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Post by lonelysummer on Mar 29, 2024 3:58:04 GMT
Has anyone here ever collected the Beach Boys albums released by Pickwick? A couple of my early BB purchases were Pickwick albums - because they were cheap. I'm attaching a chart from Record World, the earliest one I've seen showing sales of budget albums. Attachments:
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Post by lonelysummer on Mar 29, 2024 3:59:21 GMT
These are the two I owned. I traded them away when I started getting the real albums. Attachments:
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Post by Sheriff John Stone on Mar 29, 2024 11:36:43 GMT
Has anyone here ever collected the Beach Boys albums released by Pickwick? A couple of my early BB purchases were Pickwick albums - because they were cheap. I'm attaching a chart from Record World, the earliest one I've seen showing sales of budget albums. I wouldn't say I collected them but I did purchase a couple of them in my newbie days. Yes, they were cheaper, but I bought them out of necessity. Where I lived and in the record stores I frequented, you couldn't find the original albums. They were almost all out of print, especially the earlier ones. And, of course, the Pickwick albums featured the earlier material.
I do remember that the packaging was a little...cheap. The cardboard seemed a little flimsy, and I remember buying a Pickwick album that had no paper sleeve, just the vinyl inside the cardboard cover. I did buy the Surfer Girl album you pictured above. Here's another two I bought for around $1.99 a piece:
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Post by B.E. on Mar 29, 2024 12:39:57 GMT
I have Good Vibrations, Wow! Great Concert!, and the self-titled (20/20 cover) in my collection.
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Post by lonelysummer on Mar 30, 2024 19:05:16 GMT
It was confusing to me in my early years of collecting, seeing Pickwick albums with titles borrowed from Capitol albums, Surfer Girl, Little Deuce Coupe; or that album with the 20/20 photo. But people bought them because they were cheap, and sometimes easier to find than the Capitol albums. And then there were albums like this. Attachments:
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Post by Sheriff John Stone on Mar 30, 2024 19:40:52 GMT
It was confusing to me in my early years of collecting, seeing Pickwick albums with titles borrowed from Capitol albums, Surfer Girl, Little Deuce Coupe; or that album with the 20/20 photo. But people bought them because they were cheap, and sometimes easier to find than the Capitol albums. And then there were albums like this. Those 2fer albums were two of the first Beach Boys' albums I ever bought, again because the original ones were out of print or nearly impossible to find.
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Post by lonelysummer on Mar 31, 2024 3:19:36 GMT
It was confusing to me in my early years of collecting, seeing Pickwick albums with titles borrowed from Capitol albums, Surfer Girl, Little Deuce Coupe; or that album with the 20/20 photo. But people bought them because they were cheap, and sometimes easier to find than the Capitol albums. And then there were albums like this. Those 2fer albums were two of the first Beach Boys' albums I ever bought, again because the original ones were out of print or nearly impossible to find.
Not that I have anything against bikini clad girls, but I have to wonder what the Warners art department was thinking?
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Post by Sheriff John Stone on Mar 31, 2024 3:58:17 GMT
Those 2fer albums were two of the first Beach Boys' albums I ever bought, again because the original ones were out of print or nearly impossible to find.
Not that I have anything against bikini clad girls, but I have to wonder what the Warners art department was thinking? You're right. Those album covers had absolutely nothing to do with the actual albums ( Smiley Smile, Wild Honey, Friends, 20/20) they represented. Reprise was frantically putting albums out to try to both counter Capitol Records' success with Endless Summer and Spirit Of America - and to jump on the Beach Boys' bandwagon. Reprise didn't make much money with Sunflower, Surf's Up, Carl & The Passions: So Tough, and Holland.
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Post by lonelysummer on Mar 31, 2024 20:26:44 GMT
Not that I have anything against bikini clad girls, but I have to wonder what the Warners art department was thinking? You're right. Those album covers had absolutely nothing to do with the actual albums ( Smiley Smile, Wild Honey, Friends, 20/20) they represented. Reprise was frantically putting albums out to try to both counter Capitol Records' success with Endless Summer and Spirit Of America - and to jump on the Beach Boys' bandwagon. Reprise didn't make much money with Sunflower, Surf's Up, Carl & The Passions: So Tough, and Holland. Maybe they should have released those 4 with new covers. Surf's Up with some bikini girl by the ocean; Sunflower with a girl in a field surrounded by daisies, tulips, etc. Holland with some of the beautiful girls from that land. And CATP with...I don't know?
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Post by Sheriff John Stone on Apr 1, 2024 11:43:23 GMT
You're right. Those album covers had absolutely nothing to do with the actual albums ( Smiley Smile, Wild Honey, Friends, 20/20) they represented. Reprise was frantically putting albums out to try to both counter Capitol Records' success with Endless Summer and Spirit Of America - and to jump on the Beach Boys' bandwagon. Reprise didn't make much money with Sunflower, Surf's Up, Carl & The Passions: So Tough, and Holland. Maybe they should have released those 4 with new covers. Surf's Up with some bikini girl by the ocean; Sunflower with a girl in a field surrounded by daisies, tulips, etc. Holland with some of the beautiful girls from that land. And CATP with...I don't know? I'm OK with Sunflower and Surf's Up's album covers, not so much with Carl & The Passions: So Tough and Holland.
Back to the bikini-clad girls on the Reprise reissues' album covers. I wonder who the genius was who sat in the meeting with the art department and suggested (promoted?) those album covers. And, who were the ones who replied, "Hey, great idea!" First , they have nothing to do with the albums, and second, why are the two covers so similar to each other? I swear they were consumed by Endless Summer's success and were narrowly focusing on - fun, girls, sun, palm trees, more girls, etc. - for Smiley Smile, Wild Honey, Friends, and 20/20? Um, why not reissue the albums with the original covers? A novel idea, I know...
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Emdeeh
Pacific Coast Highway
Posts: 520
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Post by Emdeeh on Apr 1, 2024 13:51:20 GMT
Putting on my graphic designer's hat: How would anyone notice who these Reprise albums are by with that low contrast color scheme? Or what the album titles are, with the title being treated like an afterthought?
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Post by Kapitan on Apr 1, 2024 14:00:19 GMT
Putting on my graphic designer's hat: How would anyone notice who these Reprise albums are by with that low contrast color scheme? Or what the album titles are, with the title being treated like an afterthought? I wonder if the idea was, "nobody has heard of these albums, and their titles mean nothing to the buying public. But the buying public loves fun-and-sun Beach Boys music, so let's just push that aspect." Really the only two things being sold by those covers are the name The Beach Boys and sex.
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Post by lonelysummer on Apr 1, 2024 19:27:56 GMT
Putting on my graphic designer's hat: How would anyone notice who these Reprise albums are by with that low contrast color scheme? Or what the album titles are, with the title being treated like an afterthought? The two covers are so similar, I can never remember which is which.
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