Roburt

Used to hang out with the Nottingham crowd in 67 @ the Mojo (Sheffield). Then, when we'd hitch down to Leicester (on our way to the Nite Owl), we'd call in a pub in Nottingham to see some of them en-route. In the 80's, we'd go to the MS nights at Rock City & to live shows there (Frankie Beverly & Maze). BUT BACK TO 63 .... this time in London ... the jazz guys were swopping over to R&B and many clubs there were doing the same. Alexis Korner started up a Blues / R&B club (The Blues Club) by hiring the Empire Rooms on Tottenham Ct Rd (just round the corner from Euston Stn & next to Warren St tube). There his band would play + he'd book other similar acts. One such act being the Graham Bond Quartet. Graham himself having just moved from jazz (with the The New Don Rendell Quintet) to R&B. Also with Graham in that jazz band had been Phil Kinorra aka Julien Covey. By the time Graham Bond had started his own R&B band, Julien Covey had also moved on and was playing drums in the Brian Auger Trio (along with Rick Laird who would later help to start the Mahavishnu Orchestra). At the time, the Brian Auger Trio were playing jazz gigs at Ronnie Scotts (see ad). They too would soon transition to R&B, with Auger adopting the Hammond B3 organ and working with Rod Stewart, Julie Driscoll, Long John Baldry & more. Over time Brian Auger would change musical styles a number of times. He'd started out in jazz, then R&B, soul before becoming one of the leaders in the musical movement to jazz/ rock fusion with his Oblivion Express (but even then he'd still cut tracks such as "Inner City Blues").

From the above (the ad sheet for the Dankworth, Ronnie Scotts & the Marquee) I noted that UK record shops were already importing US discs (mostly jazz I'd think back then) as early as April 1963. No doubt it was these stores that also got US blues and R&B records for British fans back then -- owning a US blues LP was a top status symbol back then. Another early status symbol was having a mohair suit ...

In 1963, it was jazz bands (of many different styles) that ruled the roost in UK clubs. Most clubs back then advertised themselves as being jazz clubs & many independent promoters put on jazz shows utilising local civic buildings (town hall) & local ballrooms. BUT a change was starting to occur. Big UK live jazz acts such as the Mike Cotton Jazzmen & Cyril Davies All-Stars were moving over to play R&B. This was being reflected in the fact that many jazz clubs started playing host to R&B nights. The Flamingo in London had started up it's allniter sessions with the likes of Georgie Fame, the Stones, Alexis Corner, Graham Bond & John Mayall all being regular acts for those sessions. The influence of US jazz, Blues and R&B acts was beginning to spread thru UK music circles (fashion store Cecil Gee advertising mohair suits as stage wear for musicians). Cyril Davies took on the likes of Sth African femme trio the Velvettes to perform with him (they recorded here). Lots of the scene then was based in London, but it had spread out right across the UK -- one club that was playing it's part was the Dancing Slipper, West Bridgeford, Nottingham (just down the road from the Brit). Here, an enterprising sound boffin had installed a good sound amplification / speaker system to ensure live acts sounded their best. His skills went further, as he'd also set up a decent recording system, linked into the venue's sound system. It appears he always asked permission first (which was given) but then he'd record each 'jazz' acts live performance (pop acts weren't recorded as they weren't deemed important). BUT, as I stated earlier, many jazz bands were including R&B numbers in their acts. The Mike Cotton Jazz Band (who would soon become the Mike Cotton Sound (with Lucas) were one act who played the Dancing Slipper in 1963. so it's likely their show was recorded. Times moved on, the jazz scene died, R&B clubs took their place and then changed into mod / soul clubs. Eventually the Dancing Slipper shut down & the venue was reused for other purposes. The sound guy from the venue eventually died, but his 'tapes' were saved by Lake Records of Workington. Some of the jazz recordings he made have escaped on CD since Lake took them on but I'm unsure if they've put out any of the shows where the act included some R&B numbers in their repertoire. Anyone out there, Familiar with the Nottingham venue or the record label know if this is the case ?

Very sad news. John would always visit out caravan @ the Cleggy weekender. Beer, music & a good crack were always the order of the day. Got to know both Barbara & John really well down the years. He'll be much missed.

AND OF COURSE ... Geno's biggest 'LIVE SHOW' song was the C.O.D.s "Michael" which Pye released as a 45 A side in 67.

If there was more demand for a particular Verve 45 than Bostocks had supply of ... Kegsy would resort to this method to make extra mula ...

A small indication of the pulling power of UK acts in the US in the mid 60's ... this booking agency was on the up & that was mainly coz it represented so many 'popular' UK acts (the UK acts getting 'top billing' above many local acts in their ad) ...

The letter was sent by Motown to the top US music mags & I copied it from an edition of RECORD WORLD as they published it.

Lots of acts that we loved (via their live performances or their records) were immigrants into the UK. They arrived here from different countries & in different ways .... The likes of Geno Washington, Sonny Childe (R B Greaves) & more were over here in the US military ... P P Arnold, Jimmy Thomas, Rosetta Hightower & more jumped ship from American acts touring here & stayed. Jimmy Ruffin, Edwin Starr, Sheila Ferguson, the guys in the Fantastics & Drifters + the gals in the Flirtations liked the UK better than the US and so settled here. Jimmy James, Jimmy Cliff, Errol Dixon & more had started his music career in the Caribbean & relocated here to develop it further. Sharon Tandy had a similar route to the UK. Starting her singing / recording career in South Africa, she relocated to the UK to take her career to a higher level. Later entrants to the UK music scene were the children of Caribbean or African immigrants who entered the UK music biz here when they grew up. Are there any decent books that document the path any of the above took to find success in the UK music biz ? I'm listening to the audiobook 'Musical Truth' by Jeffrey Boakye at present. I also seem to recall buying a book on this subject a few years back (but still haven't gotten around to reading it).

From the start of the R&R era right through to 1964, the US just about had things all their own way; pop music wise. It was US artists that dominated record sales right around the world. At the time, UK acts experienced very little commercial success in the US and so were no opposition to American pop / R&B acts. BUT after the Beatles broke thru in the States in December 63 & particularly after the group had been on the Ed Sullivan show, all things British became the new big thing there (music, fashion, cars, accent, films, etc.). This caused massive problems for the US immigration service, who pressurised by the US music biz to help US singers / musicians, banned lots of UK acts from visiting the US for promotional purposes or to play live gigs. Not liking this situation, the UK government responded by banning many US acts from entering the UK. With countries all around the world now booking more & more UK acts and 45's by British acts topping the charts everywhere, US officials could see they were onto a big loser. HOWEVER, before sense prevailed, some US music people stepped forward to back up the Brits (& so, give support to their acts who wanted to go to the UK to perform). In the end sense prevailed & a DEAL was arrived at. For each UK act allowed into the US, a US act had to be allowed to come to the UK. This agreement worked well for UK R&B / soul fans as most insipid US pop acts were now dead in the water here. The answer for US record companies, who had UK acts on their books via licensing agreements, was to team one of their soul acts with one of their UK pop acts and thus meet the terms of the US / UK working agreement. So many American soul acts came over here to play British mod / soul clubs while acts such as the Hollies, Searchers, Gerry & the Pacemakers, Dave Clark Five went the other way. I know it served their own ends, but it was nice to see that Motown was to the fore in trying to influence US government policy in 1965 ...

There are quite a number of 'covers' that I like. Not too many decent Beatle's songs covers on the soul side but I do like E,W&F's attempt + Syretta's effort too. For me, Jose Feliciano was at his best on covers -- his take on "Golden Lady" is just sublime. One song that never really did it for me was "Pony Time" -- that certainly inspired quite a few cover versions in very quick succession after Don Covay's group's original effort ...

A few bits (below) to help back up the fact that it was indeed the real VIBRATIONS that toured here back in the 60's ... they were renowned for their high energy stage moves, being great dancers ... one of the jpegs is a pic of them on stage @ the Dungeon in Nottingham. One fact that led lots of folk to believe that they weren't the real group was that 'fake group' supremo Roy Tempest ran lots of their UK tours. But these tours took place way before he started with his 'fake group' phase -- ahead of that he always brought over the genuine article. Their Dec 67 released 45 ("Talkin About Love") was a UK only effort (2 old tracks); specially released here on Columbia by EMI to tie in with the tour they were undertaking at the time.

Bought the Precisions as a new UK release back in late 1967 .... can't say I ever remember playing the B side.

I'll nominate .... O' Jays - Working On Your Case / Hold On Bobby Bland – Call On Me / That's The Way Love Is Edwin Starr – I Am The Man For You Baby / My Weakness Is You Bud Harper – Mr. Soul / Let Me Love You The Steinways – My Heart's Not In It Anymore / You've Been Leadin' Me On PLUS there's loads more that have a great dance side + a great deep side on the same single.

A bit more info on the Cutlass set-up ... Floyd Morris (from Chicago) had a 45 out on Cutlass, produced by Bunky Sheppard. Before this 45 he'd played on recordings with Johnny Pate's band and had 45's out working with the likes of Jack Daniels. Tom Tom Washington, etc.).

Anyone have the full info on this Nashville label; or at least ... on it's soul output (being from Nashville, it also put out C&W stuff). It was started up in late 71 or early 72 and by the end of 73 was gone (due to the prosecution of it's execs for bootlegging). Seems the guys who ran the company were Charles Shafer & Billy Carr. They started out with just the Cutlass Record label and then added the Hot Line label especially for their soul stuff. They obviously had a wide outlook as they were soon teamed with John Abbey / Trojan Records here in the UK, with lots of their tracks being released here on Action. The Martha Turner tracks were cut around April 71 in the Jack Clement Studios in Nashville, so her 45 has to be one of their 1st releases (though it states on the label 1972; Custom Recording Co, 16th Ave Nashville -- arranged by Billy Carr). The 73 piece on the labels says that Custom Recording was based in North Augusta, Sth Carolina. . . . . ALSO lots of their product seems to be 'bought-in tracks, rather than self produced. Anyone know how the Cutlass / Trojan tie up came about -- maybe via B&S and John Abbey ? If I remember right; I got some Cutlass / Hot Line 45's in a Contempo (B&S) soul pack around 73-ish.

Yes, Kegsy told me that his Bostock 45 sales @ the niters financed his buys of stuff (!) for a good while.

Kegsy has been in touch & has given me the full run down (just about the same as Rick stated above; but more detailed). I didn't realise Bostocks also had a multitude of 45's on Okeh, Wand, Ric Tic, ABC, Chess, Checker & loads of other labels too. Though I was getting Chess / Checker 45 stuff (& Stax / Volt / Motown) from B&S / Contempo back then (72-ish).

I've been pointed in the direction of this podcast ... COLIN CURTIS & TIM ASHIBENDE TRIBUTE TO KEITH MINSULL SHOW NORTHERN SOUL HISTORY HITMIX RADIO 107.5FM www.podomatic.com/podcasts/colincurtis/episodes/2023-01-23T03_56_29-08_00 I've given it a listen & it seems the Stoke crew were heading over to Bradford in summer 73 to buy from Bostocks.

I largely stopped 'chasing' 60's US import 45's after 1971, being more interested in newer stuff that you didn't have to send away for to the US or head off miles to go crate digging in some record dealers premises. So I never made it to Bostocks in Bradford market. Of course, with the size of their haul, you'd find some of the 45's they'd brought over here in all sorts of weird places -- 2nd hand shops / Sunday market stalls / local supermarkets (the Boyes chain; Hull, York, etc branches). When I came across any in such premises, of course, I'd sort through them & buy any I was interested in. But I never got to witness the 'mother load' back in their original UK location. They were sold so cheap at that time (5p each ?; around double that in a sold-on shop) that even if some of those singles were unknown back then, you'd still take a punt if the producer / song writer / artist name looked promising. It seems many top sounds came out of the market there and initially went on to be sold for a substantial mark-up to those not in the know. MY QUESTION ... it must have seemed that you'd be able to find any MGM / Verve soul 45 in quantity back then, so paying the pre-Bostock's going-rate must have seemed pointless for a while. BUT, many Verve 45's -- Howard Guyton – "I Watched You Slowly Slip Away" for instance -- managed to retain it's sought-after status & still go for a hefty wad. SO, which collectable MGM / Verve 45's didn't turn up in quantity in the Bostock's haul and is it known why they didn't ? Were the copies of the 'rarer' items on Bradford market (Howard Guyton for instance) issues / demos or a mix of both ?. Obviously, there was always pent-up demand from niter-goers for the Howard Guyton single, otherwise it wouldn't have been booted back in the 70's. How soon after it started getting plays was it booted & how did that tie in (date-wise) with the Bostock's haul ? Are the details of where Bostock's got their haul from known -- record company warehouse stock or from a big US record warehouse ?

No NOla folk on that list ... a major omission .. Allen Toussaint should at least figure in the standings. He was writing top songs from 1961 right thru to the 70's.

A tale posted on FACEBOOK by Neil Rushton ... GETTING LUCKY @ a 'cheapie' UK 45 seller ... . . . . . I found my first copy (of LOU RAGLAND'S "I Travel Alone") in the late 1970s. At the time I was running a Soul records wholesale business in funky Walsall and was always looking for stock. Most of it came from the U.S.A but other suppliers were much closer, especially Oldies Unlimited at St.Georges near Telford. Bill Baker and myself used to regularly nip down the A5 to deal with Anthony Lewis, the owner, who was great but quirky (for instance if I asked for x amount of copies of a single Anthony would invariably count out so many inches rather than count the amount). Oldies Unlimited imported huge amounts of records from the USA and Bill and myself would buy quantities of recent promos, cut outs and sometimes quite astonishing finds (best ever was 200 copies of Bill Brandon “The Streets Got My Lady”. Everyone on the Soul scene was aware of Anthony but he was always good to me as I had been buying from him by mail order when I was at school when he was based in Kent (?)and he often mentioned that. Anyway one afternoon he told Bill and myself that we would be allowed to look for records in one of the former chapels in the grounds of his base. We were met by a carpet of records on the floor and shelves full of them on the side. We started wading through and found some good stuff but nothing amazing, not all the singles were Soul. Anyway I slipped while reaching for the shelves and ended up lying on my back on top of the deep pile of records covering the floor, Naturally as I pulled myself up I pulled a handful records from where my right hand had landed. Two out of three were county and western, and the third - a stone mint copy of “I Travel Alone” - Lou Ragland. To add to the shock only either demos or issues (I can’t remember which)had turned up in the UK by then and the copy in my hand was the format that was unknown at the time.

A pic taken in the radio room @ Prestatyn ... me interviewing Ray Pollard & Swamp Dogg while John Poole watches on. I did the artist radio interviews each year. So I did the interviews with Lou Pride & Don Gardner in 2003. Lou had travelled over to the UK with a Severn Records label exec (Lou was recording for Severn at the time). Lou & his record label guy, being so close to Liverpool while in Prestatyn, wanted to go up there to visit the Beatles Museum. So I took them + Don Gardner up there (on the Saturday morning if my memory ain't playing tricks on me). Got to have long chats with em all, especially with Don who just came along for the ride (he wasn't interested in going in the Beatles Museum). So Don & I hung around while the other two went all Merseybeat. Had a fascinating chat with Don about his time in Sweden in the 60's + about the period in the 70's when he was Curtis Mayfield's travelling tour manager. Lou also had a few tales to tell, the one with the funniest ending being the story about how he came to write "Coming Home In The Morning". I obviously didn't take the pic in the radio room (as I'm in it), so it was most likely Snapper who took it (on my camera or on his own).

It's just been announced that Pontin's Prestatyn has closed & will not reopen. So the days of Soul Weekenders there ( & everything else) are definitely over.

A US radio stn down in Florida. This outfit kept it's full signal strength up over the full 24 hour period. I guess it's signal (at night) would reach some of the Caribbean islands.