THE GARBAGE:
The Scaffold - Do The Albert(Roger Bloody McGough! Mike Macca-Bro McGroovy! The Other One! The Scaffold had been regulars on kids’ telly in the late Sixties, meaning that “Thank U Very Much”, “Lily The Pink” and “Gin Gan Goolie” had already been seared into my formative consciousness as indelible earworms. This, at least, has the virtue of being a good deal less poisonously memorable.)
The Pipkins - Gonna Give Up Smokin' And Take Up Lovin' With You(Another Cook/Greenway effort, from the “Gimme Dat Ding” duo of Roger Greenway and Tony Burrows, blending unfunny comedy with Gibb-esque vocal blackface.)
Greyhound - Follow The Leader(Flop follow-up to their “Black And White” hit, and a grisly reminder that Trojan could often be terrible.)
The Doggs - Billy's Gotta Run(Co-written by Alan Hawkshaw, but don’t let that give you hope. Their only single.)
Howard Keel - All Of My Life(From a musical called Ambassador that starred Keel, and flopped in both the West End and Broadway. Lyrics by Hal Hackaday. Well, quite.)
― mike t-diva, Saturday, 2 October 2021 18:58 (two years ago) link
Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.
― System, Sunday, 3 October 2021 00:01 (two years ago) link
Wait, you uploaded audio clips for 4500 singles on discogs? (three clips per record??)How long does that even take?
― enochroot, Sunday, 3 October 2021 01:32 (two years ago) link
It was actually just one 90 second clip per record, spliced together from the start and end of the A-side and the middle of the B-side.
It took almost exactly a year, working full time, but justified by the sales figures; it was a valuable collection, mainly of super-obscure UK promos from 1971-73, all genres. Loads of psych-pop, junkshop glam, and the sort of stuff that ends up on Cherry Red or Bob Stanley comps.
It wasn't just the clips, though. About 25% of the records weren't even on Discogs, so I had to create entries for them, with label scans and composer/production credits etc. This also made valuations harder; I had to do a lot of cross-referencing via Popsike and MusicStack. Plus cleaning them was no trivial task.
As loads of them weren't available to listen online, the clips helped sell them to collectors - I was getting a lot of large bulk orders towards the start, and sold quite a few privately in advance of having to list them. One collector came to my house seven or eight times in the space of a few months, to go through the crates and test-play anything that looked interesting - he'd stay for hours and pay cash, and we'd have fantastically detailed conversations about obscure music. Happy days.
― mike t-diva, Sunday, 3 October 2021 09:43 (two years ago) link
that is incredible.
also, i missed this previously - they were passed to me by his stepdaughter (who is also my stepsister) - so what connection to you was James Hamilton?
― stirmonster, Sunday, 3 October 2021 15:31 (two years ago) link
ie - did you know him personally? i'm sure you have gone into detail about this previously but my memory sucks.
― stirmonster, Sunday, 3 October 2021 15:32 (two years ago) link
Yeah, after my dad died, my stepmother re-married, to James Hamilton. They married in 1994, he died in 1996, so I knew him for the last two years of his life.
― mike t-diva, Sunday, 3 October 2021 19:54 (two years ago) link
Wow.
― Starmer: "Let the children boogie, let all the children boogie." (Tom D.), Sunday, 3 October 2021 20:03 (two years ago) link
Anyway, I ended up voting for Freddie Scott. There were other more inventive records on my shortlist, but his pressed the most buttons.
― mike t-diva, Sunday, 3 October 2021 20:08 (two years ago) link
Thanks for the lowdown. He was a total hero. I still have tons of 12" singles from the early 90s with the bpm written on them that I copied from his columns (often worked out down to the 1/4 of a bpm which is quite a feat to figure out).
i voted for Satori.
― stirmonster, Sunday, 3 October 2021 23:55 (two years ago) link
Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.
― System, Monday, 4 October 2021 00:01 (two years ago) link
Mmmmmm, that Freddie Scott is so good. New to me, as was that 5th Dimension song. I just rewatched Summer Of Soul for the 3rd time and still adore so much the bit where McCoo & Davis are filmed now watching themselves perform then.
― stirmonster, Monday, 4 October 2021 00:01 (two years ago) link
RECORD MIRROR singles reviews, 15th October 1976
― mike t-diva, Monday, 4 October 2021 14:07 (two years ago) link