[78-L] Heartaches and Decca 25000s

[Randy Watts]

Transcribed from the December 7, 1946 issue of Billboard. This sheds some light on the 1946-47 "Heartaches" revival.

Randy

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Decca Cleans Out and Up on Oldie

New York, Nov. 30 -- Efforts of Decca's Charlotte, N.C. distributing branch to clear shelves of an old disk that's been gathering dust for years may lead to reviving another oldie and pushing it into the top sales class. Decca branch had some 600 or 700 records of Ted Weems's "Heartaches" lying around and shoved them out to juke box operators and disk jockeys in the territory. In a few weeks the item had caught on and the demand for it resulted in Decca now planning to press an additional 50,000 to meet the Charlotte-area demand.

When reports from Charlotte first hit New York many tradesters figured the disk might have a Perry Como vocal, since the Victor balladeer was with Weems at the time. Payoff, however, is that the record is strictly instrumental. Tune is owned by Leeds Music, but was originally in the Olman music catalog which Leeds bought some time ago. 

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