After moving to Hollywood in 1956, Dot Records bought many recordings by small local independent labels and issued them nationally. In 1957, Wood sold the label to Paramount Pictures, but remained in charge until 1967, when he departed to join Lawrence Welk in the formation of Ranwood Records.
In 1968, the label was acquired as part of the acquisition of Paramount by Gulf+Western, which transitioned it to recording exclusively country music and placed it under the management of Famous Music in 1971. Gulf+Western sold its labels to ABC in 1974. Dot was renamed to ABC-Dot Records before closing in 1978.
Dot's founder, Randy Wood, a veteran of the Army during World War II, settled in Gallatin, Tennessee. There he started an appliance store named Randy's, and began carrying records as an afterthought in 1947. Wood initially carried records in the classical and popular genres, but found his customers were asking for records of such rhythm and blues artists as Joe Liggins, Roosevelt Sykes, and Cecil Gant. They were staples of the playlist of Nashville's CBS Radio affiliate, WLAC.
After discovering that their records were only available in limited quantities—and not in Gallatin—Wood formed a mail-order operation by placing a short advertisement with WLAC personalities "Hoss" Allen and Gene Nobles. By 1950, his record sales had far surpassed that of the appliances he carried and he renamed his store Randy's Record Shop. As an extension, he formed a label named Randy's, which released "Gene Nobles' Boogie" by Richard Armstrong, and Record Shop Special, which had Gant on its roster.[1]
After Wood purchased local radio station WHIN, he and Nobles formed Dot, a more widely distributed label, whose first headquarters were in that station's building. Since WHIN broadcast only in the daytime, recording sessions were at night when the station was off the air.[1]
One of the first artists he recorded was the young Johnny Maddox, who packed records for him at his store, and whose honky tonk piano style graced Dot Records for almost twenty years. Wood's roster of R&B artists included Ivory Joe Hunter, Joe Liggins, the Four Dots, the Big Three Trio, Brownie McGhee, Shorty Long, the Counts, and the Griffin Brothers, who had a number one R&B hit with "Weepin' & Cryin'" (with vocal by Tommy Brown) in 1951. His country artists included Mac Wiseman, who had hits with "The Ballad of Davy Crockett" and "Jimmy Brown the Newsboy", and, more famously, Jimmy "C." Newman, who scored many hits on the label (the biggest being "Cry, Cry, Darling") before leaving for MGM Records in 1958. Wood also recorded such gospel artists as the Fairfield 4, the Gateway Quartet, the Golden Voice Trio, Rosa Shaw, Joe Warren, the Singing Stars, and the Brewsteraires.[1]
In 1956, Dot also made a noteworthy contribution to the Easy Listening genre by releasing a recording of popular music arranged by John Serry (Squeeze Play, DLP-3024, 1956).[2][3][4]
Paramount years
Dot Records logo after its sale to Paramount Pictures combined the original Dot script logo with the Paramount mountain and halo of stars symbol.
In late 1956, Wood signed Warner Bros. star Tab Hunter to a record contract after Chicago disc jockey Howard Miller suggested to Wood that he might want to sign Hunter, who was enormously popular and had just packed a stage show in Chicago with screaming girls. Wood asked if Hunter could sing, but Miller replied, "I don't know, it doesn't matter, I guess." Tab Hunter was the first to tell Wood that he could not sing a note. However, after giving Hunter the Ric Cartey tune "Young Love", Wood told producer Milt Rogers to repeatedly teach Hunter how to sing it until he finally reached the point where he could. The record topped the charts in 1957; Dot's release of a follow-up record from Hunter ("Ninety-Nine Ways") frustrated Warner Bros. chief Jack L. Warner, who retaliated by forming Warner Bros. Records and placing Hunter on the label as its first artist.[5]
In 1957, Wood sold the label to Paramount Pictures,[6] but he remained president for another decade. Dot (and Wood) then moved to Hollywood, where the label began to release soundtrack albums, including Elmer Bernstein's score for The Ten Commandments (1956),[7] a 2-LP set that played longer than the usual record album.
Pat Boone had further success in the 1960s, registering a #1 hit in 1961 with "Moody River", then coming back in 1962 with a #6 hit with "Speedy Gonzales". He was one of the Big Three Dot album sellers of the 1960s, along with Billy Vaughn and Lawrence Welk, whose orchestra members, such as Myron Floren, Jo Ann Castle, Joe Feeney and Bob Ralston, released records alongside him in the 1960s. Welk and Vaughn in particular regularly appeared in the album top-twenty. Johnny Maddox, banjo player Eddie Peabody, Steve Allen, Louis Prima, Keely Smith, the Mills Brothers and organists Eddie Baxter and George Wright made many albums for Dot as well.[6] Known for artist loyalty, many of these artists stayed with Dot for over a decade, partly because Wood had a reputation for fairmindedness. His label was not impacted by any of the record industry scandals of the 1950s and Wood told a 1959 congressional hearing on payola that his books were open.[1]
Hamilton Records, a subsidiary, was founded in 1958 for rockabilly and rhythm & blues. It also functioned as a venue for albums by their regular roster of artists that could be retailed for $1.98, since all or most of the material featured on them was in the public domain, thereby obviating the need to pay song royalties. It distributed Steed Records and the only two records from Carnival, owned by Herb Alpert and Jerry Moss. Two other subsidiary labels were created: Crystalette Records and Acta Records. In 1967, Dot picked up distribution of DynoVoice, owned by Bob Crewe, from Bell Records. Later in 1967, Randy Wood left Dot to found Ranwood Records with Welk.
Country music label
Dot's logo after Gulf+Western acquired Paramount. The Paramount logo was removed when Famous Music took over.
In 1971, Gulf and Western placed Dot under the umbrella of the Famous Music Group,[9] which included Paramount Records, Stax (until 1970), and Blue Thumb, with distribution of Sire (now owned by Warner Music Group) and Neighborhood, originally owned by Melanie Safka. By 1968, Lawrence Welk had acquired his portion of the Dot back catalog and subsequently reissued the material on his own Ranwood label.[10]
With the rest of the Famous Music Group, in 1974, Dot was bought by ABC, which had tried to purchase the label years before, and renamed it to ABC/Dot Records, a name it retained before the label was discontinued at the start of 1978.[11] The ABC/Dot headquarters became the Nashville office of ABC Records.
The ABC/Dot Records logo. The logo first read 'ABC/Dot' and the word 'Records' was added later.
The merger of the MCA Records and PolyGram Records families became the foundation for Universal Music Group in 1999. Currently, the Dot pop music catalog is managed by Universal Music's Geffen Records. The country back catalog is managed by the former Decca and Coral unit, which was rebranded as MCA Nashville, except for those by Roy Clark and Hank Thompson (owned by their respective estates).
Randy Wood died at age 94 in his La Jolla, California, home on April 9, 2011, from complications after a fall.
Lawrence Welk was an American accordionist, bandleader, and television impresario, who hosted The Lawrence Welk Show from 1951 to 1982. The program was known for its light and family-friendly style, and the easy listening music featured became known as "champagne music" to his radio, television, and live-performance audiences.
MCA Records was an American record label owned by MCA Inc. established in 1972, though MCA had released recordings under that name in the UK from the 1960s. The label achieved success in the 1970s through the 1980s, often by acquiring other record labels, from ABC to Motown to Geffen. MCA Inc. became Universal Studios, Inc., in 1996, and the MCA record label was folded into Universal Music Group's Geffen Records in 2003, but Universal's MCA Nashville continues to use the moniker.
Monument Records is an American record label co-founded in 1958 by Fred Foster. Originally founded in Washington, D.C., the label moved to Nashville, Tennessee in 1960, and experienced success over the next two decades with a number of artists including Roy Orbison, Dolly Parton, Willie Nelson, Ray Stevens, Kris Kristofferson, Charlie McCoy, Boots Randolph, Jeannie Seely and others.
MGM Records was a record label founded by the Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer film studio in 1946 for the purpose of releasing soundtrack recordings of their musical films. It transitioned into a pop music label that continued into the 1970s. The company also released soundtrack albums of the music for some of their non-musical films as well, and on rare occasions, cast albums of off-Broadway musicals such as The Fantasticks and the 1954 revival of The Threepenny Opera. In one instance, MGM Records released the highly successful soundtrack album of a film made by another studio, Columbia Pictures's Born Free (1966).
ABC Records was an American record label founded in New York City in 1955. It originated as the main popular music label operated by the Am-Par Record Corporation. Am-Par also created the Impulse! jazz label in 1960. It acquired many labels before ABC was sold to MCA Records in 1979. ABC produced music in a variety of genres: pop, rock, jazz, country, rhythm and blues, soundtrack, gospel, and polka. In addition to producing records, ABC licensed masters from independent record producers, and purchased regionally released records for national distribution.
Impulse! Records is an American jazz record label established by Creed Taylor in 1960. John Coltrane was among Impulse!'s earliest signings. Thanks to consistent sales and positive critiques of his recordings, the label came to be known as "the house that Trane built".
Warner Records Inc. is an American record label. A subsidiary of Warner Music Group, it is headquartered in Los Angeles, California. It was founded on March 19, 1958, as the recorded music division of the American film studio Warner Bros.
Ranwood Records is an American record label started in 1968 by Randy Wood and Lawrence Welk. Lawrence Welk owned all of the recordings that he released on Dot as they were produced and manufactured by Teleklew Productions and leased to Dot. These were repackaged for reissue on Ranwood. Welk did not own or buy those recordings he made for Coral and they continue to be owned by Universal Music.
Rodney Crowell is an American musician, known primarily for his work as a singer and songwriter in country music. Crowell has had five number one singles on Hot Country Songs, all from his 1988 album Diamonds & Dirt. He has also written songs and produced for other artists.
Donna Fargo is an American country singer-songwriter known for a series of Top 10 country hits in the 1970s. These include "The Happiest Girl In The Whole U.S.A." and "Funny Face", both of which were released in 1972 and became crossover pop hits that year.
Earl Thomas Conley was an American country music singer-songwriter. Between 1980 and 2003, he recorded ten studio albums, including seven for RCA Records. In the 1980s and into the 1990s, Conley also charted more than 30 singles on the Billboard Hot Country Songs chart, of which 18 reached Number One. His 18 Billboard Number One country singles during the 1980s were the third most by any artist in any genre during that decade, after Alabama and Ronnie Milsap.
Sugar Hill Records is an American bluegrass and Americana record label.
King Records was an American label founded in 1943 by Syd Nathan in Cincinnati, Ohio, United States. The label owned several divisions, including Federal Records, which launched the career of James Brown. It released original material until 1975.
Byron Hill, is an American songwriter from Winston-Salem, North Carolina. Living and working professionally in Nashville, TN for more than forty years, his songs have been recorded by many country and pop artists.
The following is a discography of the jazz/swing vocal group The Mills Brothers.
George Greeley was an Italian-American pianist, conductor, composer, arranger, recording artist and record producer who is known for his extensive work across the spectrum of the entertainment industry. Starting as an arranger and pianist with several notable big bands in the 1940s, he segued into the Hollywood radio scene, working on several nationally broadcast variety programs. After conducting an Army Air Force Band during World War II, he was hired by Columbia Pictures as a staff pianist and orchestrator. He worked as pianist on several hundred motion pictures, worked with many famous composers orchestrating their soundtrack compositions, and created original compositions of his own in several dozen movies. It was Greeley's hands that performed the piano parts that Tyrone Power mimed in The Eddy Duchin Story. Concurrent with his work at Columbia Pictures, George Greeley also worked at Capitol Records as music director, pianist, and conductor for many artists such as Gordon MacRae, Jane Powell, Jo Stafford, Frankie Laine, and Doris Day. He was hired in the late 1950s by the newly established Warner Brothers Records. George Greeley arranged, orchestrated and performed as primary artist for a series of hit recordings entitled "Popular Piano Concertos." As music tastes changed in the late 1960s, Greeley had already moved into television, composing themes and music for popular TV series like My Favorite Martian,The Ghost and Mrs. Muir,Nanny and the Professor, and Small Wonder. He performed as featured piano soloist and as guest conductor in concert appearances around the world. He died from emphysema at age 89 in Los Angeles, California.
Longhorns & Londonbridges is a 1974 album by B. J. Thomas, released on Paramount Records. It is commonly misidentified as Longhorn & London Bridges.
The Mills Brothers, sometimes billed The Four Mills Brothers and originally known as Four Boys and a Guitar, were an American jazz and traditional pop vocal quartet who made more than 2,000 recordings that sold more than 50 million copies and garnered at least three dozen gold records.
Randolph Clay Wood was an American record producer and the founder of Nashville-based Dot Records, one of the most successful independent record labels of the 1950s and 1960s.
George Vaughn Horton was an American songwriter and performer. Usually credited as "Vaughn Horton" or "George Vaughn", he wrote or contributed to the success of a number of popular songs, including "Choo Choo Ch'Boogie", "Hillbilly Fever", "Sugar-Foot Rag", "Mockin' Bird Hill" and the Christmas song "Jolly Old Saint Nicholas".
↑ Birmingham, Jed (March 22, 2006). "Beat Vinyl: Reports from the Bibliographic Bunker". Realitystudio.org. Retrieved November 14, 2007. The ultimate Beat Generation collectible on vinyl might be Jack Kerouac's Poetry of the Beat Generation on Dot Records.
↑ DeMara, Bruce (February 27, 2015). "Five things you don't know about Leonard Nimoy". The Toronto Star. ISSN0319-0781. Retrieved March 25, 2016. Leonard Nimoy, who died Feb. 27 at the age of 83, was more than his most famous character, Spock. He also wrote poetry, sang and loved photography.
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