The London American Label Year By Year 1959 Various Artists (London American)

£12.56

Genre:
Rock'n'Roll
Label:
Ace Records
Format:
CD
Catalogue Id:
CDCHD 1285

They say that as one gets older the passage of time becomes ever faster. That’s only true if you are not compiling CDs of music from bygone days. At the moment, and thanks in no small way to the “London American Label Year By Year” series, Peter Gibbon and I feel as though we’re permanently stuck in the late 1950 and early 1960s, reliving our youth over and over again in a skewed cross between Groundhog Day and Life On Mars. Roll over Doctor Who, and tell Gene Hunt the news.

The late 50s and early 60s are a long way from the worst years to find yourself reliving. I would bet that I am far from the only person here who, given the choice, would not permanently reset his personal controls for a one-way ticket to a similar time frame. However you slice it, the soundtrack to that period is worth abandoning DAB for in favour of the return of Fabulous 208, Juke Box Jury and ceaseless attempts to locate AFN’s signal.

The series continues to offer Ace fans their own personal time machine via some of the best American records of their era, all of which appeared on the cherished black-and-silver imprint. This month Ace’s equivalent of the TARDIS lands in 1959 – a pivotal year in popular music that managed to survive the US payola scandals, a UK printers strike, a failed experiment with stereo 45s (Sun and Specialty in stereo? Methinks not, thanks) and all attempts to kill off rock’n’roll and replace it with lots of people called Bobby and Frankie, to bring us some of the most wonderful and well-remembered recordings of that life-changing decade.

It’s a mark of how many great records came out on London in ’59 that only one of the tracks on our latest compilation is currently available elsewhere on Ace. Once again the diversity of the compilation reflects London’s own diversity of catalogue. (Inevitably nobody will like everything here – but, hey, Wink Martindale’s ‘Deck Of Cards’ was the label’s biggest seller of the year and that’s what the god of electronics invented that fast forward button on your CD player for.) Thanks to the foresight of the Decca (that’s D-E-C-C-A) record company in preserving the original production tapes for London 45s, we are again able to bring you more than 80% of the tracks featured from the same sources that were used to manufacture those 45s over 50 years ago.

Believe me, I could chat all day about this, but the TARDIS is making that funny noise it makes when it’s about to take off and we need to make sure that our next stop is 1963. All being well, we should land there early next year. If anyone would like to apply for the post of our glamorous sidekick, we’re still taking applications.

By Tony Rounce

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Track listing

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Side 1

  • 01 Preview I'm Ready - Fats Domino

  • 02 Preview Sermonette - Della Reese

  • 03 Preview You Went Back On Your Word - Clyde McPhatter

  • 04 Preview Here Comes Summer - Jerry Keller

  • 05 Preview Luther Played The Boogie - Johnny Cash

  • 06 Preview Charlie Brown - The Coasters

  • 07 Preview Come On-A My House - Julie London

  • 08 Preview Red River Rock - Johnny and The Hurricanes

  • 09 Preview Sweet Annie Laurie - Sammy Turner

  • 10 Preview Back In The USA - Chuck Berry

  • 11 Preview I Don't Know - Ruth Brown

  • 12 Preview Just Keep It Up (And See What Happens) - Dee Clark

  • 13 Preview Teenage Heaven - Eddie Cochran

  • 14 Preview Ring-A-Rockin' - Neil Sedaka

  • 15 Preview A Letter To An Angel - Jimmy Clanton and The Aces

  • 16 Preview Mack The Knife - Bobby Darin

  • 17 Preview Some Kind-A Earthquake - Duane Eddy

  • 18 Preview Starry Eyed - Gary Stites

  • 19 Preview Diamond Ring - Jimmy Isle

  • 20 Preview My Life - Chuck Willis

  • 21 Preview So High, So Low - LaVern Baker

  • 22 Preview Say Man - Bo Diddley

  • 23 Preview She Said "Yeah" - Larry Williams

  • 24 Preview Cruising - Jimmie and The Night Hoppers

  • 25 Preview Run, Boy Run - Sanford Clark

  • 26 Preview Let's Talk About Us - Jerry Lee Lewis

  • 27 Preview Deck Of Cards - Wink Martindale

  • 28 Preview I'm Moving On - Ray Charles

Delivery & Returns

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We offer free P&P to UK addresses. For all other territories packaging is free and postage is charged on a weight basis.

We use Royal Mail First Class for UK deliveries and standard Air Mail for all other territories, very large orders will usually be sent via parcelforce. You may cancel your order at any time prior to your order being dispatched by emailing us at orders@acerecords.com ensuring that you quote your name, address and order reference number or by telephoning +44 (0) 208 453 1311 between 9am and 5pm GMT/BST, Monday to Friday. Please note: As music downloads are dispatched immediately after purchase, there is no possibility of cancelling these orders.

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You have the right to cancel your order within seven days of purchase, or seven days of receipt of the goods (whichever is the longer). If you choose to cancel your order, full payment will be returned to you. Returned items should be sent to: “Returns” c/o Ace Records, Such Close, Letchworth Garden City SG6 1JF, United Kingdom. Music downloads should be returned to us via the email address: orders@acerecords.com including a copy of your notice of cancellation and order number.

Press quotes

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An excellent series. ★★★★

Mojo

Every track is worthy of special mention...thoroughly maintains the series' past qualities. ★★★★

Record Collector

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