A BEATLES' HARD-DIE'S SITE


Received - Rarities from Europe 2

Hallo !
I`ve scanned some labels for You with cover versions of Beatles songs:

Baccarola was a german cheapo- label covering mostly german Schlager. They had no great experience with english- sung titles, and the (presumably) studioband featured on this side of the single is mixing up the words a bit.

Tempo was located in Munich, Germany, also concentrating on coverversions of current hits. Many of the english numbers were made by british studiobands. These four Beatlessongs were played by "The Beat Kings". By the way, a Tempo- single did cost 3.95 Deutsche Mark, a regular one 6 DM.

Another german ep- cheapo- label was Tip. These singles had a very thin sound, but again , four songs for less money. "The Ravers" was one of easily more than fifty (!) pseudonyms of the beatband "The Tonics" from Hamburg.

Seems that "The Rockernors" on Top Hit weren`t even allowed to get a proper text of "We can work it out". Again a german cheapo.

Embassy was a british label that was sold in Woolworth-stores, from the fifties until 1965 (If You are interested, read about it at http://www.embassyrecords.co.uk/index.html ). "The Typhoons" were another bunch of different sessionmen, depending on who was handy. Making mostly good sounding records, they sold a lot of them to a lot of other cheapo- labels, for example

Juke Box. But this swedish label also featured "regular" scandinavian beatbands, as well as american soul and rhythm & blues stars, even Chubby Checker coupled with the Beatles (albeit only "My bonnie" and "The Saints" from the Polydor- aera).
Danvox sounds very danish, but the label reads "Switzerland International", and it was made in Italy...- The songs featured on the backside of the cover are all in italian language, but this one seems to be an odd exception: The a- side reads "Ob- La- Di - Ob- La- Da", the singer is male and sings in english, the b- side reads "Obladi - Oblada`", and the singer is a woman singing in italian language. And the backgroundmusic on both sides is identical...

The next three singles are of british origin:
Top 6 as well as Top Six feature six songs, with of course a very thin sound, and not mentioning the musicians. I guess these were the kind of birthday gifts from good hearted relatives, that every beatfan had to fear. I am lucky, though, they do exist.

Just the same with Top Ten. Because of the line "Aral Records" on top of the label I as sume it was given away with some litres of fuel. Note that the man responsible for the production is one Peter Sterling, who was to delighten (some of) us with songs like "Beautiful Sunday" as Daniel Boone in the seventies.
At last two "proper" beatbands, that is to say no sessionmen.
From Czechoslovakia came the Crystals, playing the Peter and Gordon- hit "World without love" on the czechoslovakian label Supraphon, three years after it`s been a hit, and a year befor the Prague Spring.

The biggest danish record company was Triola, and one of the biggest acts during the sixties was Peter Belli, starting with the beatband "Les Rivals". Here he sings "Obladi, Oblada" and "Bungalow Bill" in danish.

That`s all for now,
greetings to You -
Joe
Many many thanks once more, Joe... Very cool stuff!

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