The Lure of the Bargain Bin

By Fred Wilhelms

I've always been something of a musical scavenger. From the age of 12, when I discovered my first Little Willie John LP in a cutout rack at Woolworths, I was hooked. For the past four decades, I've haunted thrift shops, garage sales, truck stops, and overstock liquidators in search of the forgotten, the under-promoted and the over-shipped. This is how I acquired my first Bobby Bland LP, my first Hank Williams, my first Billie Holliday.

The Internet, especially eBay, has supplanted a lot of the physical searching, although there isn't the same tactile thrill you get from coming across a find with the flip of a finger on a corner of a cover, and there's far less chance of that chance encounter where something catches your eye from the edge of your vision. It's not bad, but it ain't the real thing for me. Buying online is the true record scavenger's equivalent of non-alcoholic beer. You can do it forever without getting a buzz.

I've got one of those overstock liquidators near me, and I can't seem to drive by without stopping in. Of course, I have the excuse of being a new homeowner, so I can say I am going there to look for picture hangers or those nifty Teflon sliders you put under the chest of drawers so that you can push them around with one hand, as seen on TV. If I come back with a CD or two, I consider it just serendipity. Teri isn't always so sure, especially when I come home with the CDs but without the picture hangers or those nifty Teflon sliders you put under the chest of drawers so that you can push them around with one hand, as seen on TV.

So there I am, among the deeply discounted cans of off-brand colossal olives and straight-to-video DVDs. I am flicking my way through row after row of New Kids On The Block and "Italy's Greatest Hits" CDs when the radar goes off. Down on the bottom shelf, three CDs, shrink -wrapped into a single package, all with the same name--"Doo Wop." There's a picture of Tony Williams and the Platters on the thin slipcase. For the present, we will skip the potentially divisive debate about whether the Platters belong on the cover of a "Doo Wop" compilation. The only source identification on the outside of the package is a tiny logo on the bottom of the slip case. It says "Time Music International" and "Made in Canada." The price sticker says
$5.99.

The back gives a track listing:

I WONDER WHY - CADILLACS
IF I CAN'T HAVE YOU - FLAMINGOS
THE WIND - DIABLOS
DARLING I'M SORRY - AMBASSADORS
TWO HEARTS - OTIS WILLIAMS & HIS CHARMS
LIFE IS BUT A DREAM - HARPTONES
IN MY LONELY ROOM - LARKS
VOO BEE AH BEE - THE PLATTERS
MY BEAUTY, MY OWN - FASCINATORS
HARBOUR LIGHTS - THE DOMINOES FEAT CLYDE McPHATTER
WORK WITH ME ANNIE - THE ROYALS
CHERRY - DIAMONDS
EVERY BEAT OF MY HEART - THE ROYALS
MY HEART'S DESIRE - OPALS
IS IT A DREAM - VOCALEERS
SECRET LOVE - MOONGLOWS
WILL YOU BE MINE - THE SWALLOWS
THIS SILVER RING - CASTELLES
JUST TO SEE YOU SMILE AGAIN - FOUR BUDDIES
I LOVE YOU SO - CROWS

SH-BOOM - CHORDS
WEDDING BELLS ARE RINGING IN MY EARS - ANGELS
NIGHT'S CURTAIN - CHECKERS
I'LL CRY WHEN YOU'RE GONE - THE PLATTERS
I USED TO CRY MERCY, MERCY - LAMPLIGHTERS
OOP SHOOP - SHIRLEY GUNTER & THE QUEENS
YOU'RE TIRED OF LOVE - GEMS
BLUE VALENTINE 0 SOLITAIRES
SHOULDN'T I KNOW - CARDINALS
DEAR ONE - SCARLETS
MY TRUE LOVE - SWANS
SUCH A NIGHT - CLYDE MCPHATTER & THE DRIFTERS
I - VELVETS
I MISS YOU SO - SONY TIL & THE ORIOLES
FOOL FOOL FOOL - CLOVERS
JOHNNY DARLING - FEATHERS
I'M SLIPPIN' IN - THE SPIDERS
SUNDAY KIND OF LOVE, A - HARPTONES
WHERE ARE YOU (NOW THAT I NEED YOU ) - THE MELLOW-MOODS
NADINE - CORONETS

DEAR RUTH - BUCCANEERS
GLORIA - CADILLACS
LING TING TONG - FIVE KEYS
ONE MINT JULEP - CLOVERS
TABARIN - FOUR FLAMES
EARTH ANGEL (WILL YOU BE MINE) - THE PENGUINS
LOVE ME MY DARLING - SHARPS
HEARTBREAKER - HEARTBREAKERS
THE STARS ARE OUT TONIGHT - TEARDROPS
A BEGGAR FOR YOUR KISSES - DIAMONDS
WE THREE - CLEFS
JUST WALKIN' IN THE RAIN - PRISONAIRES
BLUE FLOWERS - STRANGERS
A THOUSAND STARS - RIVILEERS
TELL ME - MASTER TONES
FOOL HEART - WHISPERS
RUNAROUND - THE THREE CHUCKLES
UNDER A BLANKET OF BLUE - CARDINALS
GOODNIGHT SWEETHEART GOODNIGHT - SPANIELS
UNTIL THE REAL THING COMES ALONG - RAVENS

All for $5.99. These 60 titles are essential stuff, many of the best-known titles and most important groups, but also some that qualify as cult classics ("A Beggar For Your Kisses" may be the best of that category in this set). There are some necessary groups missing, most obviously the “5” Royales, but this set fairly represents the cream of the vocal group genre. It's an amazing collection, especially for the price.

I'm standing in the store looking at the package. Alarms go off in my head immediately. There are three possible explanations for these CDs to be that cheap.

1. They're bootlegs. The generic packaging is a troubling clue in favor of this conclusion. "Time Music International" sounds like an obvious attempt to palm this set off as something legitimate from "Time/Life."

2. They're either re-recordings or mastered from vinyl. These will make listening a painful experience, either, or both, on aesthetic grounds or because of the surface noise. I can pretty much discount re-recordings, just because I've never run across re-recordings of a lot of these titles. If the set is a bootleg, mastering from vinyl is a real possibility.

3. They're gray market; legally released under licenses from the putative owners of the masters (more on that "putative" stuff at a later time), but not for release in the U.S., where someone else holds the rights.

I buy the CDs, plus another 3-CD set that I found behind the Doo Wop stuff. It is from the same company and titled "The Birth of R&B." It has an equally impressive track list. I am working, or have worked in the past, for artists who appear on both sets, so I have some investigation to do.

If these are boots, I get to let my clients know, and then I get to write nasty letters to the "real" rightsholders asking why they aren't paying attention to someone ripping off them, and my clients, too. It doesn't mean my clients will be paid, but it puts the owners on notice that someone is watching out for the artists. There have even been a couple occasions when the "legal" owners have actually chased the bootleggers once I've pointed them in the right direction, so anything can happen. It costs me a stamp. That makes this a cheap thrill.

If the CDs are gray market, I get to make sure the rightsholders are including them on royalty statements, when there are statements. If there aren't statements, I get to ask why not. It's always something of a crap shoot, and often the result is not much more than a paper trail that may prove valuable if my client ever decides to sue for royalties. There are times, however, where just starting the process of asking questions pays large dividends. A client recently came across what appeared to be an Australian bootleg CD of some of her 60s recordings. There is substantial doubt that the label has any rights to release the CD, but the inquiry led me back to the U.S. company that claims to hold the worldwide rights to my client's recordings, and they ended up admitting they had never paid her any royalties. The result was my client's biggest royalty check in her 40-year career. Actually, it was only her second royalty check in her 40-year career, and I had gotten her that other one, too.

The sad reality is that many times, the reward, in terms of royalties, cannot justify the pursuit. If the labels actually paid what they were supposed to without involving people like me, those royalties could make a substantial difference in the lives of the artists. But when you factor in the amount of time a suit normally takes, subtract a fair attorney's fee, and allow for the potential for large out-of-pocket costs to build the documentary record, the justification for legal action is often reduced beyond the point where winning might amount to a moral victory, but nothing more.

Research on "Time Music International" satisfies me that what I have purchased are gray market CDs; sets that should not be reaching the retail market in the United States because someone else holds a license for domestic releases.

Now I am happy, because the presence of these CDs in a local store is a problem for the domestic licensee, but not for anyone I work for. If my clients tell me to do so, I can and will chase the royalties, knowing that somewhere there is a legitimate bank account where that money could be reached. We may not get all the way to the bank this time, but every fight makes the next one a little easier. We may measure our successes in half-inches, but we have them to build on.

And I am also happy that I have now two really neat sets of legal CDs picked up on the cheap, and that's perfectly in line with where I started out four decades ago, riffing through the racks at Woolworth's.

Professionally, I am satisfied. Personally, I am thrilled to death with my acquisitions.