By Ralph (209.240.222.130 - 209.240.222.130) on Thursday, July 04, 2002 - 10:38 pm:

I heard from Mr. Stan Messmer who is a collector who lives in my neck of the woods. He asked if he could post some information regarding the availability of the Cameo Parkway records on CD. For those of you interested in finding these rare selections he will direct you to his source.
This is strictly a " For Your Information " situation and is not to be regarded as sales on the forum. I have allowed this because quetions came up in the past regarding Cameo-Parkway and I thought there may be those on this forum that would want this information.
Stan, thank you for this information and welcome to the forum.
Ralph

By Ritchie (62.254.0.6 - 62.254.0.6) on Thursday, July 04, 2002 - 10:46 pm:

Hi Ralph

I'm sure this will be of major interest as we discussed this label at great length some time ago, and all agreed that it was high time this material was available again. The only existing CDs I am aware of were on the Marginal label, whereby hangs a tale, of course. Perhaps there is another source..?

By Ralph (209.240.222.130 - 209.240.222.130) on Thursday, July 04, 2002 - 11:01 pm:

Ritchie,
Stan has some interesting things to relate regarding this material. I'll leave it to him when he appears here.

By Ritchie (62.254.0.6 - 62.254.0.6) on Thursday, July 04, 2002 - 11:11 pm:

OK. We'll await his arrival with anticipation!
Thanks for passing this on.

By david, glasgow, scotland (213.122.33.8 - 213.122.33.8) on Friday, July 05, 2002 - 07:42 am:

I have heard some concerns regarding these cd's.

By stanzer (64.1.0.119 - 64.1.0.119) on Friday, July 05, 2002 - 08:36 am:

Greetings: I spoke with Ralph regarding this info prior to posting and he said �ok� so here goes! I recently discovered this site in looking up some info regarding the Detroit Emeralds and started reading the archives and saw some discussion on the Cameo/Parkway situation so wanted to provide this info to the group as it appears this info may not be known in England. I have been a record collector in the US for about 35 years and provide items for radio play from time to time and consult to some CD compilers here for oldies compilations and while by no means a Northern Soul expert can provide some Cameo/Parkway knowledge. Alan Klein does indeed own the masters and for whatever reason doesn�t appear to be inclined to release them on CD. I don�t think a �tiff� with former owners is the issue as many C/P titles were out in LP and/or 45 form on his ABKCO label in the US as recently as the early to mid 1980s but deleted since then. As you know, many C/P tracks are considered �essential� for radio play such as tracks by The Dovells, Dee Dee Sharp/Orlons, Bobby Rydell, Chubby Checker, ? & The Mysterians and so on. While many of these aren�t considered Northern, certain tracks of this nature are contained in some compilations. For example, The Tymes are one group anthologized on the Park label Euro-boot CD (Park 552) which contains 30 tracks, 17 in stereo, with many taken either from submasters or very clean records. Granted, these are boots but Klein�s dreadful performance in releasing/mastering the Phil Spector product leads many US collectors/radio programmers to believe this is probably the best that will ever happen for these titles as Klein will never issue a 30 track CD and even if he issues something in the future, who knows how much stereo will appear. While I�ve never seen what purports to be a complete list of these 30 track Park CDs, I do know that there are between 10-15 CDs in release and these are considered �essential� to US collectors as there are no �official� Cameo/Parkway titles in print via Klein. For most US collectors, Cameo/Parkway recordings are very hard to find except via this CD route although I do find them from time to time but they tend to be $10-$100 per 45 in mint or unplayed condition. This gets very costly very quickly!

As for Northern related items in these CDs, there are Dee Dee Sharp/Orlons anthologies but specifically The Tymes is of note as this 30 cut CD contains all the obvious ones such as �So Much In Love,� �Wonderful, Wonderful,� �Somewhere,� and �The Magic Of Our Summer Love� although �To Each His Own� was not there.

As for other Northern items, there is a 3 volume set called �All The Best� that contains mostly US pop/Top 40 tracks but does include things like Candy & The Kisses �The 81.� Bunny Siglers �Let The Good Times Roll� & �Feels So Good� and Bob Seger�s very hard to find Detroit classic �Heavy Music.� The best Northern hit is Eddie Holman�s Parkway classic �This Can�t Be True� which is a stunning transfer which is better than my mint Parkway 45. Unfortunately Billy Abbott & The Jewels �Groovy Baby� isn�t here but I know of a source for that elsewhere. If you�re looking for any of these, please Email me and I�ll pass along the Emails to dealers in the US with these CDs to help you get these. I don�t work for any of these people�just trying to relate info as one collector to others as until these CDs came out, I had huge �holes� in my record collection on C/P product.

Stan Messmer
Santa Clara, CA
Messmer@concentric.net

By Ritchie (62.254.0.6 - 62.254.0.6) on Friday, July 05, 2002 - 12:12 pm:

FYI, there is a Candy & the Kisses compilation on the (UK) Castle label, and the Eddie's My Name comp on Goldmine has Mr Holman's This Can't Be True, and other early Philly gems from the same period.

By Luke (66.222.33.182 - 66.222.33.182) on Friday, July 05, 2002 - 01:18 pm:

A few notes:

- ABKCO *IS* C/P - back in the '60s Klein purchased C/P and eventually changed the name to ABKCO.

- While ABKCO has had a terrible track record, they seem to be getting better. Last year they released a 23 track Sam Cooke CD, with 2 unreleased tracks and totally remixed in stereo. Lots of notes too. Good sound.

Also, come August 20th, the entire '60s Rolling Stones catalog is being issued by ABKCO on hybrid CD/SACD discs. They're using stereo for a lot of the early tracks, and prior to remastering they did an exhaustive search for masters around the world. They estimate that around 90% of the stuff comes from an original master. The current issue of ICE has details.

Just an FYI...

By Chip - HP (64.216.12.156 - 64.216.12.156) on Friday, July 05, 2002 - 05:49 pm:

Stan - I am not clear on the C/P CD source info which you are offering. Is it sources for the Park CDs or some other C/P CD source?