Contempo Record Club - Blues and Soul 1971

[MIKEW-UK]

won't allow upload of jpeg

[jsmith]

I bought from B&S / Contempo at that time & still have their 1971 catalogue [[luckily) ... the prices they charged for US 45's back then was great. If I'd have known about Cleveland's Way out Records back then, I'd have bought the Harmonics 45 for 50p -- it turns out that this was quite a rare single [[not too many copies being pressed up).21122

[jsmith]

The above is way too small to see on here ... so ...
21123

[kenneth]

This is very interesting. I never heard of a Record club that sold 45s. What were the terms and conditions of joining, if you were a member?

[MIKEW-UK]

I have been trying to post that exact page but for some reason I am stopped from posting due to exceeding posting allowance:confused: Anyone know the problem and the fix? Never encountered before during several years of posting.....

Contempo Record Club was merely the name of their record sales operation. There was no membership, no registration, no joining fee. It was just a name but it did perhaps infer you were buying as a ‘member’ of the cognoscenti or in-crowd.

Contempo was a British company with an office in London for their Blues and Soul Magazine. Every Saturday, one could visit their very basic upstairs area and they would spin records and you could choose what to buy. I recall buying records directly from John Abbey and David Nathan. The mail order record operation, Contempo Record Club, offered UK releases of soul 45s for 50 pence, and US releases for 75p, postage included.

Pre packed Soul packs of 10 US label 45s were available for £1, and 50 for £4. Amazing value. The Contempo operation and their Blues and Soul Magazine were hugely influential in promoting soul music in the U.K., with authoritative interviews with US acts and reviews and credits of US releases. It was really exciting visiting their offices and deciding what to buy; wonderful times

[jsmith]

Their SOUL PACK selections ... well, one example of them at least ...

[jsmith]

Mike, I have the same problem as you all the time. Basically, all pics you load to threads are stored on the SDF system for all time. You are only allowed a certain amount, when you reach that, you can no longer post new stuff. You have to go into your 'settings' section, find the attachments bit and start deleting old ones. That way, you'll free up space & that'll mean you can start posting jpegs again [[till you hit the limit once more)..

[MIKEW-UK]

Pity becsuse storage is now so ridiculously cheap. I view SDF as a historical record of all aspects of soul music and all things Motown generated by forum members. It is a pity that some of the contributions lose their supporting pictures.

[144man]

I have been trying to post that exact page but for some reason I am stopped from posting due to exceeding posting allowance:confused: Anyone know the problem and the fix? Never encountered before during several years of posting.....

Contempo Record Club was merely the name of their record sales operation. There was no membership, no registration, no joining fee. It was just a name but it did perhaps infer you were buying as a ‘member’ of the cognoscenti or in-crowd.

Contempo was a British company with an office in London for their Blues and Soul Magazine. Every Saturday, one could visit their very basic upstairs area and they would spin records and you could choose what to buy. I recall buying records directly from John Abbey and David Nathan. The mail order record operation, Contempo Record Club, offered UK releases of soul 45s for 50 pence, and US releases for 75p, postage included.

Pre packed Soul packs of 10 US label 45s were available for £1, and 50 for £4. Amazing value. The Contempo operation and their Blues and Soul Magazine were hugely influential in promoting soul music in the U.K., with authoritative interviews with US acts and reviews and credits of US releases. It was really exciting visiting their offices and deciding what to buy; wonderful times

Their shop, which was near Tottenham Court tube station, was a regular port-of-call for me too.