Penny Farthing Records was a British

independent record label An independent record label (or indie label) is a record label that operates without the funding or distribution of major record labels; they are a type of small- to medium-sized enterprise, or SME. The labels and artists are often represented ...

, established in 1969 by the British record producer

Larry Page Lawrence Edward Page (born March 26, 1973) is an American business magnate, computer scientist and internet entrepreneur. He is best known for co-founding Google with Sergey Brin. Page was the chief executive officer of Google from 1997 unt ...

as a progression from his mildly successful 1960s

record label A record label, or record company, is a brand or trademark of music recordings and music videos, or the company that owns it. Sometimes, a record label is also a publishing company that manages such brands and trademarks, coordinates the produ ...

Page One Records Page One Records, established in 1966, was the UK independent record label, owned by the producer/manager, Larry Page. They were involved in a court case in July 1967 with The Troggs.9681 WLR 157; 9673 All ER 822; (1967) 111 SJ 944 The label, ...

. The label signed some artists of note. It released a number of hit songs, including "

Venus Venus is the second planet from the Sun. It is sometimes called Earth's "sister" or "twin" planet as it is almost as large and has a similar composition. As an interior planet to Earth, Venus (like Mercury) appears in Earth's sky never fa ...

" by

Shocking Blue Shocking Blue was a Dutch rock band formed in 1967 in The Hague. It was part of the music movement in the Netherlands that was generally known by the name Nederbeat. The band had a number of hits throughout the counterculture movement during ...

, "

Beautiful Sunday ''Beautiful Sunday'' () is a 2007 South Korean crime drama film.
''Koreanfilm.org''. Retrieved 13 April 2008.

...

" by

Daniel Boone Daniel Boone (September 26, 1820) was an American pioneer and frontiersman whose exploits made him one of the first folk heroes of the United States. He became famous for his exploration and settlement of Kentucky, which was then beyond the we ...

, " Blue Is the Colour" by the

Chelsea Chelsea or Chelsey may refer to: Places Australia * Chelsea, Victoria Canada * Chelsea, Nova Scotia * Chelsea, Quebec United Kingdom * Chelsea, London, an area of London, bounded to the south by the River Thames ** Chelsea (UK Parliament consti ...

football team, and "Sleepy Shores" by the

Johnny Pearson John Valmore Pearson (18 June 1925 – 20 March 2011) was a British composer, orchestra leader and pianist. He led the ''Top of the Pops'' orchestra for sixteen years, wrote a catalogue of library music, and had many of his pieces used as the ...

and His Orchestra.

History

Page first founded

with Dick James in 1966, but left the company in 1969 to start a new label. He bought the name of another company Penny Farthing to use it for his label, and located the headquarters on Tilney Street. Penny Farthing Records had its first success with their second single released in 1969, which was "

" by the Dutch group,

. In 1970, Penny Farthing Records released the single, "Sister Simon (Funny Man)" PEN 738, by the UK group Heatwave (later known as The Sensations). While the a-side received airplay, the funky b-side, "Rastus Ravel", was well received in the clubs. Both songs were written and produced by

John Edward John Edward McGee Jr. (born October 19, 1969) is an American television personality, author and a self-proclaimed psychic medium. After writing his first book on the subject in 1998, Edward became a well-known (and controversial) figure in the ...

for Instant Sound Productions. The single featured Maggie Stredder and Jean Ryder of

The Ladybirds The Ladybirds were a British female vocal harmony trio, most famous for their appearances on '' The Benny Hill Show''. They participated in over 60 episodes between 1968 and 1991. In addition, they were long-standing backing singers to many e ...

with

Doris Troy Doris Troy (born Doris Elaine Higginsen; January 6, 1937 – February 16, 2004) was an American R&B singer and songwriter, known to her many fans as "Mama Soul". Her biggest hit was " Just One Look", a top 10 hit in 1963. Life and career She ...

as back-up singers. The group was a regular on the

BBC Radio BBC Radio is an operational business division and service of the British Broadcasting Corporation (which has operated in the United Kingdom under the terms of a royal charter since 1927). The service provides national radio stations covering th ...

Terry Wogan Sir Michael Terence Wogan (; 3 August 1938 – 31 January 2016) was an Irish radio and television broadcaster who worked for the BBC in the UK for most of his career. Between 1993 and his semi-retirement in December 2009, his BBC Radio 2 weekd ...

, Dave Cash, Jimmy Young and Radio 1 Club shows. In 1970, Killing Floor's second album, ''Out of Uranus'', was released on Penny Farthing Records. The former

Honeybus Honeybus were a 1960s pop group formed in April 1967, in London. They are best known for their 1968 UK Top 10 hit single, " I Can't Let Maggie Go", written by group member Pete Dello who also composed their previous single "(Do I Figure) In Y ...

bassist, Colin Hare, released an album ''March Hare'' on Penny Farthing in 1971, which was not a commercial success. It was re-released through Hare's own Runfast label in 2004.

's "

Beautiful Sunday ''Beautiful Sunday'' () is a 2007 South Korean crime drama film.
''Koreanfilm.org''. Retrieved 13 April 2008.

...

" (written by the singer) and released in 1972, was a staple of early 1970s disc jockeys. Picked up by the Japanese TV show ''Beautiful Sunday'' some ten years later, this song was re-popularized in Japan. Page also recorded Daniel's wife (Lesley) Lelly Boone, but with no success despite an appearance on

BBC TV BBC Television is a service of the BBC. The corporation has operated a public broadcast television service in the United Kingdom, under the terms of a royal charter, since 1927. It produced television programmes from its own studios from 19 ...

's ''

Top of the Pops ''Top of the Pops'' (''TOTP'') is a British Record chart, music chart television programme, made by the BBC and originally broadcast weekly between 1January 1964 and 30 July 2006. The programme was the world's longest-running weekly music show ...

''. In 1971, Larry Page also signed up

and released a stream of easy listening albums, the last of these being released in 1982. Pearson is notable as being the pianist and arranger behind British studio outfit

Sounds Orchestral Sounds Orchestral was a British studio-based easy listening group, assembled by John Schroeder with Johnny Pearson in 1964. Career John Schroeder had worked with Johnny Pearson previously over at Oriole Records, producing Johnny Pearson's fi ...

. The Johnny Pearson Orchestra's track, "Sleepy Shores", was a No. 8 hit in the

UK Singles Chart The UK Singles Chart (currently titled Official Singles Chart, with the upper section more commonly known as the Official UK Top 40) is compiled by the Official Charts Company (OCC), on behalf of the British record industry, listing the top-s ...

for Penny Farthing in 1971, and an album of the same name was released the following year. Page also recorded

The Barron Knights The Barron Knights are a British humorous pop rock group, originally formed in 1959 in Leighton Buzzard, Bedfordshire,Colin Larkin, ''Virgin Encyclopedia of Sixties Music'', (Muze UK Ltd, 1997), ), p. 32 as the Knights of the Round Table. C ...

, whose comedy

records A record, recording or records may refer to: An item or collection of data Computing * Record (computer science), a data structure ** Record, or row (database), a set of fields in a database related to one entity ** Boot sector or boot record, ...

had some UK

chart A chart (sometimes known as a graph) is a graphical representation for data visualization, in which "the data is represented by symbols, such as bars in a bar chart, lines in a line chart, or slices in a pie chart". A chart can represent tabu ...

success. However, Page's attempts to turn them into a mainstream pop group failed. He eventually resorted to the flop "The Ballad of Frank Spencer". Even his attempt to record them under another name – Philly Dog – did not produce the desired hits. Paul Da Vinci, the voice on

The Rubettes The Rubettes are an English pop/glam rock band put together in 1974 after the release of "Sugar Baby Love", a recording assembled of studio session musicians in 1973 by the songwriting team of Wayne Bickerton, the then head of A&R at Polydor R ...

hit "Sugar Baby Love", turned to Penny Farthing immediately after this song made the UK no. 1 slot. The resulting "Your Baby Ain't Your Baby Anymore" sold modestly.

stalwarts

The Troggs The Troggs (originally called the Troglodytes) are an English garage rock band formed in Andover, Hampshire in May 1964. Their most famous songs include the US chart-topper " Wild Thing", "With a Girl Like You" and "Love Is All Around", all o ...

were persuaded to join Penny Farthing but their label debut, Page's attempt at the

Beach Boys A beach is a landform alongside a body of water which consists of loose particles. The particles composing a beach are typically made from rock, such as sand, gravel, shingle, pebbles, etc., or biological sources, such as mollusc shell ...

hit "

Good Vibrations "Good Vibrations" is a song by the American rock band the Beach Boys that was composed by Brian Wilson with lyrics by Mike Love. It was released as a single on October 10, 1966 and was an immediate critical and commercial hit, topping record ...

" with

Reg Presley Reginald Maurice Ball (12 June 1941 – 4 February 2013), known professionally as Reg Presley, was an English singer and songwriter. He was the lead singer with the 1960s rock and roll band the Troggs, whose hits included " Wild Thing" (#1 on th ...

's vocals, did not produce sizeable sales. Penny Farthing also recorded an early album by

Raymond Froggatt Raymond William Froggatt (born 13 November 1941) is an English songwriter and singer.Larkin, Colin (1998) ''The Virgin Encyclopedia of Country Music'', Virgin Books, , p. 159-160 Biography Froggatt (otherwise known as "Froggy") was born in Bordes ...

. However, most of the company's revenue was gained from Germany, where their solo artist signing Kincade had a number of minor hits, including "Dreams Are 10 A Penny", "Big Hand For Annie" written by John Carter. Carter, writing under a number of different names, also had hits with Penny Farthing in the early 1970s. Page formed Rampage Records as a successor for Penny Farthing in 1978.

References

{{Authority control Defunct record labels of the United Kingdom Rock record labels Pop record labels

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History

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See also

References