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Interesting West Indies Single
Topic Started: Sep 22 2014, 05:18 PM (678 Views)
socorro
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Hi all,

I saw this single on ebay, and it raised a few questions.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/BEATLES-SEXY-SADIE...1#ht_461wt_1153

1. There is no designation of manufacturer on the disc, and the sole geographic designation is "manufactured under licence in the west indies." No reference to Gloken, which was found on earlier singles (and the Parlophone LPs) from Jamaica.

2. The title print is considerably larger than earlier Jamaican singles.

3. The sleeve states "manufactured exclusively by Lee Enterprises (Holdings) Ltd." and provides a Jamaica address and phone number.

I wonder of this is exactly as it appears -- a Jamaican single from 1968 or later, pressed in Jamaica by a company other than Gloken. If so, that's a pretty interesting piece of information.
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namralos
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The copy on discogs has the same kind of sleeve, so I would agree.
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servi
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Indeed. The copies shown in books by Maus and Watzek also have the same sleeve so probably not a gloken press. We discussed WIRL also, but I forgot what we concluded or what jae said and can't find the thread.
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socorro
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The most interesting thing I've noted about the WIRL singles is that there seems to be some overlap between WIRL Jamaica and WIRL Barbados. I'm pretty sure HJ/Revolution was pressed in both countries, and my perhaps faulty recollection is that there were others. Jae's documents show that by 1967 EMI's Caribbean operation had (at least on paper) moved to Barbados.

I'd be interested to see if this single is the only Beatles record pressed by Lee Enterprises.

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pinio65
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https://www.facebook.com/pinio65/photos/a.3...?type=3&theater
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Jae
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Hehe. Lee Enterprises was owned by Byron Lee...the same guy who, by 1969, owned WIRL (renamed Dynamic Sounds in May '69). ;)

(Remember, WIRL's pressing plant burnt down in late '68 so presumably Byron used 'his' when he bought the company from owner and future Jamaican PM Edward Seaga).

And, as we know, both WIRL(Bar) and Dynamic Sounds were EMI/Capitol licensees into the 1970s.
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servi
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Ahhhhh......thanks Jae.
Have you found anything on Gloken Co. Ltd ? I only was able to find an OCR file from the kingstown herald 1957, mentioning Ken Khouri (it's GloKen apparantly):

I parent company w ill manu- I I facture records for various dis- I tnbutmg companies haxe been formed Tnese include Rec- ords Limited d stnbi.tnrs rf Mer- cury and Cah pso reiords. Ken tone Limited distributors fni Decca of the S and BrunswicV of GloKen Company distributors of Capitol Phonodisc dis tributors for Herald ant4 as well as Monogram Rhythm and Blues recorrs Federal Record Manufac- turing Co. are now fully equipped to record for individual emploving a staff of about twenty workers m the office and factnrv. They anticipate reaching peak production in just over a month from the opening date a acoustically- perfect studio where weekly disc jockey will be a mam fea- ture of the Company's newest record-manufacturing techniques Mr. Ken Khouri disclosed this week that the Company is to a large extent a reality due to the hard excellent cooperation and techn'ral assistance accorded by IDC uith whom he has worked in clotp collaboration to effect completion of the fac-
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Jae
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FFS, of course! GLOria plus KENneth equals GloKen (Gloria was Ken's wife)! They both owned Federal Records.

I'll do some more digging...
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servi
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Wow, that's excellent info. Finally we know what Gloken means.
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Jae
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But why did they form this company when they already had Federal Record Manufacturing Co Ltd, which, by its name appears to cover the manufacturing???
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Jae
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So it seems that Federal Records/GloKen was the Capitol licensee until sometime in the 1960s (1966 or 1967 it would seem) when WIRL took over, with its own pressing plant.

Then the plant burnt down in late 1968, providing Byron the opportunity to buy WIRL off Seaga, and in the process using his own plant until he built a new one on the Bell St premises, now renamed to Dynamic Sounds.

Does this fit in with label evidence?
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Jae
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Jae,Sep 24 2014
10:00 PM
But why did they form this company when they already had Federal Record Manufacturing Co Ltd, which, by its name appears to cover the manufacturing???

I've figured it out by reading the newspaper that the above OCR text came from... https://www.google.com.au/url?sa=t&source=w...F4S5ketkGQ_T5YQ

FRM was the parent and manufacturer and GloKen was the company set up as distributor for Capitol. Other companies were set up to distribute other international labels.

Just gotta confirm the Parlophone link to GloKen...
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servi
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Yes, fits with the labels. LPs up till 1966 appear only on GloKen, while later singles such as obladioblada have Lee Holding sleeves and lack GloKen references. Wonder if WIRL Jamaica was unable to press records (WIRL-B did LPs) and if Jamaica was only importing Beatles LPs after 1966.
Indeed it's most likely that GloKen was solely set up for pressing Capitol and Parlophone releases (all Parlo pressings mention GloKen so that must have been part of the deal). There's also a Capitol Shirley Bassey pressing with Gloken reference.
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socorro
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Wow, what a breakthrough! I will need some time to digest all this new information.

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admiral halsey
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My son has this single and taunts me with it as he knows I need it for my "all songs on singles collection" :angry: :angry: :angry:

AH
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