Thank you, ex-Islander, Rob Bell for your expert comments on the third edition of The Island Book of Records.
Read his review on Rob Bell’s website
The website 78Crazy.com, has an online flea market for old records, musings on old friends, odd happenings, aging jeeps, vintage record players, and anything else …
Wait… who is Rob Bell?
One of the go-to people we speak with for getting the real facts.
“I was with Island Records, in 1965, and then briefly with Transatlantic Records in 1966, and then back to Island in 1968, and thence to Trojan, right at the dawn of Reggae. Working out of the legendary Music House, at the bottom of Neasden Lane in Willesden, we watched reggae first hit the charts in the UK, and then literally storm the world. Chart records by The Pioneers, Desmond Dekker, The Upsetters, Boris Gardner, Dave and Ansel Collins, Dandy Livingstone, The Maytals, The Melodians, Jimmy Cliff, Bob and Marcia, Greyhound, Freddie Notes and the Rudies … the list goes on and on.
“And this was three years before Bob Marley broke through. (Link here to Island/Trojan memoir) Meanwhile, Island was home to Traffic, King Crimson, Jethro Tull, Fairport Convention, Mott The Hoople, Roxy Music and countless others. It was the destination label for aspiring young bands.
“Returned to Island in late 1979 at the time of the Two-Tone ska revival, organized the company’s Jamaican archive, and came to the USA in 1980, to search for the ghost of Jack Kerouac. Early in the trip I ran into Roomful of Blues in Atlanta, Georgia where the band was playing a three-night stand, and blown away by their jump blues repertoire and impeccable musicianship, got the band record deals in Europe and ended up working with them for the next twenty-two years as manager, publicist and occasional sound engineer. It was one more great job in a long list of great jobs …
“I got to travel the immense vastness of the USA, plus much of Europe, and while doing so got to work with, hear and meet so many wonderful musicians, such as Earl King, Eddie ‘Cleanhead’ Vinson, Big Joe Turner, Jimmy Witherspoon, Jay McShann, Koko Taylor, Lightnin’ Hopkins, Big Mama Thornton, Percy Mayfield, Albert Collins, The Fabulous Thunderbirds, Stevie Ray Vaughan, Anson Funderburgh, Robert Cray, Jimmy McCracklin, Bobby Parker … the list goes on and on and on…
