Teenbeat: January 2025 round up

 Well it is Internet Free Saturday.

A mess up being polite by the people responsible means we have no internet or much else today so today we are going to look a couple of things one being Now Yearbook, who having given us the main 1977 volume which we brought the three Lp version last year have released the Extra on three cds.

An annoyance with the otherwise excellent series is we don’t get at the time vinyl editions of the Extras, just as with the 1980-84 portion two boxes of one set of extras that are close but not identical to the corresponding cd issues.

The cd features some sixty-two songs taking in Queen’s Good Old-fashioned Lover Boy from the Queen EP, the last Rubettes single to trouble the charts Baby I Know and it’s era mates the Bay City Rollers with It’s A Game with a good helping of the New wave from the Stranglers, Jam and Boomtown Rats plus Disco from Shalamar, Diana Ross, Tavares and many of the supremely talent Philadelphia International acts like Billy Paul.

Pop was well served by The Brotherhood of Man, classic rock as we call it today by Thin Lizzy and Status Quo and an ever present Donna Summer.

I do hope much of this makes its way lp in due course.

The other thing has been rediscovering my Mariah Carey albums mainly from the 90’s which I’d bought on compact disc and minidisc and original dvd of Glitter, the much maligned film based on the story of a young female singer that caused issues for her and put something of a cloud over her then unassailable career.

Teenbeat: More stereo explosions from the past

What was billed as a major snow storm was really rather a damp squid here at the weekend so all the preparation was really rather wasted with a centimetre of snow at the most but something it did do was give me the opportunity to listen to the latest in a series of special cds for collectors.

The stereo explosion series of cds was a new series started a few years ago by the enterprising Eric Records company in Oshawa, On., Canada who specialize in finding and re-issuing original hit recordings that in an era where albums are more coveted the single version which is often different is hard to find new.

There was a period in the United States especially where such records were tossed out as singles especially mono single mixes were seen as "old hat" and not worth spending money on storing.

A lot of research and time finding them even if sometimes a clean original record may be the only available option would be undertaken and they'd issue compilations of them for collectors and presenters of vintage chart shows.

The Stereo Explosion series follows the same concept they would try to find the stereo single and using modern techniques of using artificial intelligence in audio extract individual elements within a recording that wasn't issued in stereo and remix that to stereo.

We had got up to Volume 10 in 2023 and just before CatMas, Volumes 11 and 12 were issued.

Volume 11 is more the mid 1950's to early 1963 period covering rock and roll as shown by the Elvis Presley selections, early R&B/Soul from Sam Cooke, Gladys Knight and classic pop fromthe Crystals and Chiffons.

A tidal wave swept the American charts from the end of December 1963 wiping out much of what had gone before and it was British and this selection from  mainly 1964 and 5 captures many of these sounds although the likes of the Beatles aren't covered.

There's no problem finding anything by them on cds!

Singles in the UK often weren't on albums, were often only mixed into mono for playing on Radio Luxembourg and inexpensive portable record players and so seldom have a true stereo mix...until now.

This just imagine my delight to hear the seriously brilliant Yardbirds perform For Your Love, Bits And Pieces by the DC5, Please Don't Go by Them and I Can't Explain by the Who in very credible clean sounding stereo.

Recordings that influenced the next wave of American acts and actually Berry Gordy of Motown really rated the production and beat of those early DC5 songs.

Also included are the awesome Animals, Manchester's Hermans Hermits and those Swinging Blue Jeans with the infectious Hippy Hippy Shake.

The out of this world Telstar produced by the amazing Joe Meek appears sounding really fresh with the second mix a generation higher than the one used for the single sounding clearer than ever.

For those of us who love pop hits of the 50's and 60's these discs are just great for the songs, memories now in stereo sound.