Ian Dewhirst

Yippee! No.16 on the first UK Compilation chart midweek! PIR back in the top 20 again! Ian D

We could have done with that for the booklet Roburt! Ian D

Yeah, I've actually had to run the publishing credits by Paul Mooney since many of the original labels neither had songwriting credits or even publishers on. There's obvious covers of "If Loving You Is Wrong (I Don't Want To Be Right)", "I'm Glad Your Mine", "I'll Take You There" but the publishing credits are anything but easy. The Main Ingredient song is a good case in point. Hopefully we'll have 'em straightened out by the time of release.......... Ian D

It surprised the hell out of me Greg. I had no idea there were so many great Gospel/Funky cuts on Jewel until Dave bent my ear. The package is looking great by the way. I should have finished artwork today touch wood so I'll make sure you see it before it goes off....... Ian D

Holy Spirit - Spiritual Soul and Gospel Funk From Shreveport's Jewel Label View full article

Interesting guy.......... Ian D

Mike Raven was pretty scary looking too. He was big into black magic by all accounts..... Ian D

Absolutely! I could totally do with a 100 CD Motown Box Set! My Motown collection is scattered around the house via hundreds of vinyl and CD's. I'd LOVE everything in a huge box set. It'd save me hours of dicking around searching for particular tracks..... Ian D

Yep. I had to service BBC Hull back in't day so it probably came from the boot of my Vauxhall Viva LOL...... Ian D

No.1 on Amazon's Hot New Releases In Compilation Chart...... https://www.amazon.co...E17RF32DKTEE3ZA In fact we're firing up a few charts....... https://www.amazon.co...=zg_bs_694308_1 Wow. We've seen a phenomenal pre-sale on this - it's actually pre-selling at a faster rate than a normal Harmless goodie, which is brilliant news. If all those UK sales convert, then we'll be looking at being the first 10 CD Box Set to hit the Top 40 Compilation Chart which will be a gas! In fact it looks like we'll need to repress by this Friday if it carries on at the same rate. Just nuts. If you want the first edition order quickly! Ian D

Glad you like it Dave. I sent PIR's finished copies off today so fingers crossed that they'll feel the same! I bet it was nice to finally see your discography in full glory! Best, Ian

Good on ya Phillbuster. I missed it completely but I still have my UK Epic copy of his version of "I Don't Wanna Cry"....... Ian D

You're probably right Robb. Ian D

Yep, I doubt if anyone would have speculated on that by the name alone...... Ian D

And originals are RARE! Only seen one or two I think.......... Ian D

Good question. Where's Rouncy when we need him? I think it's entirely possible that more demos were pressed than issues with a lot of the flops. I'd guess that the big majors would press a thousand demos, see if there was any traction anywhere and then press the issues to demand, which for the most part would be nil. One also has to consider the size and regionalism of the USA. Major regional biases were huge in the 60's and 70's. Brunswick, Mercury and Curtom thrived on their Chicago power base, Motown and Ric-Tic/Golden World owned Detroit, Duke/Peacock/Backbeat had Texas, King had Cincinatti, Mirwood had L.A. and Cameo, Arctic and later, Philadelphia International, controlled Philly etc, etc. Regionalism rules America. Even 30 years later in the Rap arena you had Def Jam/Bad Boy in New York, Death Row in L.A., Luke Skywalker in Florida etc, etc. When I was researching stuff about 20 years ago I was stunned to be told that Al Johnson & Jean Carn's "I'm Back For More"- a No.1 U.S. R'n'B hit was purely down to it's huge sales in some parts of the South and Florida. The same record didn't translate to the rest of the USA but the surge from some of the Southern states and Florida propelled it to No.1 R'n'B. Wow. Some of the more well-known regional anomalies are fairly well-documented. "Brandy (You're A Fine Girl)" by Looking Glass from Jersey was successfully transferred from a local into a national hit. Rockin' Sydney's "My Toot Toot" from New Orleans sold phenomenally locally and sparked a national pop hit for Denise LaSalle. "Disco Duck" by Rick Dees & His Cast Of Idiots was released by Fretone (home of Lillian Hale) before it was picked up by RSO and sold a million. And what about Nashville? How many Nashville records translated to either of the U.S. coasts or the North? Maybe 0.000001%? It's really incredible how much there is to still hear. That's the beauty of it really. Ian D

Weirdly enough, in the early 80's I used to go out with a lovely girl from Leeds called Emma Haywood who was in the Fantastics. Her dad was Don Haywood who was in the Velours when he lived in the U.S. I talked to Don about "I'm Gonna Change" but I can't recall the conversation. Back then most Americans were always genuinely shocked that we even knew the records so he was probably trying to figure out how I even knew about the Velours leave alone how friendly I was getting with his daughter LOL.... The worst thing was, I always preferred the Four Seasons version to the Velours because it was much punchier. I thought the Velours version was kinda lame to be honest. And I thought they were white LOL.... Ian D

Good question and there's no easy answers unfortunately. I think when Bostocks in Bradford bought the entire contents of the MGM/Verve warehouse most of that stock ended up in the UK. For all the hundreds of copies of April Stevens, Clara Ward, Dottie Cambridge, The Tymes, Spyder Turner, The Charades, the Superiors, The Triumphs, The Ambers, Billy Woods, The Shalimars, Terri Bryant, Beti Webb, The Righteous Brothers Band and the King Davis House Rockers that were there, I still never found The Embers, Howard Guyton, Tony Middleton, Youngblood Smith, The Jewels, The High Keys or The Velours, which you would have thought would have turned up as well. There was a period where I almost wouldn't buy a Verve or MGM release because I was convinced they'd eventually turn up at Bostocks but history has proved that there's no apparent formula. Yep, plenty. Some of these major label 45's are rarer than many indies IMO.Also, I don't think a lot of these labels have been trawled completely either. In the last few weeks alone I've heard several great major label 45's by artists I've never heard of! Also a couple of real surprises from known artists who had the misfortune to have a release just before a label was discontinued. These are massively rare records which haven't made it into any guides thus far. There's still stuff on ABC for sure. I heard a record the other week which was a vintage Robert Bateman Detroit production on ABC by a totally unknown group with a name that no one would ever bother with believe me. It's brilliant. Vintage Northern Soul from 1969 produced by a legend, yet few people are aware of it! Not in any guides and mega rare. So they're still out there. I honestly think that there's more great stuff to find on many of the major labels. I was staggered when I got to go through the complete Bell/Amy/Mala listings a few years back. You'd need a couple of years just to go through all those releases believe me. Just checking the discographies of most of the U.S. majors between, say, 1964-1969 and looking at the sheer volume of releases, I know there's still gold in them there hills. I've heard some unbelievably great major label records in the last few weeks so the glass is definitely half-full tonight LOL.... Ian D

Having worked at a few majors since the mid 70's, I can tell you that the overiding practise since the early 60's for most majors was essentially to release tons of records every week on the basis that something will eventually stick. When they had a hit record it would sell in such volume that it would cancel out all the stiffs. This policy was A&R led and long before the days when the accountants took over so there was a constant 'churn' of releases. With the bigger companies like RCA, MGM, Columbia, Warners etc, they all had huge machines to keep going with nationwide Sales and Racking operations, PR departments, national and regional Promotion offices, Pressing plants etc, etc, so to keep the machine going they needed multiple releases every week. One major hit would wipe out any losses on the other 50 releases each month. Elvis Presley and Perry Como effectively subsidised Lorraine Chandler and Metros releases for RCA, the Beach Boys and the Beatles subsidised Alexander Patton and Patrice Holloway for Capitol, Frank Sinatra and Dean Martin subsidised Linda Jones and Ben Aiken for Warners and Connie Francis and Eric Burdon subsidised the Charades and the Tymes for MGM. We should be thankful that the music business was so rich back then that they could easily support so many releases. Also I'm constantly surprised at hearing some of the sales figures for regional hits in the U.S. Just this week I've been researching the Gospel output and sales of some indie labels and I'm always staggered when I get told,"hey we did 50,000 in Cleveland alone' or similar sentiments. A lot of these sales were through 'Mom & Pop' stores which seldom contributed to the Billboard sales chart so some big sellers were out there which were not necessarily reflected in the national charts. Back then you could actually sell over 250,000 records regionally without having a national hit. Essentially America is just so big that when a record did take off it could bring in a fortune. We're incredibly lucky that we got to be the recipients of such great quality flops! Ian D

Well you're in luck there Roburt 'cos ALL the unknown Jones Girls and Shirley Jones masters have automatically been selected already due to Ralph Tee's unhealthy obsession with all PIR things with the 'Jones' moniker..........sound familiar? Ian D

Already several mentions of this track from various sources, so one for the forthcoming projects I suspect Dave....? I'm kinda excited because tomorrow morning a whole heap of national journalists and major radio DJ's will be pouring over your discography with their morning coffees wondering why they've never heard half of the listings LOL.... Dick Jensen's incredible "New York City's A Lonely Town" which Richard Searling has been championing just lately is already getting wider attention which is pretty incredible for a 'forgotten' 40 year old record. Sounds phenomenal though. It's such a gas that Philly International is getting such widespread recognition again from all sectors of the media. It's important that music of this pedigree is getting major attention again 'cos most current music can't touch it. All good and I can't thank you enough for allowing us to finally print your full discography. Over 2000 people will be feverishly reading through it in 10 days time! Ian D

Twelve and a half hours of impeccably brilliant music and 175 beautifully produced, arranged and written songs from the masters of the game in a state-of-the-art box with a 60 page booklet including the full Mighty Three discography......? Go on. Spoil yourself. You deserve it and it'll last you the rest of your life. It's the bargain of the century and probably better than sex! Ian D

Far be it from me to hype one of my own releases Daryl but this is just a beautiful body of work to own. Also, as someone pointed out the other day, at the current Amazon price, it works out at a quid a year for the last 40 years of PIR which has to be a bargain whichever way you look at it. This release is currently pre-selling at the same rate as a normal Harmless release which is pretty incredible in the current climate. You'll be well happy mate. Tell everyone in Hull to buy it! Ian D

LOL, you're about 2 months too late Mike. I'll bear you in mind when we get to the HI Box later this year! Ian D

I just fell over with shock! Ian D