Embassy label shots

British online record store Vinyl Tap has a number of UK Embassy 45s. The site includes several Embassy label shots.

More on the Embassy label

I heard from Michael White, who has researched the Embassy label, sold in the UK through Woolworths stores from the early 50s till the mid-60s (see previous three posts).

You can contact Michael by email if you have any information for him.

He has yet to publish his full account of Embassy and its artists, but in the meantime here are some items of interest:

• Johnny Worth who, as Les Vandyke, wrote a number of hits for Adam Faith and Eden Kane, recorded covers of his own songs under his own name for Embassy;
• Elvis Costello's father Ross McManus, a vocalist with the Joe Loss Orchestra, recorded for Embassy using the names David Ross and Hal Burton;
• Ray Pilgrim was a vocalist with the Oscar Rabin Orchestra. He also recorded for Embassy as Bobby Stevens, and recorded with Embassy groups including The Jaybirds (not to be confused with another, later band called The Jaybirds that included Alvin Lee). He also recorded for associated label Oriole.
• A song co-written by Ray Pilgrim and recorded by Dick Jordan, Little Christine, charted Top 10 in Belgium, was covered by other Belgian artists, and was released in the US on Everest (#19360, 1960).

Fascinating stuff, I reckon.

Cheapo Labels: some links

See my Links page at the website for some of the links I've found about cheapo/budget/soundalike labels, including the British soundalike hits albums Top Of The Pops.

Rikki Henderson's appearance on Oh Boy! on 21 February 1959 is listed at the Oh Boy! Diary website. (Archived page. Also appearing: Gerry Dorsey, before he was Engelbert.)

Embassy Records

I just found a great thread at Vinyl Vulture forum, kicked off by Michael White with lots of information about artists who recorded for British label Embassy, the source of Golden Fleece's Top Hits records.

Michael writes, for example, about Rikki Henderson:

I have recently read that Rikki Henderson won his contract with Embassy through a competition run by Mirabelle magazine, but I have also seen a reference to a resident vocalist with the Denny Boyce Orchestra called Rikki Henderson (Rikki also apparently made one appearance on TV's 'Oh Boy').

(Oh Boy! There's another Trevor Peacock connection!)

Golden gassers: an Aussie cheapo label

I found this record in amongst my bedraggled 45s. How it got there, I can't imagine. (Surely I didn't buy it? Nah, must be one of my brother's...)

This was a cover of Herman's Hermits' Mrs Brown You've Got A Lovely Daughter (written by Trevor Peacock of Vicar of Dibley fame). The B-side was a version of The Seekers' hit A World Of Our Own, by The Jaybirds. This places GF-1025 in 1965.

It's one of a series sold in the 60s at service stations by Golden Fleece, the Australian petrol company later bought out by Caltex. John Maloney has also posted a shot of this one, and the B-side, along with three others from Golden Fleece, to the Odd Labels forum at Whirligig.

Welcome to the world of the cheapo label, companies that put out cut-price soundalike versions of current hits. There's a group at Yahoo! called Cheapo Labels: it's fairly inactive at the moment, but its home page usefully lists about 40 cheapo or budget labels.

One of the fascinations of the cheapos is the discovery of well-known artists recording under other names. The Hit Records Project, devoted to one of the better-known US cheapos, mentions Sandy Posey and Bobby Russell, both of whom recorded for Hit under a number of names.

There is also some interest in the cheapos from soul fans: see, for example, Soulful Kinda Music's discography for Herbert Hunter, aka Leroy Jones, who recorded for Hit, and Jeff Lemlich's post to Bomp about soul recordings on Hit and Spar.

Australia's Golden Fleece Top Hits singles were recycled from the Embassy label, recorded in Britain and sold there at Woolworths stores (see the follow-up post by Brian at the Odd Labels forum). British site 45rpm.org.uk has a label shot of an Embassy single by Johnny Worth, better known by his pseudonym Les Vandyke, who wrote for the likes of Adam Faith and Eden Kane, and also wrote, for example, Little Pattie's Australian hit Dance Puppet Dance. (See also The Flies - Doin' The Mod.)

Into the 70s, albums of soundalike tracks were issued, some of which famously included pseudonymous recordings by a young Elton John. His efforts have even been reissued, on the Chartbusters Go Pop! CD (see Richie Unterberger's review at All Music Guide).

Golden gasser? On Top 40 radio, that was an oldie, aka a blast from the past, a mouldy oldie. Golden Fleece, petrol, gas... Get it?