Tag Archives: Columbia Records

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Music by the Hour

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Music by the HourYet another insert? Either I’ve got a stockpile of particular inserts, or I’m excessively lazy. The jury has been out for over a week.

There’s a lot to learn from an insert. They’re a time capsule filled with images and ideas of what men in suits, getting paid a lot of money, thought people desired. They’re ripe with branding, marketing ploys, and artists’ renderings of “regular people” enjoying their product. In this particular case, its Columbia Records.

Columbia Records was pretty monumental in the heyday of record utopia. Here are a few facts that Columbia Records would like you not to forget. These, and others, can be found within this iconic promotional advert. Who knew learning could be so stunning?

– The “LP” (short for Long Play) was introduced by Columbia Records and was legally backed by a registered trademark.

– Men liked to smoke.

– The “LP” debuted in 1948.

– Women enjoyed picking their nails while listening to music by the hour.

– “LPs” allow for up to thirty minutes of music per side. That’s up to one full hour of music!

– Women loved to lean, uncomfortably, on the backs of men.

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From the Makers of Gold Bond Ceiling Tile…

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Sound Off... Softy Cover SmallerNothing, and I mean NOTHING says Count Basie & Duke Ellington quite like Gold Bond Ceiling Tile. Back in 196? Columbia Special Products, a sister company of Columbia Records, teamed up with Gold Bond to promote their brand of ceiling tiles which, when installed in your “listening room,” were supposed to improve acoustics and offer an overall better listening experience. You know Gold Bond for their powders and creams that help treat diaper rash, jock itch and other moisture causing embarrassments, but what you may not know is that Gold Bond used to manufacture Silentex, “a beautifully brush textured tile with a wheat and white color… and it has no unsightly holes.” I HATE those unsightly holes! They’re just so, unsightly!

Got the urge for some do-it-yourself construction work? Unsatisfied with your current hi-fi and the quality of music it produces? Sick of that beautiful Patti Page track, Moon River sounding cockeyed and unpleasant? Then it may be time to consider installing Gold Bond Silentex. Because, as you know, with your current ceiling, “echoes bounce from surface to surface, and they can make utter hash out of what started out as good music.”

Woman SmallerOh, and the woman on the cover has figured out inception, so, there you go.

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RCA Victor’s Simple Suggestions for Proper Record Care…

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Not unlike Mercury Records thinking you’re a buffoon, RCA Victor is there to help you properly care for your record collection.

I find these Record Care inserts fairly frequently, and always enjoy the variations on the visual representations of each label’s suggestion for, well, proper record care.

RCA_ClothFor example, when applying a lint-free, damp cloth, hold said cloth between your thumb and index finger very daintily while flailing out your remaining fingers as wide as you possibly can and never, EVER rub! Got that? No rubbing records, you damned record rubber! STOP IT! After all, “this record is designed to give you many years of trouble-free listening pleasure,” but you’ve got to follow directions. Because, who enjoys trouble-ridden listening pleasure? Not this guy. Ok, moving on.

RCA_StoringRecordsThis suggestion leaves me scratching my head. “Never store records at an angle…” How would one store records at an angle? Do they rest their stack of Harry Belafonte LP’s on top of their dirty whites? Do they rest their Bob Seger albums against the cat? Help me out, somebody! The flower, however, is a nice touch.

RCA_DustFreeThis one I actually dig, but it does however raise a very psychological question: is the record going INTO the sleeve, or is it coming OUT? Not unlike a “glass half full” question… I’ll allow you to ponder as I conclude by stating: How iconic is this image? I mean, this insert is probably nearing 60 years old, and the simplicity of a circle protruding from a square is just as recognizable and distinguishable today as it was in the late 1950’s. Crazy.

The remaining suggestions for the most part make sense: Get your stylus checked (by a guy with a microscope) and never touch the playing surface (hold that record as if it were a hot potato). Never, EVER forget these suggestions and you will have many years of trouble-free listening pleasure, courtesy of RCA Victor.

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Album Review-ish: Calypso Holiday – The Norman Luboff Choir

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C CoverThis playful little selection sounds exactly like one would imagine by the parrot-laden cover and a title that is about as on-the-nose as could be humanly conceived. Throwaway titles for this album could have been: Riding the Coattails of the Rising Star, Harry Belafonte and His Successful Calypso Sound and This is Calypso Music, You Narrow-Minded Yankee.

Ok, I’ll admit, the only other Calypso music I’ve been exposed to was indeed Harry Belafonte, so this write-up isn’t going to be anything near groundbreaking (not that there would be any worry of that to begin with).  So, that having been stated, here goes:

This is an exceptionally fun album! The singers, both male and female HAD to be sore with grinning stretch marks from the making of this album. It’s good-time music. Plain and simple. Did your dog just knock over his water dish for the 17th time during the last commercial break of Gentle Ben? This album will help cheer you up. Did you just find out that your spouse has been secretly cheating on you with your younger sibling and that the raised papules on your skin sustained while swimming in that lake in early June may in fact be Swimmer’s Itch? Calypso Holiday will free you from this and seemingly ANY First World trouble.

So, Wikipedia tells me that, ahem, “Calypso is a style of Afro-Caribbean music that originated in Trinidad and Tobago from African and European roots.” Being neither African nor European, I proceed to Google “Trinidad and Tobago. “ Well, Oxnard California this is not! The women are beautiful (and wearing next to nothing), and that has GOT to be some of the bluest water I’ve ever seen (Probably Photoshopped). I’ve never had any sizable itch to travel south of San Diego, but a Port of Spain vacation has just made my bucket list.

Focus track for side 1: Dance de Limbo (Track 6). I challenge any of you to listen to this song and NOT nod your head to the simple pleasures of the religiously pure Calypso sound. Think back about that pool of water on your kitchen floor… You are now getting thoughts of raiding the closet for a broom with which to start a Limbo. Get to the back of the line, buddy, and fix me another Flying Masturbator. (It Exists)

End of side 1

Back

The first track on side 2, Sound de Fire Alarm begins an awful lot like Belafonte’s Jump in the Line (Shake Senora). I’m going to be thinking of this song while the “several-times-daily” fire trucks roll by my window to the rescue of some poor cat stranded up in a tree. Do cats still climb trees on LA’s west side?

Columbia Records put out this release in 1957, just 1 year after RCA’s release of Belafonte’s appropriately, and also on-the-nose album titled simply, Calypso. That album, having been only Belafonte’s 3rd, went on to sell over a million copies and spent 99 weeks on the U.S. Billboard charts. So, Columbia Records, being nether based in Columbia NOR, seemingly, having a creative bone in their corporate skeleton, decided to cash in on Mr. Belafonte’s raging success. As I’d mentioned, Belafonte is the only other Calypso artist I know, but I can promise that you’ll only read his name 1 more time during this write-up. Belafonte.

Allmusic.com doesn’t rate Calypso Holiday, or even provide an album cover. What type of flabbergasting tomfoolery is this! Somebody should write a letter. Here is their address:

AMG Headquarters

1168 Oak Valley Drive

Ann Arbor, MI 48108

Mr. Luboff unfortunately met his demise in September of 1987. I was eight then, and it would be close to fifteen years until I would even hear the poor man’s name. Well, he was talented, so I doubt he was poor, just poor in the sense that he’s now dead. For all I know he may have wanted to die, which would mean his death wasn’t poor at all. He had lung cancer which, I imagine doesn’t feel like a dip in the Caribbean Sea. Maybe his death was something of a sweet Calypso melody, softly kissing the ears of another eager listener. His NYT Obituary can be found here, if you’re into that kind of thing: Obit

Well, now I feel bad, having ended such an uplifting album on a morose disposition.  The inevitable Yin to the Calypso Yang, I guess.

Quickly, the back cover suggests “Records sound best on Columbia phonographs.” So, remember that the next time you’re shopping for your next hi-fi home stereo system. Or don’t. I won’t know.