| Custom Records | |
| Parent: | Modern Records |
| Status: | defunct |
| Genre: | Various |
| Country: | United States |
| Location: | Los Angeles California |
Custom Records was a budget record label owned by the Bihari Brothers.
The label was a subsidiary of Modern Records.[1] It was formed some time prior to March 1965 and according to an article in Billboard, it was a new label that already had 31 LPs in its catalogue. The records were to sell at $1.98 as opposed to the other budget LPs that retailed at 98 cents and 99 cents.[2] Saul Bihari recognized the value of the rack jobber for these types of records.[3]
Some of the records were re-releases of previous Crown releases and the covers often featured a female in some pose designed to attract attention.[4]
One artist that was covered by Custom was Hank Williams. The album Your Cheatin' Heart and other Hank Williams Favorites Custom CM 1023, CS 1023 featured a singer called Johnny Williams who was really Curley Williams.[5] Later the It's Happening album by The Dave Clark Five And The Playbacks was released on Custom CS 1098. The album only had 2 tracks by the Dave Clark Five with The Playbacks covering the remainder. It was also released on Crown CST 473 in 1964.[6] [7] The Playbacks appear to be just studio musicians.[8]
In 1967, the label released More Psychedellic Guitars CS-1096 (with 2 LLs), an album that featured the tracks "Another Trip", "Really Got It Bad", "Out Of Touch", The Letdown" "Psychedelic A-Go-Go" Flower Power", "Flower Power/Can You Dig It", "Sit- In", "Lost In Space", and "Psychedelic Venture".[1] [9] This like the earlier release Psychedellic Guitars CM 2078,[10] appears to be reissues of earlier Jerry Cole albums with the titles changed. This music however wasn't quite Psychedelic.[11] One Exploito album that was a bit more in the psych mode was Are You Experienced by T. Swift & The Electric Bag.[12] [13] This also featured Cole.[14]
In 1978, the company appeared to be still in operation with a large section of the page in the January 7 issue of Billboard magazine, offering congratulations to fellow Los Angeles label Laff Records for their ten-year anniversary.[15]