Remembering Singles

Subject: RE: Remembering Singles
From: Ron Davies
Date: 03 Jan 09 - 01:04 PM

I bet you're right, Jerry.   That sounds like a collector's item.

Subject: RE: Remembering Singles
From: Jerry Rasmussen
Date: 03 Jan 09 - 11:06 AM

The Flip Side of La Bamba was Oh, Donna... Both turned out to be major hits for Richie Valens.

I have a 45 rpm by the Beatles which credits the songs to the soundtrack of the movie "8 Arms to Hold You." I wonder if it's a collector's item. The title of the movie was later changed to Help.

My Aunt Gladys and Uncle Jim had a wind up victrola in their attic that we'd sneak up to listen to. The great thing about them was that if the needle got dull, you could just sharpen it with a fine file or sandpaper.

Jerry

Subject: RE: Remembering Singles
From: Ron Davies
Date: 03 Jan 09 - 10:29 AM

One of the best things about singles was the discovery, sometimes, that the flip side was a fantastic song.   I remember buying "You Turn Me On, I'm A Radio"--which I still love-- and being totally blown away by "Urge for Going" on the other side.

Subject: RE: Remembering Singles
From: topical tom
Date: 03 Jan 09 - 10:24 AM

When I was quite a young guy we had a spring-wound grammaphone that played cylinder records . Then it would not play and my father gave it to a neighbor who assured him that he could repair it. He later admitted he couldn't and returned it minus the diamond stylus! He swore that the diamond was missing when he got it but...! Then the spring broke. Along with the grammaphone were two large cardboard boxes filled with cylinder records, most of them Harry Lauder songs. My aunt later threw out both the grammaphone and the records as garbage!
As for the old 78s, we later had a spring-wound victrola and many 78s, most of them country songs (notably Wilf Carter) but also others of The Carter Family, Doc and Chickie Williams, et al. Ah, fond memories! Great thread, Jerry!

Subject: RE: Remembering Singles
From: open mike
Date: 03 Jan 09 - 10:22 AM

A Reason to Believe -- by Tim Hardin

If I listened long enough to you
I'd find a way to believe that it's all true
Knowing that you lied straight faced while I cried
Still I look to find a reason to believe

Someone like you makes it hard to live
Without somebody else
Someone like you makes it easy to give
Never thinking of myself

If I gave you time to change my mind
I'd find a way to leave the past behind
Knowing that you lied straight faced while I cried
Still I look to find a reason to believe

Someone like you makes it hard to live
Without somebody else
Someone like you makes it easy to give
Never thinking of myself

If I gave you time to change my mind
I'd find a way to leave the past behind
Knowing that you lied straight faced while I cried
Still I look to find a reason to believe
Still I look to find a reason to believe
Still I look to find a reason to believe

Subject: RE: Remembering Singles
From: Midchuck
Date: 03 Jan 09 - 07:51 AM

Those (few) who have our 1995 CD can refer to my song, "Daddy Come Home," which has the line"

"You might have been in the same kind of place your own self.
You got six songs for a quarter way back then..."

And I do remember when that was the cost to play the juke box. while drinking your 30-cent pint of beer.

I have, in our office/studio room, the cabinet - the non-stereo "entertainment center" - on which I used to listen to 78s of Tex Ritter and them at age 10 or 11. It was one of my first requests when my mom asked who wanted what when the homestead furnishings were split up. I gutted it to use for storage.

Peter

Subject: RE: Remembering Singles
From: VirginiaTam
Date: 03 Jan 09 - 07:16 AM

At first I got hand me down 45s from my big brother.
Hermans Hermts, Tommy James, Beatles, Tommy Roe, Grass Roots, etc..

The 1st I ever bought were Isaac Hayes Shaft and Rod Stewart's Maggie Mae. I loved the flip side of Maggie ... Reason to Believe. About the only thing by Stewart that I like now.

Temptations,Just my Imagination Running Away with Me
Bill Withers, Ain't No Sunshine
Marvyn Gaye, What's Goin On
Rolling Stones, Brown Sugar

I am sure there are more... I am just remembering summertimes hanging out in basement or breezeway with friends listening, dancing, playing spin the bottle, necking. Wow! Nostalgia.

I wish I had known about this when I was a kid.

Later I bought the Mowtown Collection on 8 track from nearby Seven Eleven. That was great purchase.

Subject: RE: Remembering Singles
From: Leadfingers
Date: 03 Jan 09 - 06:30 AM

When I was in Aden with the R A F I was a member of Aden Forces Broadcasting Society and had two half hour programmes a week (BOTH Repeated) . One was all Fok Music amd the other , Cobweb Corner , was all 78 rpm records . We had about 12,000 78s in the Library , with ALL sorts of stuff - Early Rock'n Roll , through to Nellie Melba(C 1904) Rachmaninov conducting his own compositions , Hot 5 and Hot Seven , and even bits of assorted Folk !
Never had so much fun listening to different music forms !!

Subject: RE: Remembering Singles
From: maeve
Date: 03 Jan 09 - 01:33 AM

We still play and enjoy all of the types of records mentioned above, except for the Edison cylinders; my mother remembers playing those at her grandmother's house.

maeve

Subject: RE: Remembering Singles
From: open mike
Date: 03 Jan 09 - 01:19 AM

ah ha--there is a niche to be filled re-releasing these..
there is a rising popularity of rag time, tin pan alley
and classic old music like that...

Subject: RE: Remembering Singles
From: Jerry Rasmussen
Date: 02 Jan 09 - 06:58 PM

Now I'd be lying to say I remember Edison Cylinders, but I had a lot of fun with them many years ago. I was working at the Newark Museum and they had quite a collection of cylinders and an old player. It was missing a belt, but I managed to get it working with a long, heavy rubber band, and ended up recording some of the cylinders onto tape. The fidelity was terrible and the speed erratic, but I came to love the old novelty songs, orchestral arrangements and quasi-folk material like The Preacher and the Bear. There was a lot of wonderful ragtime too. It's when I first heard Vess Ossman and Fred Van Epps on plectrum banjo, doing ragtime. Great stuff, not much of which has been re-issued because of a lack of interest.

Jerry

Subject: RE: Remembering Singles
From: open mike
Date: 02 Jan 09 - 06:46 PM

Hey, I'm single...i thought you were talking about remembering folks like me.

seriously, though, I do remember when music was on BOTH sides of the
dics, and have seen 78's that had grooves on only one side. some of these were "cut" in a university recording studio/lab apparently, and
had multiple holes in the middle presumably to keep them centered while the process of cutting the grooves was going on.

too bad the record lady no longer has her web site
here is one: http://78rpmrecord.com/

Subject: RE: Remembering Singles
From: GUEST,TJ in San Diego
Date: 02 Jan 09 - 05:21 PM

Our high school cafeteria, 1954-58, had a jukebox filled with 45's that included "Rock Around The Clock" by Bill Haley and the Comets, Bill Doggett's "Raunchy," several Everly Brothers songs, "Heartbreak Hotel" by Elvis, etc. Songs were five cents a play or six for a quarter. The KT's "Tom Dooley" made it the year before I graduated. I still have a box of 150 or so of these "little records with the big hole" from that era. If you listen to a lot of them today, you can see why there were so many "one-hit-wonders" back then. Lots of good stuff too, and worth a revisit once in a while.

Subject: RE: Remembering Singles
From: fat B****rd
Date: 02 Jan 09 - 03:24 PM

I actually didn't spend my holiday money but got Lost John by Lonnie Donegan and Rock Arouind The Clock on 78s from Harry Horner's in Cleethorpes. I could sometimes use some of that 'buzz' these days. I had The Fendermen record on the orangy Top Rank label. Macdonalds Cave by The Piltdown Men was another fave 45.

Subject: RE: Remembering Singles
From: paula t
Date: 02 Jan 09 - 03:19 PM

I still have, and play ,my singles and L.Ps.from my teens and twenties.I am convinced they sound better than the C.Ds.I now own. My copy of "Blood on the tracks ",which I bought in the late '70s sounds much better than the C.D bought for me in 2005.

I agree that there was something special about the whole idea of taking home a vinyl record - whether as an L.P. or a single. It was a substantial thing to own.I have been pleased to see a return to vinyl by many new bands.

Subject: RE: Remembering Singles
From: Amos
Date: 02 Jan 09 - 02:14 PM

The earliest singles I had were truly singles--78's that were thick (a hard plastic like Bakelite)and only had grooves on one side!! A number of 20's jazz numbers, The Two Black Crows, aaaaand Beeeyaitlebaum.....


A

Subject: RE: Remembering Singles
From: WFDU - Ron Olesko
Date: 02 Jan 09 - 01:58 PM

"Singles" are making a comeback.   In this digital age, people download SONGS and the album concept is not the draw that it used to be.   I receive many CD's where it becomes obvious that the artist has a few really good songs and the rest is "filler". There are fewer thematic recordings as well.   Of course, there are still magnificent albums such as Kathy Mattea's "Coal", but it does seem like we are heading back to a "singles" mentality, and that might not be a bad idea.

Of course, you cannot hold a digital download like you can those old '78s.   I can still remember a number of childrens "singles" that I had as a child - some with Captain Kangaroo on the cover.   The first single that I remember purchasing (with the help of my parents) was the Beatles "I Want to Hold Your Hand".   Still have it!

Subject: RE: Remembering Singles
From: Geordie-Peorgie
Date: 02 Jan 09 - 01:52 PM

By heck!

Aah remember that 45's were 6/4d (Six Shillings and four pence) which meant you could get 3 for a quid (poond)(pound)

If it was your birthday and AALL of your relatives sent you a half-crown postal order (This is startin' to sound like The Antiques Roadshow) you could afford to shell oot on a couple of records.

When the record was bought and got home ye had te listen te both sides and then it wez played at 78rpm to get the Pinky & Perky effect

Ye cannit dee that with a CD or Hem Pee Three

Aah! Happy Days

Subject: RE: Remembering Singles
From: PoppaGator
Date: 02 Jan 09 - 01:44 PM

I'm a little younger than Jerry, and remember 78 singles as already being obsolete, as 45s quickly became the new and definitive format for "single" records.

The 78s that I do remember are the ones that came in albums. A set of several 78 rpm records (maybe about a half-dozen?) would be packaged in the form of a big book, not unlike a photo album. There'd be a few pages of text just inside the cover, usually illustrated, and then a series of brown-paper sleeves for records, bound into the album just like pages.

(78s were almost the size of the 12" vinyl LPS that came later ~ maybe 10" or 11" in diameter? ~ so those original old album covers and inside pages were roughly the size of the more recent and more familiar classic "album covers" from the 60s-70s. A good size for cover artwork, and for sizeable portions of readable text.)

This is the way an artist could market a set of more than two songs, and was also the only way to package longer pieces, including classical music and Broadway scores. The 78 format could only provide about 3 minutes of uniterrupted audio at a time, which made it difficult to present symphonies; suites such as The Nutcracker and Peter and the Wolf were more easily accommodated.

I get a laugh sometimes when current-day musicians or commentators talk on TV or radio, etc., and say "...my new album, or, oops, I suppose I should say my new CD..." It would be anachronistic to speak of a "record" or an "LP," but it's just as correct to refer to a CD as an "album" as it ever was to use that term for a 12-inch 33-1/3 rpm long-playing vinyl record

The term "album" has applied to a collection of 40-50 minutes of music ever since the days of 78s; it was already an old-fashioned or "legacy" term when an album's worth of music could be contained on a single LP disc, so the usage continues to be appropriate for today's smaller digital disc format, and indeed should still be suitable even for future media.

Sorry about the drift; let me get back to (or at least closer to) Jerry's original intended subject.

I love those "oldies by goodie" hit singles of the rock 'n' roll era. Yesterday morning I sat enthralled through an hour-long TV infomercial for one of those Time-Life collections of remastered all-original-artists, all-original recordings.

I don't need to buy a set as long as they keep advertising them. I'm OK with hearing a 20-second sample of each beloved tune, and then another, and then another, etc. I know the songs so well that it's not really necessary to listen all the way through. Many of the accomopanying visuals are familiar images of the artists, but there are many more that are new to me and very interesting.

Subject: RE: Remembering Singles
From: lefthanded guitar
Date: 02 Jan 09 - 01:36 PM

Jerry maybe I'm a little too 20th century also, but I DO remember how exciting it was to bring home a single, and later an album. I would often discover music just as exciting on the flip side - my early singles were Beatles and Motown records so there was no shortage of treasures there.

But I really loved my albums collection- and the entire process of buying them, listening to them while enjoying the photos and artwork and all the writing on the cover- just 'reading' the cover was almost as exciting as hearing the music. I could never experience the same 'unwrapping your holiday presents' feeling with tapes, CD's an IPOD (which I've borrowed but don't own). Also your record collection was almost like a signature style, as individual as your way of dressing and talking. Someone once remarked that my album collection was impressive b/c it contained a lot of music that would last, instead of forgetable 'hits' - we wound up dating for years lol. The thing is, I would always read who the songwriters were on other people's albums,so I would be the 'first on the block' to get albums by people like Jackson Browne and Chris Smither, and later Gillian Welch or Nanci Griffith. On CD's I can barely read who the performers are.

Well I suppose you feel most comfortable and attached to what you grew up with and got used to , but I DO agree there was something 'weighty' about albums. And for my money,the music never sounded better than listening to a good stereo set,whether it was Bruce Philips, Beethoven by NY Philarmonic, Blood on the Tracks by Mr. Zimmerman, Missippis John Hurt or Tommy by the Who.

Final thought- a stellar album played on a good stereo gave a shared experience, perhaps like our parents gathering around the radio- but those people hooked into their Ipods and Berries I see on the bus or the street look a little too robotic to me.

Subject: RE: Remembering Singles
From: Rasener
Date: 02 Jan 09 - 01:32 PM

Blimey Jerry, that brings back memories.
45 rpm records were out when we as a family started buying them.
My dad bought a record player and we all agreed to pay so much a week into a fund. Once a week we would take it in turns to choose the single. As there were 5 of us, that made it very exciting.
We would all gather round the record player every week and listen to the latest single. It was always a magical moment.
From my memory the first 2 singles I bought were Lonnie Donegan with Jack of Diamonds with the B side I think was Ham n Eggs and Marty Wild with Endless Sleep.
To this day they are still firm favourites of mine.
However the old man almost threw the Lonnie single out, becuase he thought it was crap and wasn't prepared to have such a single in the house. We managed to talk him out of it.
You are right Jerry, it was special.
I remember going to my local record shop every week and listening to the top ten in the record booths.
In those days we used to have a radio program (UK) on every Saturday morning called "Uncle Mac - Childrens favourites", which we all listened to.
That sort of magic doesn't seem to be there anymore.
Les

Subject: Remembering Singles
From: Jerry Rasmussen
Date: 02 Jan 09 - 01:14 PM

For some unknown reason, I was remembering the excitement I felt of bring home a new record. Remember records? I go back to the days of 78's and can still feel them in my hands with the thin brown paper sleeve with the advertising on it. Once in awhile, I'd buy one that was a picture record imbedded in the clear plastic. That was the definition of "neat." 45 rpms were equally exciting to bring home and put on the turntable, although the excitment was tempered a little if I had listened to the record in the listening booths at the music store. Remember listening booths? The excitment started fading when I "graduated" (not by choice) to cassette singles. For some reason they didn't feel quite the same. Now, downloading a single to an ipod has lost all measure of excitement for me. You can't even hold the darned thing in your hand or read the label.

One of the unexpected pleasures of a single was to listen to the flip side. I always hoped that it would be good, but was more often than not disappointed. There are classic examples of the "flip side" becoming the hit. The most famous was Earth Angel by the Penguins being the flip side of Hey, Senorita. Another of my favorite memorable flip sides is the flip side of Mule Skinner Blues by the Fendermen. It's an instrumental titled Torture. It's something that the Ventures would have been proud of.

Most of the music I grew up with was on singles. Many well known groups and individual singers never recorded an album. The Oldies revival led to the release of Greates Hits albums, but they were a hodge podge of everything the group recorded, including records that probably didn't sell a hundred copies as well as alternate takes.

I realize that this is a purified folk music site where pop musci and rock and roll are looked upon with crinkled noses, but I'm sure there are some other Catters who just loved music, and learned to label it much later in life.

Jerry