[78-L] London

[Han Enderman]

Cary, thanks for this enlightning summary.
It also explains the L-prefix as used for UK releases.
I checked London on US & UK ebay, and on UK we find almost exclusively the L- & HL-issues,
while in US these are absent.

Also found LD-500 (poss. Swedish).
Teter's 501-A/B with Made In England labels exists in 2 editions, with reversed sides. 
Johnson Rag as 501-B on Made in E (first ed?); on Made in USA and on L-501 it is the A-side.
And some labels list a Teter vocal, and others do not.

I have 3 images of London(G) labels. These have "78N' at 6h (as on other German labels),
and mention "Bestell-Nr". With L-prefix in L-20/25000 series.
Surprisingly, the Dutch issues are in a L-500 series (not same as the normal 500 series !)
and contain the "American Recordings" trademark.

Han Enderman
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>>> This is information culled from "The London American Legend" by David M. McKee, published by Athena Press. 

London came from the old British Decca label after they severed ties with American Decca's distribution network. American London was born in 1947 to be specifically used to market British Decca recordings in the U.S. Canadian London began operations a few months later. Pressings were imported directly from the UK (using their patented ffrr process - full frequency range recording).

London was one of the first US companies to issue 33 1/3 records (also pressed in Britain) in 1948. By 1950, all single-play issues appeared on 7-inch 45s.

The first few hundred London releases all originated from British Decca. At issue #500, the first U.S. recording appeared ("Jealous Heart" by Al Morgan). This disc was originally on Universal 148 but London had better distribution. 501 was "Johnson Rag" by the Jack Teter Trio, acquired from Sharp Records in Chicago. Despite signing such successful artists as Teresa Brewer, London could not compete with other U.S. labels and in the early 1950s, they gradually reduced its US roster of artists. Eventually, London reverted back to its previous status as a distributor for British recoridngs. 

After the success of the Morgan and Teter recordings, British Decca decided to release them in Britain, which resulted in the birth of British London. The first British release was the Teter disc, issued on L501. One month later, the Morgan release came out on L500. Release dates were chronologically erratic. The UK series corresponded the same catalog numbers as their US counterparts, however, some in the 16000 C&W series were given specially allocated numbers for issue in Britain. None of the R&B 17000 series were issued in Britain. The first UK release not to have appeared on US London was L1003 "That Old Black Magic" by Billy Daniels, licensed from Apollo and issued in March 1951. As the US roster was slowly depleted, British London increased its licensing from US independent labels. The most prominent hit during this period was "Indian Love Call" by Slim Whitman, licensed from Imperial in November 1952. The series continued until the HL8000 series began in 1954. 

The HL8000 series marked the beginning of British Decca exclusively licensing material from US labels (the HL stood for "Home London"). Eventually, London became the leading source of contemporary US pop recordings in Britain. Thanks to rock 'n' roll, London licensed recordings from labels like Sun, Imperial, Cadence, Chess, Specialty, Atlantic/Atco, Dot, Liberty, and many others. The exception to the Sun license was Elvis Presley. An application had been made to release Presley's 2nd release (Good Rockin' Tonight/I Don't Care if the Sun Don't Shine) but London decided against the release. A year later, when "Mystery Train"/"I Forgot to Remember to Forget" was released on Sun, London decided to issue it as a 45, but by the time the contract was received, Elvis had already moved to RCA. (London did press and distribute Elvis' RCA releases in England). 

 Cary Ginell
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