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prevent a DJ/station from accidentally play-
ing or purposefully pushing the ’wrong’ side
(diluting the label’s control over the record)
and labels would not have to pay royalties
on promotional copies. Only if a single hit
in a specific market would a label begin to
press two-sided ’stock’ copies of the single
in any real quantity to distribute to stores
for sale. A losing single could be recouped
by being written o as a tax loss.
Although major labels had contracts with
their own artists who they recorded and
released records on, most labels also pla-
ced independent productions in an attempt
to get more material and more play (often
stealing artists from their original producer
if a record did become a hit). By the mid-
’70s, placing material onto major labels was
one of the only routes a small independent
producer could follow to have any commer-
cial success in recording an artist. Labels
would sign a contract with a producer to
release one or two singles; producers would
either use already recorded material or use
the money advanced to record an act. Labels
would try to secure as many productions as
cheaply as possible, quickly promotionally
pressing and distributing material, hoping it
would ’stick’ as a hit, and writing o failures
as tax losses. Labels would rarely promote
a single long enough for it to actually get
played and sink in with a radio audience,
and only the poppiest, most widely appealing
sides would get pressed to send to stations.
Out of all the ‘70s major labels promoting
African American music (Atlantic, Epic,
Capitol, and Mercury, to name some of
the larger players), Polydor was one of the
most tightly controlled – licensing a large
amount of material, pressing few copies of
each record, mostly as single-sided promos,
and giving each single very little chance to
get any play. All the artists / material on
this 2-LP are small, licensed in productions,
with only one act (Creative Source) actually
getting a contract with Polydor (and proba-
bly only after the single was released and
became a minor hit). Most of the material on
this 2-LP is even rarer as most of the tracks
are the more soulful, less poppy songs
which were relegated to the b-sides of
stock copies pressed in minute quantities.
The short-sightedness of Polydor’s policies,
even relative to other major labels, became
clear, as some of the acts on this LP (e.g.
Debbie Taylor and most notably Enchant-
ment) had later success on other major
labels that gave them more of a chance.
In any case, Polydor’s policies led to a
large amount of high quality but often
very rare material, some of which is compiled
on this 2-LP.
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