Recordmecca

If you’re a record or memorabilia collector, don’t miss last month’s Wall Street Journal article on Atlantic Records chairman Craig Kallman.  Craig, who I first met in the 90’s when I was an executive at Warner Bros. Records, has 750,000 records.  That’s right, three quarters of a million albums.  That’s got to be the largest record collection in the world.  If your significant other thinks your collection is out of control,  send them a copy of this article for a reality check.

And while quantity doesn’t often equate with quality, Craig’s collection is amazing.  For many years, he only wanted sealed original pressings, or absolutely perfect examples of the records he sought.  In the past few years, he’s relaxed his standards a tiny bit to simply mint, “to create a working library for his artists, songwriters and producers.”  He’s also got exacting standards for his incredible memorabilia collection.

And none of this would impress me if Craig didn’t love music as much as anyone I’ve met.  This is a man who lives and breathes music.  Whenever he comes to Los Angeles, he calls to see if I have anything new.  If he visits, we’re talking music when he’s not on the phone talking to an artist or executive.  He’ll leave late on a Saturday night, heading off to visit an artist or two in the studio, then waking up early for a Sunday morning breakfast with another artist.  I worked at major labels for twenty years and rarely if ever did I meet anyone as obsessed with music as Craig.

He’s converted the Manhattan apartment next to his into the ultimate listening room/recording studio/office/record haven (see it in the Journal article’s accompanying slide show.)  Craig’s got 40,000 records there — about 2% of his collection.  He often takes meetings with musicians there, as well as recording tracks with Atlantic artists in the studio.  When I visited earlier this year, he was talking private press Hip Hop records with a mutual friend.  During a lull in the conversation, I asked him to play us something, and he put on the first Hot Tuna album.  Now that’s eclectic.

If I was a young recording artist, this is the guy I’d sign with !

Jeff Gold

It’s been a crazy few months with the holiday season and the release of my book 100 Essential Rock Records: The Golden Age of Vinyl, From The Beatles to the Sex Pistols.   Below is a just-in review from my favorite music magazine, Mojo, which happily gave the book four stars (their highest rating) and made it the lead review.  Below that are some other great quotes, from Rolling Stone, Entertainment Weekly, and others.  The first printing sold out on publication date and happily the second printing has arrived, and it’s back in stock at Amazon and other fine booksellers.  Forgive the hype, but it was great to see people’s enthusiasm for vinyl records is alive and well.  Thanks to everyone who bought it.

It’s been a while since I posted, but I’ve got a good reason.  I’ve been consumed with finishing and now  launching my first book, the just released 101 Essential Rock Records: The Golden Age of Vinyl, From The Beatles to the Sex Pistols.  It’s a coffee table sized celebration of vinyl’s Golden Age, beginning with Please Please Me and ending with Never Mind The Bollocks–soon after which the Walkman was introduced, and cassettes took over as the dominant format.

It includes large photos of first pressing albums, some extremely rare, essays on vinyl records and favorite albums from Iggy Pop, Graham Nash, David Bowie, Peter Buck (R.E.M.), Robyn Hitchcock, Johnny Marr (The Smiths), Suzanne Vega, Devendra Banhart and producer Joe Boyd.  There’s also a history of the LP from Elektra Records founder Jac Holzman, a pictorial exploration of Jimi Hendrix’s personal record collection, and a history of censored album covers.

Rolling Stone called it “Record-nerd eye candy, and an insight-filled look at how great art begets great art,” while Spin profiled it as “A loving tribute to the long lasting cultural importance of the Vinyl LP.”  In the next few weeks, I’ll post some selections from the book–staring off with a few  Bob Dylan entries.  More information and spreads from the book can be seen at 101EssentialRecords.com.

On Sunday I wrote a post about helping Public Television’s History Detectives investigate a Fender Stratocaster guitar allegedly played by Bob Dylan at the 1965 Newport Folk Festival, when he famously “went electric.”  The people at History Detectives had asked me not to reveal the results of the investigation before the show airs, next Tuesday, July 17.  But yesterday Rolling Stone, The New York Times, and the Associated Press revealed the results–so here goes…

Late last year, I was contacted by a History Detectives producer who told me a viewer had approached them about a guitar that had purportedly belonged to Bob Dylan–and was possibly the Newport guitar.  The woman’s late father had been a private pilot who had flown Dylan to concerts in the mid-60’s, and she told the producers that the guitar had been left in her father’s plane after a trip.  She claimed he’d tried to return it, but never got a call back from Dylan’s office.  She also had her father’s phone book with Dylan’s phone number in Woodstock, and few snapshots he’d taken of Dylan at an airport.

The guitar case was stenciled “Property of Ashes & Sand”–Dylan and his manager Albert Grossman’s touring company during the era (and a little known name)– and there were some typed and handwritten lyrics and manuscripts in the case. Howard Kramer, curatorial director at the Rock and roll Hall of Fame had recommended me as someone who could tell them whether these were actually by Dylan.  Andy Babiuk, the guitar expert for the Hall of Fame and author of  Beatles Gear (the definitive guide to the Beatles equipment,) had agreed to evaluate the guitar, and so I agreed to take a look.

The History Detectives producer emailed me high resolution scans of thirteen pages of manuscripts, and very soon after opening them, I felt confident these were the real deal.  Over the years, I’ve examined a lot of Dylan handwriting and manuscripts, some real, a lot of it forgeries.  And some of the forgeries were quite good, with a very compelling back story.  So you really have to do your homework with this kind of thing. But these just looked good.  And had a lot of similarity to a collection I’d seen a few years ago.   So I set to work.

After a few hours of examining the pages carefully, I was convinced these were indeed authentic.  Dylan’s typing and handwriting are very idiosyncratic, and I saw many things I’d seen before.  His handwriting is ever changing–just like his music.  Years ago, I hired a former Treasury Department forensic document examiner to evaluate some Dylan documents for a lawsuit I filed.  He told me he’d never seen anyone who’s handwriting changed so dramatically over time; and instilled in me the need to compare “questioned” documents to “known” writings from the same time period–and that this was essential in Dylan’s case.  Fortunately, I had some authentic “exemplars” from the Newport era.

It was immediately clear these weren’t lyrics for well known songs.  There were phrases I recognized, though, so I  typed each line into Google, one at a time.  I found there were three fairly complete lyrics, all for unreleased songs recorded in the Blonde on Blonde era–“Jet Pilot,” “I Wanna Be Your Lover,” and “Medicine Sunday” (an early version of “Temporary Like Achilles.”)  But the eureka moment came when I notice the line “watching the six white horses pass.”  Dylan sings the lyric “Well, six white horses, that you did promise” in his classic song “Absolutely Sweet Marie,” from Blonde on Blonde.  I’m fortunate to own his manuscript for that song.  So here was an opportunity to do a direct comparison.

In the “Absolutely Sweet Marie” manuscript, Dylan writes “Six flying horses” and above the word “flying,” writes “white” and “the,”refining his lyric.  Though the words weren’t in exactly the same order, the two examples of “Six white horses”–both written during the Blonde on Blonde era were a Rosetta Stone moment.   I photoshopped the phrase from my manuscript to put the words in the same order and it was a perfect match.  The producer had asked if I could come up with a way of illustrating to viewers why I felt these lyrics and manuscripts were written by Dylan, and this was surely it.

I filmed my segment in New York City at the end of last year, and it in early January it was Andy Babiuk’s turn.  To determine if this guitar was the guitar played by Dylan at Newport, Andy needed a very clear photograph of Dylan onstage with the guitar.  And that was a problem.  We’d seen many photos and the film of Dylan at this legendary show, but everything was in black & white and shot from a distance–you really couldn’t see much detail.  Here, History Detectives really shined.  Pulling off a near miracle, producer Tom McNamara discovered some previously unknown color photographs of Dylan at Newport, on the Flickr site of a fan who attended the festival, John Rudoff.  Rudoff, a teenager at the time, had been up right up against the stage that night, and his photographs were extremely clear and detailed.  Tom contacted Rudoff and obtained large blow ups of the photographs, and brought them to Andy’s shop in Rochester, NY, along with the guitar.

Andy took the guitar apart, confirmed it was built in 1964 and was all original, and then carefully compared the wood grain on the guitar’s body and neck to Rudoff’s photographs.  Andy explained that wood grain is like a fingerprint–no two pieces of wood have identical grain.  And he found the grain on the guitar and the neck matched the guitar in the photographs perfectly.  This was indeed the Dylan Newport Stratocaster.

Last week when Andy and I saw the program for the first time, we learned the pilot’s daughter had written to Dylan’s management in 2005, asking that he release all claims to the guitar.  Dylan’s lawyers had written back declining and asking for it to be returned.  History Detectivesexplains all this in the program, even showing the correspondence, and notes that it’s unclear after all this time exactly who owns the guitar.  That takes us to…yesterday, when Dylan’s lawyer, Orin Snyder, issued the following statement:  “Bob has possession of the electric guitar he played at The Newport Folk Festival in 1965. He did own several other Stratocaster guitars that were stolen from him around that time, as were some handwritten lyrics.  In addition, Bob recalls driving to the Newport Folk Festival, along with two of his friends, not flying.” (This last part is irrelevant, as Dylan was pictured a month later at Forest Hills, NY playing an identical Stratocaster.)

It’s unclear if Dylan or his attorney have actually seen the History Detectives segment, but a number of writers have previewed the segment and wrote about it today (links below.)  The consensus seems to side with the History Detectives‘ assessment–that this is indeed the Newport guitar.  The New York Times reported “The evidence the guitar may have belonged to Mr. Dylan during that period is strong: the case is stenciled with the name of his touring company, Ashes and Sand Inc., and lyrics found inside the case appear to be in his handwriting.  But the crucial evidence is an appraiser’s assessment that the wood grain on the guitar’s body matches the wood grain visible in photographs of the guitar taken at the historic concert.”  “The producers of the show, however, say Mr. Dylan must be mistaken…They added that those working on the show would “welcome the opportunity to examine the guitar which is currently in Mr. Dylan’s possession.”

It’s ironic and yet somehow fitting that the controversy and intrigue surrounding Dylan’s “going electric” at Newport, 47 years ago, continues.  Don’t miss the show.  I think you’ll be convinced.

History Detectives, Season 10 Premiere.  Tuesday July 17.  9:00/8:00 central.    (According to one online article, History Detectives will be available for viewing the day after broadcast on the PBS Video site and PBS mobile apps for iPhone and iPad.)

And don’t forget to check out our music collectibles and other other blog posts

–Jeff Gold

The Rolling Stone and New York Times stories, and Dylan  manuscripts

The July 17 episode of Public Television’s History Detectives will be of great interest to Bob Dylan fans–and anyone interested in 60′s music and rock memorabilia.  The show, the first in History Detectives’ 10th season, is devoted to solving three mysteries involving potentially historic music artifacts.

On History Detectives, a group of researchers from various backgrounds help people answer historical questions, usually involving a family heirloom or historic object.  The show devotes itself “to exploring the complexities of historical mysteries, searching out the facts, myths and conundrums that connect local folklore, family legends and interesting objects.”

A producer from History Detectives contacted me in late 2011, asking for help with one of their “cases.”  He explained that a viewer had contacted the show about a guitar they claimed had been used by Dylan, possibly at the 1965 Newport Folk Festival when he famously “went electric.” The owner was the daughter of a pilot who had allegedly flown Dylan and other clients of his manager, Albert Grossman, including The Band and Peter Paul and Mary.  Some handwritten lyrics had been found in the guitar case, and they asked if I would inspect them to determine their authenticity.  A friend, vintage guitar expert Andy Babiuk, had agreed to examine the guitar to see if it was indeed Dylan’s, and I agreed to do the same with the lyrics.

At the end of last year, I examined the lyric sheets and filmed my interview, and a few weeks later Andy examined the guitar and filmed his segment.  History Detectives also interviewed Rolling Stone associate editor Andy Greene and former Dylan road manager Jonathan Taplin for the episode.

Dylan goes electric at Newport, 1965

Is this Dylan’s guitar ?

Me with History Detectives’ Wes Cowan

The lyrics.

Andy Babiuk, History Detective’s Elyse Luray, and the guitar.

History Detectives asked Andy and me not to discuss the results of our investigations for now–sorry–but after the show airs, I’ll post a detailed explanation of what I found.  In the meantime, I can assure all Dylan fans this is a program you won’t want to miss.  The episode also includes investigations into a painting possibly created by Frank Zappa, and autographs allegedly signed by The Beatles during their second Ed Sullivan appearance.  The research done by the History Detectives team is top notch, and there are many surprises along the way.

History Detectives, Season 10 Premiere.  Tuesday July 17.  9:00/8:00 central.    (According to one online article, History Detectives will be available for viewing the day after broadcast on the PBS Video site and PBS mobile apps for iPhone and iPad.)

See our music collectibles

See our other blog posts

–Jeff Gold

Note: another copy has just surfaced, which we have for sale here.

The original “Freewheelin’.”  One of–if not the–rarest and most valuable records in the world.  A stereo copy sold for $35,000, and a mint mono copy would likely bring $15,000.  So it’s big news when a previously unknown copy surfaces.  And I’m happy to report one just did.

“The Freewheelin’ Bob Dylan” is Dylan’s second album, released in late May, 1963.  While his self-titled debut  featured only two original compositions, eleven of  the thirteen tracks on “Freewheelin” were written by Dylan.  For reasons still not completely clear, just prior to the album’s release four of the songs were replaced with four newly recorded tracks.  Some speculate that because CBS television’s censors wouldn’t let Dylan perform “Talkin’ John Birch Blues” on the Ed Sullivan Show,  the CBS-owned Columbia Records pulled it from the album.  Others note that the four “replacement” tracks were recorded after the album was completed, and were simply too good to be left off (they included Dylan classics Masters of War and Girl From The North Country.)

In any case, replacement masters featuring the new songs were made, the artwork was changed, and Columbia released the revised album.  Except–and this later turned out to be a very big deal–someone at one of the pressing plant didn’t get the message, and a small number of copies were pressed using the old stampers.  In the 49 years since the release of “Freewheelin’,” a very few copies have surfaced that play the four “withdrawn” tracks–only two stereo copies are known, and fewer than 20 mono copies.  No one has yet solved the mystery of why so few copies escaped Columbia’s pressing plants.

I searched for a copy for nearly 10 years, finally buying one in the early 80’s for $1000–a huge amount for a record at the time.   Last month I finally found a second copy–or it found me.  An Arizona woman, Lori, emailed to say she had an original “Freewheelin'” for sale, wondering if I’d be interested.  I replied that I was extremely interested, and a few hours later Lori and her husband Ray arrived with the album.

Lori told me that she’d been given a box of old albums by her uncle in 1980, and in 1994, while pricing them for a garage sale, she discovered this was no ordinary Bob Dylan album.  She was using a “Goldmine” price guide, and saw notations on the back of the album cover suggesting the songs on the album differed from those on the album cover.  She noticed that there was a very rare version of “Freewheelin'” and checked the matrix number and confirmed that, incredibly, this was indeed the ultra rare original.  In the years since her discovery, she’d made a few half-hearted attempts to sell it, but never followed through–she lived in a rural area, and  figured it would just keep increasing in value.  She packed it away in a box from a cake tin, and figured some day she’d cash in.  But now she was moving to a different state, and decided it was time.  She’d found Recordmecca online, was coming to LA for a family visit, and decided to bring the album along, and see if she could find a buyer.  Happily, I was her first stop, and we quickly made a deal.  And now, the newly discovered “Freewheelin'” is for sale on the Recordmecca site.

In the last 40 years, I’ve checked thousands of copies of “Freewheelin'”–but have never found an original.  If you want to check yours, here’s what to look for:

Original copies have matrix numbers ending in -1A on both side (see photo below,) and include these four songs: Rocks and Gravel/Let Me Die In My Footsteps/Gamblin’ Willie’s Dead Man’s Hand/Talkin’ John Birch Blues.  Stereo copies list the rare tracks on the labels; mono copies list the replacement tracks. In either case, the record must play these four songs, not just list them on the cover or labels.

Regular copies have matrix numbers ending in -2 or a higher number, and include these four songs: Girl From The North Country/Masters of War/Bob Dylan’s Dream/Talkin World War III Blues.  The labels list the correct tracks and the disc plays these four songs.

(Note: Original Canadian copies and some promo copies of “Freewheelin'” list the rare tracks on the cover or labels but play the regular tracks.  For more details, check the excellent Dylan discography site “Searching For a Gem” – scroll down 1/3 of the page.)  If you find one, let me know !

-Jeff Gold

Since the advent of eBay, sellers have been hyping UK versions of the Jimi Hendrix Experience’s Electric Ladyland with blue type and larger photos of Noel Redding and Mitch Mitchell as “true first pressings.”  We have long disputed this claim, and now we have evidence to refute it.  For those obsessed with minutiae like this, read on.  For the rest of you, we’d suggest listening to this album—Hendrix’s masterpiece—instead.

When “Electric Ladyland” was released, Jimi Hendrix was an international superstar, and the album sold huge quantities from the outset– yet there are very few examples with blue type.  If these were first pressings, logic would dictate there would be far more blue type copies than ones with white type.

Furthermore, I’m lucky enough to own part of Jimi Hendrix’s personal record collection, including his own copy of Electric Ladyland (sold at auction by his girlfriend Kathy Etchingham.) It’s not much of a leap to assume that Jimi’s copy would be a first pressing, yet it has the white type.

The streaky blue type on the covers in question is actually a result of a printing error—it’s made up of two shades of blue, a whitish-blue and a solid blue. This is the result of what’s called a “stripping error.” Without getting too technical, printing a full color image uses a process called “four color process printing,” which creates a color image by combining tiny dots of four different color inks. When the dots don’t line up perfectly, you get an error such as the streaky printing here. An imperfect print job like this would never have been approved and would surely have been corrected immediately (as former creative director at two major labels, I have first hand experience with this.)

Electric Ladyland  was originally issued in the UK as a double album and on two individual discs, Part 1 and Part 2.  The back cover of Part 2 has similar larger photos of Mitch and Noel and a solid blue type—strongly suggesting the error originated with confusion between this and the double album’s gatefold.

Now comes the interesting part.  Last month’s Record Collector magazine featured an interview with Edwin Pouncey, the English music journalist and artist also known as Savage Pencil.  Pouncey, an occasional Recordmecca client, mentioned buying Electric Ladyland on the day of release—so we contacted him to find out what color the type was on his copy, indisputably a first pressing.

He replied “Regarding my copy of Electric Ladyland. As I wrote in the RC article, I had ordered my copy in advance and it was bought on the day of release. The writing inside this copy (that I still have) is white with the two small photos of Mitch Mitchell and Noel Redding underneath the larger photo of Hendrix – which in my copy is positioned on the left hand side of the gatefold cover. Until a few years ago I didn’t know that the blue text version existed.

Here’s something else to muddy the water still further.  A local record dealer I know once told me that he too bought a white text version on the day of release. In the shop that he bought his copy there were several empty blue text/large photo sleeves in the window. When he asked why the covers were slightly different, the shop owner replied that they had been supplied by the record company for promotional purposes. He asked if he could have one when the display came down, and the shop owner happily agreed. Unfortunately, through the passage of time, he has since lost this “promotional” sleeve, but it is an interesting story.

I also couldn’t help noticing that the UK single LP edition of EL2 is a version of the blue text inner gatefold.  The tale about the record shop does suggest that the blue cover/larger band member photos version was a printing error and that Track were giving them out as publicity items to get rid of them.”

Pouncey’s account leaves little doubt that the white type version was the original first pressing—sold on the day of release—and highly suggests, as we have long maintained, that the blue type is nothing more than an unintentional printing error.

There are many examples of insignificant printing variations or errors being hyped on eBay as true first pressings to boost the price—such as the ridiculous Sgt. Peppers “Fourth Proof” cover.  We’re happy to debunk one here.  If you want a true first pressing of Electric Ladyland, get one with white type.  And enjoy one of the greatest albums ever made.

-Jeff Gold

And by the way, have you noticed that “Electric Ladyland” has the word “Dylan” in it ?  Jimi certainly idolized him.

ADDENDUM:

From reader Warren Wilson, June 2016:  I just wanted to add a little curio here that might be connected somehow – I actually own a ‘Blue Text’ version of The Who’s ‘Tommy’ on the Track label. It’s the first press with laminated sleeve etc but the writing on the rear of the sleeve, which is usually white, has been corrupted with blue. The effect is not quite the same as on EL though because the print is much smaller, resulting in it just being difficult to read ( with the black background) but it’s essentially the same type of printing error.

Fascinating Warren, especially as the Track catalog numbers from Electric Ladyland and Tommy are only 5 apart, and the Tommy was released about six months after Electric Ladyland.  Below is a cell phone photo Warren sent of his album; clearly it has the same kind of printing error as the blue Electric Ladyland copies.  Clearly the printers were having problems!

On April 9, I was thrilled to attend the opening of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame’s new Library and Archives in Cleveland.  Many years in the making, the Rock Hall has opened a truly world class (I know it sounds crazy) study center dedicated to Rock and Roll.  The opening featured a panel discussion with academics (and the great Lenny Kaye), as well as a gala party.  But the highlight for me was touring this state-of-the-art facility.

The 22,500 square foot library and archives shares a brand new building with the Cuyahoga Community College’s Center for Creative Arts in downtown Cleveland, two miles from the main Hall of Fame building.  The archive hosts a vast collection of books, periodicals, audio and video recordings, and important archival collections (including the personal papers) of some of popular music’s most important figures, including pioneering DJ Alan Freed, Atlantic Records founders Ahmet Ertegun and Jerry Wexler, Sire Records founder Seymour Stein, Commodore Records’ Milt Gabler, Warner Bros. Records longtime chairman Mo Ostin  and former Warners and Capitol head Joe Smith.

In 1992, I donated my Jimi Hendrix collection, at that time perhaps the largest in the world, to the Hall of Fame.  My younger daughter was about to be born, and the collection filled much of what was to become her room–so I sent 26 boxes of Jimi records and memorabilia to Cleveland (it was their first donation.)  The Hall of Fame building wouldn’t open for another 3 years, but I’d attended the induction dinners since 1986 and knew it was going to happen.  Since then, I’ve donated thousands of items to the Rock Hall, and have worked with them to help further their mission to document, preserve and exhibit the history of popular music.

It was wonderful to see the library and archives open for business–and an emotional experience to see my Hendrix collection for the first time in 20 years.  As I explained to the staff, collecting was a far different enterprise in the pre-internet era.  You wrote letters to people who answered your classified ads in Melody Maker or The Rock Marketplace, posted “wanted” note cards on bulletin boards in record stores, prowled thrift shops, swap meets, flea markets, junk stores…anywhere where you might get your fix.  It was hard work.  And so it was great so see those old vinyl friends again, and know they were someplace they’d be well cared for–and available for future generations.

The library and archive is open to the public, though some of the collection is accessible only to qualified researchers, scholars and students, by appointment.  The library and archives website has a searchable database and overviews of their archival collections.  Congratulations to director Andy Leach and his team; though they’ve just opened, the library and archives is already an invaluable resource.

And it goes without saying–but I’ll say it anyway–if you’re anywhere near Cleveland, by all means, visit the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and Museum too.  They have just completed a redesign and it has never looked better.  Literally thousands of the most unusual and extraordinary music artifacts you’ll ever see — John Lennon’s Sgt. Peppers suit, Hendrix’s Stratocaster, Otis Redding handwritten lyrics, Elvis’s car, Mick Jagger’s stage outfits, The Doors instruments…it just goes on and on.  And they’ve just opened a superb new Grateful Dead exhibit  (put together by their curatorial director, Howard Kramer.)  For music obsessives like myself, a trip to Cleveland is a must.

Jeff Gold   5/6/12