Sold Date: October 29, 2023
Start Date: October 19, 2023
Final Price: £22.00 (GBP)
Bid Count: 2
Seller Feedback: 9632
Buyer Feedback: 0

Hello again folks far & wide, we're back after a summer break with the continuation of this meticulously curated collection. Listing now and to the end of 2023.

Over the next few weeks we'll be listing some extremely rare Hitsville USA (Tamla Motown Appreciation Society) Magazines. From the birth of the popularity of the label in the UK.

HITSVILLE USA - Vol 1 No 12 (Feb 1965)

20 page magazine in EX condition. Hardly used at all

In 1963 two fanatical R&B fans from Bexleyheath set out to bring the Sound of Motown to the attention of Britain’s teenagers, after discovering the label a couple of years earlier. At the time the Detroit record company was hardly known outside of the United States and only a handful of their releases had been issued in the UK on import labels, their records were largely ignored by the music press and vinyl sales were modest due to a lack of publicity.

Dave Godin, assisted by Clive Stone began by setting up the UK’s first ever Tamla-Motown Appreciation Society from Godin’s suburban Kent bedroom. Godin then contacted Motown’s Berry Gordy, who was excited by this initial interest from England in his fledgling label, and invited Godin to Detroit for talks. Imagining the fan base was a lot bigger than it turned out to be, Gordy quickly organized the first Motown tour of the UK in 1965 and with the aid of EMI started the Tamla-Motown label. Godin publicized the tour and kept UK fans up-to-date with all the Motown news, he also arranged informal meet-and-greets with the labels stars for the TMAS members, however other than a few devout Mods, the tour had very poor turnouts and was concluded to be a flop.