginning at 501.

Chris

I wonder if the TMGs started from 501 to have a clear distinction from the numbers used for the motown releases on Stateside label, the last of which I think was Tony Martin - Talkin' to your picture #394.

Alan

I wonder if the TMGs started from 501 to have a clear distinction from the numbers used for the motown releases on Stateside label, the last of which I think was Tony Martin - Talkin' to your picture #394.

Alan

Stateside changed it's numbering system to the 2000 series in 1966 to avoid further clashing with Tamla.

Stateside changed it's numbering system to the 2000 series in 1966 to avoid further clashing with Tamla.
Perfectly plausible Tony but it was in fact in 1967 that the numbering system changed. What may well have been of concern was the confusion arising from the fact that both labels were arriving at number 600 at virtually the same moment in March of that year.
  • 7 years later...

Alan, TMG, does indeed stand for Tamla Motown Great Britain, as suggested by Terry Wilson{ his book of 2010."The Story Behind The UK singles""}. It also alleged that Dave Godin suggested the amalgamation of the UKname to  Gordon Frewin EMIs TMg supremo! 

I always thought TMG stood for Tamla Motown Gramaphone.

Edited by Guest

I have an Indian release of Love is Like an Itching in my Heart and the prefix and number is the same as the British release I.e.TMG 560. I assume therefore that the G doesn't stand for Great Britain but I have no idea what it does stand for.

My take on this has always been that these were the three main core labels:- Tamla been the first in '59, Motown in '60 and Gordy in '62. These core labels then either sucked up or created other minor labels like Golden World, Ric-Tic and VIP etc

Tamla Motown Records ( TMG ) started in '65,  so that would sort of make sense or it always has imo

 

Edited by NSG

Having said that, based on other countries entries - it could well mean G for Great Britain or simply TMG for the first idea for serialization for the first country outside the US...... as Canada tended to follow the US cat markings, then the system was adapted to cover other countries as the Motown sound spread worldwide ;

France was - TMEF initially

Germany was a mixture of M, TM, GO

Spain was M-xxxx

Italy was DE xxxx / TM xxxx

Australia was TMO-xxxx

East Africa was TMSK xxxx

Ireland was TMG(I) 

and so on.........., so could this relate to country of manufacturer perhaps in some way ???? 

Edited by NSG

On 8 March 2016 at 17:34, NSG said:

Having said that, based on other countries entries - it could well mean G for Great Britain or simply TMG for the first idea for serialization for the first country outside the US...... as Canada tended to follow the US cat markings, then the system was adapted to cover other countries as the Motown sound spread worldwide ;

France was - TMEF initially

Germany was a mixture of M, TM, GO

Spain was M-xxxx

Italy was DE xxxx / TM xxxx

Australia was TMO-xxxx

East Africa was TMSK xxxx

Ireland was TMG(I) 

and so on.........., so could this relate to country of manufacturer perhaps in some way ???? 

Just to add that the three letter reference for 45s and four letter reference for LPs beginning with TM tended to be used where EMI distributed. They seem to me to represent countries or regions where possible G for GB, F for France, O for Oz (maybe?), K for Krone (Swedish currency). India seems a strange mix of UK references and local. Does the E in ETM mean Eastern for example? I have copies of Pathe Marconi (an EMI subsidiary) references used in France for all their issues. They all follow a pattern so seem to be led by Pathe rather than an individual label such as Motown, Liberty and the others they distributed.

Some of the other examples quoted are different distributors. The italian references were used by Durium, the German by CBS although isn't GO Dutch rather than German (distributed by Artone)? The Spanish was RCA. EMI didn't distribute in these countries until much later. 

Seeing the different types of prefix suggests that the local distributor had more influence on this than Motown itself. Even in the UK, in the early days EMI wouldn't have let Motown lead the dance. Motown needed EMI more than the other way around to get themselves established. EMI were the establishment at the time as far as UK music was concerned.

I.r.o. german Tamla-Motown 45s:
The early orange CBS issues had the standard CBS numbers (4 digits), no prefix.
The green-silver 45s usually had TM prefix followed by the numbers of their US equivalent.
Black label 45s had 'C' as prefix. But that wasn't specifically for TMG releases. All EMI released had that prefix.

Also to add that EMI were incredibly methodical in their approach to numbering their output as Beatles collectors would testify with EMIs system of matrix numbers and stamper and master references in the run out groove being fundamental in dating and valuing their 60s Parlophone output. Outside UK EMI set up it's own referencing system in 1969 as it expanded further into European markets. Effectively there are 3 references in 1. A first number representing the country (1= Germany, 2= France and so on), a 2nd group of one letter and three numbers representing the format (C006 = 45s, C062 = LPs etc.) and a 5 digit reference number with the first two digits being the year (90= 1969, 91= 1970 etc.) and the last three being unique identifiers for the record itself. Presumably it was done to give precise information for their stocking and cataloging systems at the time but gives a lot of information to today's collector. The only downside is that the references are for all EMI product distributed in the region so there is no sequence to follow for a labels output by countrywhich would make it easier to follow for a label collector.

so for example 2C062.90298 is the Four Tops Now LP French edition from 1969, 1C006-90768 is Jr Walkers These Eyes 45 Germany in from 1969, 5C006-90741 is Marv Johnson Sleep little one from Holland in 1969.

just some of the minutiae I've picked up in years of European record collecting.....

 

 

I, m not convinced about the O in TMO relating to "Oz" ,surely slang reference which I can,t see a company like EMI using.O = Oceania ?

2 hours ago, Alan Bonthrone1 said:

 

I, m not convinced about the O in TMO relating to "Oz" ,surely slang reference which I can,t see a company like EMI using.O = Oceania ?

You're probably right Alan, it makes sense. 

To sddto the confusion;  Denmark-TMK,  West Indies - M, South Africa's -TMJ, TMS ,,Portugal's TMEL, Lebonan- TA , Jamaica- T,,!  Some great oddities above, any for sale, PM me,but how do you price them?

Seeing that TMG 45 from Pakistan, does anyone know if they pressed any Motown 78s in Pakistan or India? I know they continued to press 78s well into the 1960s, e.g. some Beatles tracks.

Edited by Benji

The TMG reference seems to have been used in the smaller markets that EMI distributed to from time to time and corresponds to the UK numbering. Maybe because the smaller markets weren't always structured to handle a release so it was managed from EMI.

See below Supremes picture sleeves distributed by Skandinavisk Grammophon in Sweden and Denmark using TMG rather TMK. I think K=Krone since Sweden and Denmark are Krone currency markets.

Same record, same distributor, different sleeves. Come See About Me was distributed in Denmark as Stateside KSS 1013. Here the K comes into play.

I'm uploading the sleeves separately to ensure they load as the files are quite large.

supremes denmark 516.tif

All the T/Mot 45's I've got from Barbados & Jamaica are via WIRL. Didn't EMI ever operate out in the Caribbean ?? 

  • 8 months later...

Further to all of the above, can somebody give me an explanation as to the stamping in the run out grooves involving 'G' on its own, or 'R' and 'G' side by side? In regard to all UK TMG releases, well certainly the first one hundred.

Edited by denbo

2 hours ago, denbo said:

Further to all of the above, can somebody give me an explanation as to the stamping in the run out grooves involving 'G' on its own, or 'R' and 'G' side by side? In regard to all UK TMG releases, well certainly the first one hundred.

 

I will have to check but I'm almost certain that each run at the pressing plant had

G

R

A

M

etc

following the letters in the word G R A M O P H O N E as part of this coding. ( edited, see next post )

 

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