Archive for the ‘Record Collector Price Guide’ Category

Caravan

Friday, July 18th, 2014

CaravanLoveToLove, Caravan, London, Decca, Deram

Listen: Love To Love You / Caravan
Love

Talk about being smitten after one play. I had seen a few Caravan albums in the stores, but never managed to own one, not until IN THE LAND OF GREY AND PINK that is. I’d already decided to spring for a UK copy via mail order that coming April, based entirely on it’s title. Without warning, this US single, coupling ‘Love To Love You’ and ‘Golf Girl’, landed in my weekly stack from WMCR, the local adult radio station that miraculously gave me their ‘unplayable’ rock singles all through my high school years. My eyes bugged out seemingly an inch. I couldn’t get home fast enough, tearing through the traffic and risking my life on a bike one very slippery, slushy, cold Friday in February ’71.

Once home, I must have played ‘Love To Love You’ a dozen times, completely anxious for it to end so I could play it all over again. Why had I kept myself in the dark about this band, sounding more British than the British themselves might tolerate. Nothing like that excited high from realizing there’s a whole new back catalog to acquire, something I began plotting on the spot.

In the days before THE RECORD COLLECTOR PRICE GUIDE and Wikipedia, research needed to be done by hand. Consequently, homework was put aside and out came the back issues of MELODY MAKER and DISC & MUSIC ECHO. I needed every Caravan record. Now.

CaravanGolf, Caravan, London, Decca, Deram

Listen: Golf Girl / Caravan
Golf

Seriously, this next bit is still vivid, like waking up in the middle of the night remembering you forgot to do something and jumping straight out of bed. I’m digging through the magazines looking for Caravan titles and catalog numbers, with the single on repeat. My Dual 1229 turntable came complete with a 45 stacking spindle and was repeat-play capable. A beauty.

Suddenly, boing, it hits me. In all my glee, I haven’t even noticed. Was the single a double A promo, or one with a B side. So midway through, off comes the tonearm and…yes! There’s a B side!

‘Golf Girl’ was just as fantastic, beginning with the “selling cups of tea” lyric. It was almost too good to be true. Another song to check off the Caravan catalog completion list.

LandOfGrayAndPink, Caravan

Saturday morning, straight to the post office, buy the international money order and airmail my advance payment for the full album that day. Come early April, I owned a first pressing of IN THE LAND OF GREY AND PINK. Everything about that album was magical: the laminated cover, beautiful artwork, pristine deep groove vinyl, inner sleeve, lyrics, production. It even smelled good.

Adding to the magic, Decca moved the band to it’s progressive subsidiary, Deram, and deemed the album an initial release in a new deluxe series, assigning the catalog number SDL – R1 as a reward.

Instantly official, Caravan was now my new favorite band. Next, I had to see them live…but that would be a few years off. 1975 to be exact, when their first US commenced in support of CUNNING STUNTS. Luckily it swung through upstate New York and luckily, they were more British than ever.

CaravanJukebox, Caravan, Pye Hastings

Above: Jukebox Tab signed by Pye Hastings

Kennedy Express

Sunday, September 2nd, 2012

kennedyexpressuka, Kenny Pickett, Eddie Phillips, The Creation, Kennedy Express

Listen: Is There Life On Earth? / Kennedy Express
Is

I stumbled on Kennedy Express in some London collectors shop, I think it was 50p. How could the staff not have noticed both the writers and producers were Kenny Pickett and Eddie Phillips of The Creation? Aren’t you paid to know these things?

Better yet, how did I not know The Creation were essentially recording under another name? Bigger fuck up.

Okay, so ‘Is There Life On Earth?’ was released in 1980, when the band were traveling the has-been patch before legend. Not sure if The Creation were ever really has-beens though. Never mind, the discovery was the shop’s loss and my gain.

It was pretty 80′s sounding stuff but the Phillips/Pickett hooks were still obvious. This was around the time when ‘Teacher Teacher’, a song they’d written for Rockpile, became a worldwide hit. Proof there is a God.

Presumably Don Arden, who owned Jet, decided to give the guys a release. Clearly he continued to be an investor, given some seven years later, when Eddie Phillips reformed The Creation, he released ‘A Spirit Called Love’, also on Jet. That was during a brief period when both Mick Avory and John Dalton from The Kinks made up the band’s rhythm section.

Considered disposable pop by those in the know apparently. ‘Is There Life On Earth?’ doesn’t even appear in the RECORD COLLECTOR PRICE GUIDE. Possibly only for we hardcore Creation specialists. I can live with that too.

Again, their loss, my gain.

The Status Quo

Monday, March 5th, 2012

Listen: Technicolor Dreams / The Status Quo
Technicolor

It’s still there, my favorite hotel in the whole wide world. Amsterdam, Holland’s American Hotel. Don’t let the name trick you into thinking it’s some home away from home for US citizens. Instead, the place has weathered nearly a century at Leidsekade 97. Just gander at the wall photos in the Bar American and try not letting your heart freeze. Good luck.

A cocktail lounge in the true European sense of the word, Bar American overlooks one of the city’s main squares, the center of Amsterdam as I know it. When time has permitted, I’ve sat for hours from mid afternoon sipping champagne, preferably as drizzle turns to sleet, watching the world go by. Seldom have I been been happier. Dare I say, some of my best times ever have been had in that hotel, other than when Corinne convinced me to eat one too many hash cakes in The Bulldog a few blocks away. Even the walls of our room, when throbbing with dripping colors, become a warm and fuzzy memory of The American Hotel, where, by the way, they serve free champagne at the breakfast buffet.

Somewhere in that bar, right next to a signed, framed shot of The Status Quo, hangs a similar photo of The Herd. I know, I know. Have mercy.

But I can see them both, clear as day, and it does remind me of Andy Bown’s haircut. Undoubtably the best haircut in 60′s pop. Seriously, who had a better haircut than Andy Bown? Go ahead, I dare you to challenge that one.

Bless those Status Quo guys. By the mid 70′s, they’d made him a member of their band, where he still remains today.

The Status Quo’s third US single, ‘Technicolor Dreams’, has been forever overlooked, given it’s one of the five greatest psychedelic pop records from that sparkling era. Other equally worthy tracks are consistently spotlighted, but never this. Although, THE RECORD COLLECTOR PRICE GUIDE could convince you otherwise. Withdrawn just after release in the UK, ‘Technicolor Dreams’ booked for £1000 a few years back.

Having gotten my original in the day, let’s fast forward to ’94, while on a Dallas business trip with Duane, I picked up another for $9, then rather pricey. Constantly needing safety copies helped in making an incredibly valuable investment. Don’t ask me exactly where it is though, but definitely somewhere in the black hole of unfiled 7′s, lining up for wall shelf seniority.

Fela Ransome-Kuti & Africa ’70

Tuesday, June 1st, 2010

Listen: Egbe Mi O / Fela Ransome-Kuti & The Africa ’70
Egbe Mi O / Fela Ransome-Kuti & The Africa '70

It took the then mainstream famous Ginger Baker’s involvement to get a Fela 7″ released. He played on the live show recording from which this single was pulled. Some things never change.

I saw Fela once at the uptown Ritz. It was a loosely groovin’ show – all very enjoyable and comfortably rhythmic. At one point, he told the audience that his people had locked the doors and no one was leaving until he got his money. It was rather sobering, and took a while to resolve.

Recently Sly Stone pulled the same tired, I’m being ripped off by the promoters routine at Coachella, coming on five hours late after torturing the 600 (in a 5000 capacity tent) attendees with an hour long, screeching, fuck you, you’re lucky we’re here soundcheck. That crowd dwindled to 300 by the time Sly hit. Very disappointing and I would have thought, embarrassing.

It was old in the 60′s, and is beyond cliched now. As if Coachella singled out Sly Stone, and in the case of Fela, The Ritz did the same to him, insinuating the intention was let’s not pay these guys. It was just stupid.

Made the whole, we get stepped on routine very overplayed and tired.

Having said that, this was a fun single to find and own. I honestly think I have another Fela 7″ somewhere, but it’s not in the wall shelf filed properly at this moment – nor is it listed in the RECORD COLLECTORS PRICE GUIDE. Hmmm, a pleasant dream perhaps.

So I decided to post this – it’s clearly an edit but a nice one to have a toe tap to.

Listen: Chop And Quench / Fela Ransome-Kuti & The Africa ’70
Chop And Quench / Fela Ransome-Kuti & The Africa '70

Maybe more interesting is this B side. I do not have the live full length from which the A side was pulled, but this B side has no applause at the end. Maybe non-LP, despite it’s 7:56 LP length?

Sandy Denny

Friday, April 24th, 2009

Candle In The Wind / Sandy Denny

Listen: Candle In The Wind / Sandy Denny SandyDennyCandle.mp3

I hadn’t even thought about meeting Sandy Denny for the longest time, not until writing my Fotheringay post a week or so back. It’s unbelievable how much email I got as a result. People wanting the most specific details of our conversation, what she drank, what she wore, did she seem depressed. Not that I’m surprised she is so revered.

‘Candle In The Wind’ was always a song that got me choked up and not many do. Then when Elton John’s version became the signature Princess Di track, forget it. I literally had to switch it off. It weirded me out. Combine such a powerful song with Sandy Denny’s immaculate voice and, well, it was a hard one to pull out and play.

But I did it just now and it really is so spectacular. I don’t know if many people have heard this as the single is quite rare, at one time booking for 100 GBP in The Record Collector Price Guide. Fact is it never made it beyond the promo run.