5x7

As I've mentioned before, I don't always have the patience to look through boxes of 7" singles, but when albums are thin on the ground I sometimes have a rummage, and somehow over the past 12 months I've amassed quite a few.  Here's a somewhat random selection.

Bought for 50p at a car boot sale last August was this well-known record from British vocal trio The Avons.

The Avons - Seven Little Girls Sitting In The Back Seat b/w Alone At Eight (1959)

After an inauspicious start, sister-in-law duo The Avon Sisters (stepsisters Valerie and Elaine Murtagh) dropped the "Sister" part of their name and teamed up with singer Ray Adams.  Seven Little Girls Sitting In The Back Seat was their debut single and their biggest hit, topping out at no.3 in the UK.  The song was first recorded earlier that year by US singer Paul Evans, who took it to no.9 in his home country.

I'm very fond of this cheeky but wholesome pop song about a frustrated motorist (driving what must be a fair sized vehicle considering the passenger load) and his polyamorous pal, especially the pleasing "de-doody-doom-doom" backing vox.

From the same seller and also costing 50p was another old favourite on Columbia, this time from Bobby Vinton.

Bobby Vinton - Blue Velvet b/w Is There A Place (Where I Can Go) (1963)

Blue Velvet was a top 20 hit for Tony Bennett in 1951, then The Clovers in 1955 and The Statues in '59.  Vinton had the most success with it, his piningly nostalgic rendition bagging two weeks at the top spot in the US in 1963.  Although it didn't dent the UK chart, it eventually achieved a no.2 placing in 1990 when it was re-released, four years after it had been heavily featured in David Lynch's noir of the same name inspired by the song.  The most recent version was Lana Del Ray's brooding interpretation, used in a TV ad for H&M in 2012.

Car boot season isn't up and running in my part of the world just yet, so I've been relying on the local charity shops for second hand music fixes.  This has meant mostly CDs, but a couple of weeks ago I bought the first lot of chazza vinyl of 2017; a handful of 50p singles including this on Disques Vogue from Pet Clark.

Petula Clark - Il Faut Revenir (You'd Better Come Home) b/w Un Jeun Home Bien (1965)

Founded in 1947, Disques Vogue began by releasing jazz by American and French artists, expanding into pop towards the end of the '50s.  Petula Clark signed with the label in 1957 and started having French-language hits in Europe as well as continuing to chart at home in the UK on Pye Records with songs sung in English.  She also recorded material in Italian, Spanish and German, and her worldwide smash Downtown was released in four different languages.

Il Faut Revenir (You'd Better Come Home) came out in 1965, and the b-side is a very tasty French-language cover of A Well Respected Man by label-mates the Kinks.  This cover was also released as an a-side the same year on the Vogue Productions imprint, with a song called Las Vegas on the flip.


Also on Disques Vogue is this by François Hardy, bought at a boot sale last summer (another 50p-er).

François Hardy - Si C'est Ca b/w Je Serai La Pour Toi (1966)

Parisienne swoon-inducing pop singer Hardy joined Vogue in 1961, and like Clark sings in Italian and German as well as French and English.  This single (the titles translate as If This Is It and I'll Be There For You) was a British release, made in England and distributed by Pye.  Both sides are lovely; Si C'est Ca features just minimal guitar behind Hardy's enchanting vocal, but the slightly more produced b-side Je Serai La Pour Toi just edges it for me.

Pye's association with Disques Vogue meant that they put out this next single on both imprints.  I bought a copy in a local E.A.C.H. (East Anglian Children's Hospice) shop at the very end of December last year for a pound.  (Sadly mine is the UK Pye version, not the rather sought-after French release.)

The Honeycombs - Have I The Right? b/w Please Don't Pretend Again (1964)

The Honeycombs were a squareish sixties London beat group, and were unusual for their time in having a female drummer; Ann 'Honey' Lantree, an ex-salon assistant to founding member and former hairdresser Martin Murray (rhythm guitar).  Have I The Right? was written by Ken Howard and Alan Blaikely, who'd later go on to write for many other artists, including Dave Dee, Dozy, Beaky Mick & Tich, Pet Clark, Lulu and, er, Rolf Harris.  Produced by Joe Meek, the thumping beat of HITR? was bolstered by band members stomping on the stairs to the studio, to which Meek had attached a series of microphones using bicycle clips.  This beefy stomp plus the novelty of a big-haired girl drummer helped propel the single to the top of the charts in the UK plus three other countries, with worldwide sales estimated at a million.  Pye's canny practise of putting out multi-lingual releases was employed, with the German-language version reaching the same place in the German chart a month after the English original, and the label's penchant for artistic cross-pollination resulted in the band's fourth single being a cover of a Kinks song.  It was called Something Better Beginning, and it flopped.  Here they are with their smash hit to see us out.

You can keep up with all of my car boot and chazza finds by clicking the Twitter follow button at the top of the page, and hear me playing some of them on the all-vinyl cloudcast here: https://www.mixcloud.com/carbootvinyldiaries/

2014 Catch-Up Part 2

This is the second in a four-part catch-up of the records I got from this season's car boot sales here on the (mostly) sunny Suffolk coast.  Part 1 can be found here: http://carbootvinyldiaries.blogspot.co.uk/2014/10/2014-catch-up-part-1.html

In July I picked up Bruce Springsteen's debut album Greetings From Asbury Park, N.J. in great condition for £1:

Bruce Springsteen - Greetings From Asbury Park, NJ
(1973)

Although it received positive reviews upon release, the spirited, industrious rock'n'roll of Greetings.. only sold an initial 25,000 copies in its first year.  Since then it's deservedly sold much better and has won the position of no. 379 on Rolling Stone's '500 Greatest Albums of All Time' list.  I have this on CD already, but couldn't leave it behind for the sake of a quid.

Another Bruce record I have on CD and again couldn't resist on vinyl, this time for £3 from a boot sale in August, was 1982's Nebraska:

Bruce Springsteen - Nebraska (1982)

Famously written and recorded as a series of demos, the ten tracks that make up the album were released unaltered from the cassette Springsteen made at home on a 4-track recorder after sessions with the E Street band failed to capture their rawness.  It's a dark, haunting record with mainly bleak, often harrowing stories of violence, escape and death. If you don't already have it, I recommend it highly.


More lightweight but equally good fayre next, in the shape of the Average White Band's second album AWB:

Average White Band - AWB (1974)

Released forty years ago (in the year of my birth), AWB was Scots funksters The Average White Band's debut for Atlantic after leaving MCA, reaching no. 6 in the UK album chart. Sadly, drummer Robbie McIntosh died the same year of an accidental heroine overdose so this album represents his best, last work.  Steve Ferrone took over the sticks and the band's subsequent LPs Cut The Cake and Soul Searching also entered the top ten.  I paid £1 for this corker of an album.


Another £1 bargain was this album from sophisticated chanteuse Françoise Hardy:

Françoise Hardy - In English (1969)

'In English' is exactly what you'd expect - Ms Hardy taking a break from her native tongue and singing a selection of her material in English, including her biggest UK hit All Over The World.  Note that this is a slightly different version of her 1966 album of the same name and more confusingly, uses the same cover photograph as 1967's Ma Jeunesse Fout Le Camp.  My top track: the beautiful Autumn Rendezvous.


One particularly hot Sunday in July saw me spending £4 on this 1980s repress (with the CBS 'Nice Price' inner sleeve) of Dylan's Bringing It All Back Home:

Bob Dylan - Bringing It All Back Home (1965)

Containing such classics as Subterranean Homesick Blues, Maggie's Farm and It's Alright, Ma (I'm Only Bleeding), it rightly takes its place at no. 31 on the Rolling Stone list of the 500 Greatest Albums of All Time.  You can hear me playing On The Road Again (and lots more besides) on Episode 7 of the Car Boot Vinyl Diaries Cloudcast here: http://www.mixcloud.com/CarBootVinylDiaries/car-boot-vinyl-diaries-episode-7/


Also featured on Episode 7 is a song from South African male choral group Ladysmith Black Mambazo's 25th album, 1987's Shaka Zulu, which I bought for £1:

Ladysmith Black Mambazo - Shaka Zulu (1987)

The soothing a capella recording consists of new versions of previously released material, this time produced by Paul Simon with whom they forged a musical relationship during their appearance on Graceland the year before.  Some of the songs are sung in English, and this accessibility, coupled with Simon's involvement, made it a hit in the US leading to a Grammy award for Best Traditional Folk Recording.


Lastly - for Part 2 of the Catch-Up at least - again for £1, was Difford & Tilbrook's self-titled release from 1984:

Difford & Tilbrook (1984)

I can't find a chart placing for this sole album as a duo made two years after Squeeze split, so I'm assuming it didn't do that well, which is a shame as although it has a rather dated 80s quality that's quite brittle in places, there's melody aplenty.  Standout tracks are singles Hope Fell Down and Love's Crashing Waves.  It's hard to find these days, so grab it if you see it.


Part 3 of the Catch-Up to follow soon-ish; in the mean time keep up with my boot sale finds on Twitter @VinylCarBooty and listen to the CVBD Cloudcasts here: http://www.mixcloud.com/CarBootVinylDiaries/