How pioneer tape-rat Roger Armstrong found vintage America a whole new audience

Roger Armstrong co-founded the legendary Rock On record shop and was running the Chiswick label long before the punk rock explosion of independents, a believer that you could license rare R&B, soul and rockabilly classics while cutting new records with rising stars (Shane MacGowan, Kirsty MacColl and Joe Strummer among them). He then co-founded Ace Records and talks to us here about the thrill of trawling through American label vaults, locating vintage tracks and finding them a whole new audience. Along with …

 

… seeing Ella Fitzgerald and the Beatles in Belfast in the early ‘60s

 

... inventing a new Irish rock circuit and turning showbands into soul bands

 

… how American Graffiti, Gaz’s Rockin’ Blues and the mod revival all chimed with Ace Records’ re-issues

 

… promoting ‘Tin’ Lizzy (“that’s what it sounded like on the phone”) and being immortalised in one of their lyrics (“I get my records at the Rock On stall”)

 

… Joe Strummer in the 101-ers – “sensational, full-tilt, as if playing a stadium”

 

… releasing Dylan’s Theme-Time Radio Hour box-sets and the size of his record collection

 

… finding a Little Richard demo and making an Elvis Presley speech album a money-spinner

 

… being a pioneer tape rat and crate-digger and Ace Records quality control – “Stack ‘em low, sell ‘em high!”

 

… “think of the strapline, then choose the tracks”: making compilations with Jon Savage, Bob Stanley, Bobby Gillespie and Paul Weller

 

… plus reflections on John Martyn, Carol Grimes, Brinsley Schwarz, Rocky Sharpe, Irma Thomas, Arthur Alexander and the Count Bishops (“like the Stones at 78”).

 

Order ‘Chiswick Records 1975 - 1982 Seven Years At 45 RPM’ here: https://www.acerecords.co.uk/chiswick-records-1975-1982-seven-years-at-45-rpm

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