ebay - mega Shadows list

[drakula63]

It would be remiss of me not to bring this to everyone's attention.

A guy up in Spilsby seems to be selling a massive collection of Shadows stuff. Just looked through it and I can say, quite honestly, that I have never seen so much Shads stuff in one place! There seems to be a lot lot of rare stuff... certainly stuff I personally have never seen or, in some cases, even heard of before! I've just spent £45 on a record. There's about 10 pages of stuff, so it'll take a while to look through. Anyway, here it is...

https://www.ebay.co.uk/sch/m.html?item= ... rp=1&rt=nc

[iefje]

This really is an extensive list! There are some very interesting items on offer, like multiple copies of the South African EP "The Shadows At The Colosseum Johannesburg" and the Yugoslav flexi-disc "Running Out Of World". Also a lot of rare Japanese records and several familiar bootleg LPs, like "Have A Party", "Now & Then" (misspelled as "Now & Than"), "Collector's Choice" and "Outtakes".

[drakula63]

I love the way the guy has a copy of EVERY different worldwide release of 'Let Me Be The One' - including a couple I'd never seen before. And I am absolutely intrigued by those Polish postcard records. What? Never even heard of such a thing before yesterday! 'Mary Anne' on red vinyl (I'll assume a Japanese edition of 'More Hits') is, again, something quite rare. All in all, a heck of a haul and I can only assume that he's clearing out his own collection or getting rid of that of a deceased relative. Very tempting.

[iefje]

And I am absolutely intrigued by those Polish postcard records. What? Never even heard of such a thing before yesterday!

I bought three of those Polish postcard records on eBay a couple of years ago. They are "Theme From The Deer Hunter (Cavatina)", "Rodrigo's Guitar Concerto De Aranjuez" and "Riders In The Sky" (single version). The sound mix of these is mono, but the sound quality is average.

[drakula63]

And I am absolutely intrigued by those Polish postcard records. What? Never even heard of such a thing before yesterday!

I bought three of those Polish postcard records on eBay a couple of years ago. They are "Theme From The Deer Hunter (Cavatina)", "Rodrigo's Guitar Concerto De Aranjuez" and "Riders In The Sky" (single version). The sound mix of these is mono, but the sound quality is average.

Ta. Yeah, but what are the records made of? Card? Or are they some kind of flexidisc stuck to card? I am just bemused! A postcard you can listen to!!!

[JimN]

And I am absolutely intrigued by those Polish postcard records.

I bought three of those Polish postcard records on eBay a couple of years ago. They are "Theme From The Deer Hunter (Cavatina)", "Rodrigo's Guitar Concerto De Aranjuez" and "Riders In The Sky" (single version). The sound mix of these is mono, but the sound quality is average.

Ta. Yeah, but what are the records made of? Card? Or are they some kind of flexidisc stuck to card? I am just bemused! A postcard you can listen to!!!

Postcard records were quite popular at one time (I'm thinking of the late 1950s) in the UK.

They were often sold as "Wish You Were Here" cards in holiday resorts, etc. I remember seeing them on sale in Brighton when on holiday staying with relatives there.

They were presumably played at either 45 or 33.3rpm, because 78 would have made them last no time at all (the size of the cards would have included only an inch or so of the inner grooves of a disc).

There's a wonderful YouTube video demonstrating some playable postcards at:

[UlrichS]

Ta. Yeah, but what are the records made of? Card? Or are they some kind of flexidisc stuck to card? I am just bemused! A postcard you can listen to!!!

Basically two types of sound postcards have been made in Poland:
In the 60s standard picture postcards were used, no specific choice of the motive, just what was available. The typical size is some 10 cm x 15 cm.
These postcards got covered with a plastic layer a bit thicker than the lamination of the early 60s LP covers. During this process the sound grooves were pressed into this plastic layer. This was done in several dozend 'studios' in Poland.
Most studios stamped the postcards on the writing side with the studio name, the song on it (mostly) and sometimes even with a catalog number.
I think that this was legal at that time as there are so many of these sound postcards existing, but most surely no royalties have been paid.
The sound quality is quite low and the sound postcards do not last extensive plays, which means that the 60s issues usually have a very poor sound.
Because of the small size these sound postcards are not playable on automatic record players as the tonearm returns before the postcard is played.
In the late 70s a second type was made in the same way but larger in size, 17.5 sm x 17.5 cm. These officially made by Tonpress Poland and came in an extra envelope with artist and title printed on it. The sound quality was also better.

Polish Sound Postcard type 1a.jpg

front & back of 60s sound postcard

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stamp on the 60s sound postcard

Polish Sound Postcard type 1b.jpg (14.24 KiB) Viewed 5598 times

Polish Sound Postcard type 2.jpg

front, back and sleeve of 70s sound postcard

(25.61 KiB) Downloaded 3384 times

I hope this is of help.
Ulrich

[drakula63]

Thanks.

Incredible! I must be too young (at a mere 57) to have been exposed to these, as I swear I have never seen or even heard of such things before! Quite a novel idea, but I am astounded to know that they were still available in the 1970s. A postcard you can listen to... for a while anyway!

Glad to see that the Shadows were represented in this unusual format.

[tullichculter]

Did some of the postcard records in the 50's not play at 16-2/3 rpm

[Twilight Ranger]

I remember seeing some postcard records in Finland in the 60s and I think I even owned one or two at some stage. I did some googling and found out that some such records are still available. They seem to have been quite common and here in Finland they contained mainly Finnish music. According to some information, they became useless after being played about 300 times, in many cases less than that.