STRUCK FROM THE RECORD TRACK and DANDELION RECORDS

TRACK RECORDS

The public school rebel, the streetwise East End scenester and the guitar hero: the three men who put together Track Records were a diverse and complicated trio. But their label was to become perhaps the great indie of the 1960s, a showcase for a stable of great acts including Jimi Hendrix. The three men were Kit Lambert, Chris Stamp and, of course, Pete Townshend.

Kit Lambert, born into a rich, artistic family, served in the Army after his time at Oxford. He had a wild streak and was already no stranger to a hare-brained scheme: a filming trip to Brazil had ended in disaster in 1961 when a close friend of Lambert’s was killed by cannibals. 

When he left the service, he worked as an assistant director on The Guns Of Navarone and From Russia With Love. He became friendly with another film-maker, a slick, tough Cockney called Chris Stamp – whose older brother, Terence was already one of Britain’s brightest young actors – and the two began sharing a flat.

Kit convinced Chris that they should make a film about an up-and-coming rock band and the pair went to the Railway Tavern in Harrow Weald where a young group called The High Numbers were astonishing audiences with their blend of squalling, anarchic feedback, vicious drumming and heart-pounding energy. They were, of course, the band that would become The Who. Kit and Chris moved fast, buying the band out of their current management contract, changing their name and setting them on the road to superstardom.

The blend of Kit’s flair for publicity and sure grasp of what would sell to the new youth culture, coupled with Chris’s toughness and gritty business intuition were the perfect management team for the band. The film was soon forgotten as they began managing the band full-time. Kit encouraged Pete to explore the darker, angrier side of his song-writing, and guessed correctly that the pumping, sexually charged energy of the band could be a huge hit with young men. They dressed the band in the Mod fashion, took control of all the lighting at gigs – rare at the time for a band – and carefully shaped their image. He urged Pete on to greater ambitions in his song-writing, encouraging the genius and invention that would see them releasing such brilliantly original works as The Who Sell Out by 1967, and Tommy by the end of the decade.

The first Who album, My Generation, was a hit, and the management duo’s next step was to set up their own label. First, they had to fight a legal battle with Brunswick records to get them to release The Who. In the meantime, they released the next LP, A Quick One While He’s Away, on Reaction Records, distributed by Polydor. They released the single ‘Substitute’ on this several times, each time with a different flip-side, in order to muddy the legal waters.

(Incidentally, Reaction Records was a small but mighty Sixties indie label in its own right: a grand total of three LPs were released on it, but what a trio they were: A Quick One, and then two terrific Cream records – Fresh Cream and Disraeli Gears.)

Eventually, Kit and Chris managed to win their legal battle and, in 1967, Track Records was born. They were keen to have total artistic control of The Who’s output, of course, but there was another impetus for setting up on their own: a young left-handed guitar player from Seattle, Washington. Chas Chandler was already managing and producing him, but Kit and Chris knew that they had to get involved with Jimi Hendrix one way or the other.

The first release on the new Track Records label was the 1967 single ‘Purple Haze’ – not a bad way to open your account! If you have a white label copy of it in mint condition you can expect to pocket around £15 for it today. The label’s first LP was Are You Experienced? An original mono copy of that will set you back around £70.

Track Records signed Arthur Brown, putting out the incomparable ‘Fire’ single in 1968 and The Crazy World Of Arthur Brown LP in that year. They also put out records by the comic Murray Brown – Keith Moon’s favourite comedian – and the now very rare first single by Fairport Convention – If I Had A Ribbon Bow b/w If(stomp). Marc Bolan’s band, John’s Children released four singles in 1967. Thunderclap Newman, Marsha Hunt and Dutch rockers, Golden Earring were also on their roster, but the label, being able to be choosy with The Who and Jimi on their books, were not bound by commercial pressure. 

Roger Daltrey said: “It was a period when the record industry was growing so fast and the business couldn't keep up. Bands were leading the way; it was driven by the art and not the business. Now it’s driven by the business.”

No label epitomised that more than Track Records from 1967-1970. On the label’s first-ever press release, Kit declared:

“The label does not intend to sign artists indiscriminately. Our policy is to sign people who we consider to be unstoppable. Only artistes of the highest quality and Top Ten potential.”

For a while, they most certainly achieved that, though there are also some interesting, rare and obscure releases too by such long-forgotten bands as Cherry Smash, Tony Simon, The Precision, The Sandpebbles and Eire Apparent who even had Hendrix playing on a track. There was even a 1967 release by The Parliaments featuring a young George Clinton - that’s a £30 collectible now. 

But things fell apart at the end of the Sixties. Hendrix’s death left Track with a massive commercial hole where all their money used to be. Kit fell out, badly, with Pete over Tommy when he tried to sell it without the band’s say-so. Now heavily into drugs, the management duo was over-spending and their judgment was failing them. They were fired by the band in the early Seventies, and by 1974, Golden Earring were Track Records only act of note. Kit and Chris went to New York to produce soul act Labelle. They released a couple of tracks by The Heartbreakers in the mid-Seventies but the label folded in 1978.

Kit’s drug habit spiralled throughout the decade and he died after falling down the stairs at his mother’s house in 1981, a grim and unfitting end for a great rock personality. Chris also battled drugs but now works as an addiction counsellor. His brother is big in the gluten-free market with a range of flour and foodstuffs, The Stamp collection. In 1998, Ian Grant – the former manager of The Cult, The Stranglers, and Big Country – revived the Track Records label with Chris Lambert’s blessing. In 2000, Ian said:

“I cannot sign acts that are ‘unstoppable’ or guarantee Top Ten with every act. Such an audacious statement! But then again, if you had discovered Hendrix and The Who, wouldn't you have felt as bullish and confident as Kit did?” 

A classic record label that was created, shaped and driven by its owners, Track Records was ultimately to be a shooting star, and although it crashed and burned, it left some of rock n roll’s most revered music behind as its legacy. 

The complete discography is here

http://www.trackrecords.co.uk/history/disc.php

DANDELION RECORDS

There cannot be a rock music fan in the United Kingdom who did not at some point listen to the late John Peel’s legendary radio shows. His championing of acts from The Fall to The Undertones to PJ Harvey and the White Stripes helped countless bands on their way. But his own record label is less well-known. Here, we’ll find out a bit about Dandelion Records.

Set up in 1969 and named after his hamster (!)Dandelion was a pet Peel project that allowed him to release records he loved but which had little chance of commercial success. His judgement was pretty much always spot on: only one single made the UK charts, when Pictures in the Sky by Medicine Head reached no. 22 in 1971. In its short life (1969 – 1972), 18 Dandelion artists released 27 records, and one eccentric sampler called There Is Some Fun Going Forward. They were very close to signing Roxy Music but Island Records whisked them from under Dandelion’s noses.

Set up on idealistic, not to say somewhat shambolic, principles by John and his manager/business partner Clive Selwood, the first release was Bridget St John’s LP, Ask Me No Questions. Bridget was a singer/songwriter in the Joni mould, a relatively conventional proposition. Nevertheless, they had a hard time finding a major to distribute them. As Clive recounts:

“Though Peely had helped Decca and EMI earn millions from acts they never knew they had, he was still regarded as a dangerous hippie...”

They eventually managed to get a deal with CBS, and were later distributed by Warner and Polydor, but the acts were resolutely non-commercial.

They attempted to revive the career of Gene Vincent, releasing an album called I'm Back and I'm Proud, but by this time the legendary rocker was a drunk and more or less a liability. He wasn’t the only Dandelion signing who was a challenging proposition: they had also signed a sort of pre-punk band called Stackwaddy (not a hybrid of Stackridge and Showaddywaddy), who Peel unwisely chose to showcase the label in front of horrified WEA suits. They worked on building sites by day, came straight from work, smashed into the free drink at the record company office and were paralytic by the time they came to play. The singer took a piss on the stage and they could hardly get through a song. Later that same night, they were on their way to play another gig when one of them was sick on a policeman, earning the group a night in jail.

But there were highlights too. The recording of an Australian band called Python Lee Jackson was curtailed due to the singer being too drunk (bit of a theme here). An unknown called Rod Stewart was brought in to replace him for the session. Rod’s fee? Some spare parts for his car, from the band’s manager – who also sold second-hand motors! Rod and The Faces were Peel’s favourite live band for many years and of course, he was on that famous Top Of The Pops appearance when the band played Maggie May, with Peely, looking a bit sheepish, perched on a stool ‘playing’ mandolin.

The label’s biggest success was with Machine Head, a two-piece, bluesy, multi-instrumentalist duo who had three hits in the early Seventies. Another act, Tractor, were big on the hippy festival circuit and are still playing today, But the Dandelion label itself was not to exist for long: it disbanded in 1973. They just didn’t have the financial clout to hold onto the calibre of artist necessary.

It seemed that this would be the end of the Dandelion story, but mint condition LPs from the label sell for a good whack. A German label, Repertoire, reissued six of them and a fair bit of the catalogue is available on Cherry Red. A six hour DVD tribute to John and the label was released in November last year.

Like John’s radio shows, the label showcased stuff he thought was great, no matter how weird or commercially untenable. He didn’t, it turns out, have quite the genius for label management as he did for playlist selection, and it wouldn’t be unfair to say that Dandelion released the odd stinker, but – like the man himself – the passion and energy and sheer mad love of the music shines through in everything they did. And that’s not something you can say about a lot of labels.

AT