***** RAREST BOB DYLAN LP ALBUM IN EXISTENCE ******

$

1,825

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·       BOB DYLAN - SELF TITLED 1962 ALBUM – ULTRA-RARE ORIGINAL U.S. MADE-FOR-EXPORT TO U.K. 1962 COLUMBIA STEREO LP CS-8579

·       ORIGINAL U.S. PRESSING

·       MONSTROUSLY RARE PRESSING ON RED AND WHITE COLUMBIA "THREE EYE” LABEL (YES, FOLKS, THIS CYCLOP OF A RECORD HAS A THIRD EYE ADDED – PERHAPS IT IS AN “ALL-SEEING” EYE?)

·       THIS IS THE ORIGINAL, AUTHENTIC, MADE-FOR-EXPORT 1962 U.S. PRESSING; THIS IS NOT A REISSUE OR A COUNTERFEIT PRESSING.

·       ORIGINAL, THICK CARDBOARD COVER (AMERICAN STYLE)

·       CLEAN, WEAR-FREE LABELS

·       THICK, HEAVY VINYL PRESSING

(►PLEASE SEE THE IMAGE OF THE COVER, LABEL OR BOTH, SHOWN BELOW)

(Note: this is a REAL image of the ACTUAL item you are bidding on. This is NOT a "recycled" image from our previous auction. What you see is what you'll get. GUARANTEED!)

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By know you know that the first pressing of Bob Dylan's first album on the impossible "Six-eye" Columbia label is near-impossible to find: it can easily fetch upward of $2,000.00 on the open market.

Ah, but wait. You haven’t seen anything yet. Compared to what we have here – a surreally made-for-export to UK pressing on just-about-unheard of THREE-eye Columbia label, EVEN the rare first pressings on six-eye label are about as common as muck.

What we have here is so monumentally, bizarrely, preposterously rare that EVEN the information on this pressing is scarce. You can’t even google this stuff. It is literally and figuratively UNKNOWN anywhere, by anyone. We claim categorically and without any reservations that this is the only known, documented copy on the planet, and you are looking at it. If any other copies exist, they yet have to turn up.

Despite its scarcity, we were able to infer and deduce something about this pressing based on peripheral and ephemeral information on hand.

First, about the label:

The amazingly rare 3-eye label (with a third “eye” located at the 12 o’clock position on the label) should NOT be confused for its better-known relative, the classic red-and-white “360 stereo” label, which was introduced by Columbia much later, in 1965. Despite the visual similarity, the 3-eye label is much, much older (we believe it was in print for only the shortest period of time in 1962) and may EVEN have PRECEDED the red-and-black “Guaranteed Fidelity”-style Columbia label, which was in print between 1962 and 1965.

In any event, we know this much: the “3-eye” label (an “eye”, being, in fact, a stylized presentation of record needle touching the record) was a transitional label used for excruciatingly short period of time, possibly as short as one month! Thus far, we have seen ONLY TWO other titles on this rare label: one by Barbra Streisand, and another one by Johnny Mathis (both of the 1962 vintage). No other titles have ever surfaced that we are aware of (please feel free to correct us – we will gladly append any comments of questions to this auction page). In view of the limited title selection found on this label, we speculate with high degree of confidence that the label was in use ONLY during the first few weeks (or months) of 1962.

This rare 3-eye label was used EXCLUSIVELY for Columbia made-for-export pressings, and those export pressings were made EXCLUSIVELY for one country: Great Britain. Mind you, Columbia Records in the United Kingdom was NOT the same label as their older, American namesake, and was NOT affiliated with American Columbia in any way, manner or form. Columbia in the United Kingdom was a part of the EMI-Odeon/Capitol family of labels (which was a home to such recording artists as Cliff Richard and the Shadows, Graham Bond Organization, Pink Floyd, etc.), and, as such, not related to Columbia/Epic/Harmony/Okeh family of labels in the US . This must have posed a significant identity problem for American Columbia label in marketing their artists to the British public.

The permanent solution to this problem was obviously found when Columbia established its own distributing “arm” in the UK (CBS Records, ltd.). We are not sure when exactly CBS (UK) was founded, but we believe it was somewhere between 1961 and 1963. We speculate that the young and fledgling UK arm of Columbia records initially had a very limited production and marketing capacity, and was probably extremely reluctant to try its luck with young and untried American artists, such as Bob Dylan or Barbra Streisand, both of whom were at the very onset of their respective careers and rather unknown in Europe back in 1961/62.

The workaround to this problem was found in allowing CBS (UK) to domestically release the “safe” (highly popular) titles by well-established artists, such as Tony Bennett and Johnny Mathis, but IMPORT American pressings by those artists with a more limited commercial potential (such as Bob Dylan). This is how the amazingly rare pressing of Bob Dylan’s first album we are presenting here came about. Essentially, because the British branch of Columbia records had very little interest in very young Bob Dylan, Columbia (US) printed their own copies and shipped them off to UK with special export labels affixed in order to boost his overseas sales and market appeal.

Printing of the covers for these made-for-export pressings turned out to be another logistical problem. Obviously, Columbia had pre-printed covers stockpiled for domestic (American) market, so they were reluctant to print additional, country-specific UK covers at extra cost. To address this problem, and to “cheat” UK customs, Columbia pasted small, square stickers with their UK affiliate’s logo (CBS) all over American covers, covering each and every mention of BOTH Columbia Records, Inc (the American parent company) - three small stickers on front side, one medium-sized on the back side. As you can see from our photos shown below. CBS stickers are all over the place, and in one instance the name of the American parent company was even SCRATCHED OUT by hand!!! (no, we didn’t do it; this is how the album was passed on to us). Clearly, the idea was to recycle American covers as British ones, despite the all-too-obvious fact that the British covers of the period had a distinctly different construction, texture, thickness and overall appearance and could not possibly have been confused as American.

The only part of this theory that does not “click” is this: if these American exports were indeed intended to boost Dylan’s British popularity, why, then, are there so few of them? (essentially, only this one – perhaps a few more?)

There could be two possible explanations: we speculate that this was a lone press run of probably less than 30 copies, which was delivered to CBS UK management and/or marketing department, essentially as promotional items, as a means of “testing the waters” to see how Brits react to Dylan. This theory is borne out by the fact that we acquired this album from a (now inconveniently deceased) British ex-pat who claimed to have been associated with Columbia records in some fashion.

The second theory appears to be more plausible, though. After Bob Dylan’s first album flopped big time Statewide (it sold miserably – we believe it remains the ONLY Dylan album not to go RIAA-certified) and Columbia nearly dumped him, something quite unexpected happened that propelled his career into the stratosphere and turned him into a New Messiah of the Protest Folk movement.

Firstly, Dylan partnered with Albert Grossman as his new business manager. Grossman, whose business savvy was the size of Texas (and whose chutzpah nearly matched Dylan’s elephantine ego) clearly had a much better and more effective idea how to market and package Bob Dylan.

Secondly – and even more importantly – Peter, Paul and Mary’s version of Dylan’s ‘Blowing in the Wind’ unexpectedly topped the charts, turning the otherwise great song into an instant classic and the anthem of the nascent Civil Rights Movement. Things would never be the same for Bob Dylan. The rest, of course, is history.

We suspect that all this was happening quite literally as the Columbia (US) was making an initial attempt (this pressing on 3-eye label) to market Bob Dylan in the UK. Alas, the sudden upswing in Bob Dylan’s popularity probably made any further promotional effort a moot point. All of a sudden, British skiffle fans espoused Dylan as one of their own. We believe that this, um…(pardon the pun) Simple Twist of Fate rendered any additional US-made export pressings of this album unnecessary. Henceforth, Dylan was a household name in the UK, and his albums were domestically pressed and distributed. Dylan’s short-lived American made-for-export first album on “3-eye” label appears to have been the first, the one and the only Bob Dylan album NOT to be released in the UK domestically, at least not initially.

Well, there you have it, folks. Our theory of how Dylan got to become a Rock Messiah (some actually called him Judas – just check out Live at Albert Hall 1966) and a household name in Britain. Alas, despite all his enduring popularity in the Kingdom, he yet has to become the Royal Family’s favorite Singer-Songwriter (we hear that this honor goes to Leonard Cohen – mind you, not a bad choice either). Perhaps the Royals were not amused by Dylan’s “Queen Jane Approximately”? Or they thought that “Ballad of a Thin Man” refers to Prince Phillip? The answer, my friend, is Blowing in the Windsors.

Now for the music: this truly IS a piece of history: an album that announced Bob Dylan’s arrival to the unsuspecting world; the work that started the entire Dylan cult, which would follow merely a year or so later, on the heels of his next album (“Freewheelin’ Bob Dylan”). Capably produced by the legendary John Hammond, Sr. (who, among others, discovered such stars as Billie Holiday, Robert Johnson, Big Joe Turner, Pete Seger, Leonard Cohen, Aretha Franklin, Bruce Springsteen, Stevie Ray Vaughan and was the father-in-law of Benny Goodman and the father of John Hammond, jr (you figured as much, didn’t ya?) , the album shows Bob Dylan's deep and genuine love for all forms of archetypal musical Americana, particularly traditionals, spirituals, folk, blues and work song, but also his evolving, maturing ability as a songwriter.

Track listing: You're no good -Talkin' New York - In my time of dying - Man of constant sorrow - Fixin' to die - Pretty Peggy-O - Highway 51 - Gospel Plow - Baby, let me follow you down - House of the risin' sun - Freight Train Blues - Song to Woody - See that my grave is kept clean.

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·                               CONDITION:

·                               RECORD

(IMPORTANT NOTE: unless otherwise noted, ALL records are graded visually, and NOT play-graded!; we grade records under the strong, diffuse room light or discrete sunlight)

(a)            WE GRADE THE VINYL AS STRONG VERY GOOD+ . CAUTION: The vinyl is NOT MINT or NEAR MINT, but is nevertheless in a very nice and clean condition. There are some surface marks and abrasions, mostly light and superficial, although some may be longer than 1.1/4 inches (1 inch = 2.5 centimeters)

(b)            The record is pressed on a beautiful, thick, inflexible vinyl, which was usually used for the first or very early pressings. Usually, the sound on such thick vinyl pressings is full-bodied, vivid, and even dramatic. Do not expect to obtain such a majestic analog sound from a digital recording!

(c)             Of course, this is a full-bodied ANALOG recording, and not an inferior, digital recording!!!

·       COVER

THE COVER IS ABOUT VERY GOOD+ (VG+)

The following flaws or imperfections are noted on the cover:

-         Cover has some ring wear. On the scale from 1 to 10 (1 being the least, and 10 being the most severe), we assess the severity of ring wear as 4 (front side) and 5 (back side)

-         Back cover has circular tarnish (grayish, dust-covered sections, which closely follow the contour of the record), probably caused by friction or by rubbing against other covers during the storage. The tarnish is similar in appearance to a common ring wear, but, UNLIKE ring wear, these grayish areas may be possible to clean up with a minor effort and with a right cleansing solution.

-         Cover shows some yellowing on both sides, apparently from aging.

-         Minor shelf wear noted on the seams (nothing significant)

-         CBS (UK) stickers noted on the cover (see above). Columbia records scratched out on the front cover (see above)

-         Cover has a few tiny wrinkles along the spine

-         Cover has a visible "wrinkle"(crease) in one of the corners.

-         Cover has some fraying/wear along the upper seam

-         Cover has a minor 'bump' (dent) along the upper seam (nothing significant)

NO OTHER IMPERFECTIONS ON THE COVER:

-         No split seams (yet)

-         No cut-out (drill) holes.

-         No cut-out corners

-         No saw-marks or indents

-         No writing

-         No stamps

-         No peel-off marks

-         No mold or mildew spots

-         No water damage

-         No warping

-         No wax, glue, paint or liquid drops on the cover

-         No glue traces or wax residue.

-         No bar codes

-         No RIAA stamps or stickers.

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POSTAGE & SHIPPING:

Generally, US POSTAGE is $5.80 FOR THE FIRST ITEM shipped via USPS PRIORITY MAIL (this includes a small $1.00 packaging surcharge).

INTERNATIONAL POSTAGE- and insurance rates vary from country to country. For SPECIFIC international and domestic postage and insurance rates ►click here. While you can be rest assured that our packaging is careful, sturdy and impact-proof, please note we are NOT responsible for uninsured items.

Media- and Surface Mail rates are available ONLY to orders of $200.00 or more. NO EXCEPTIONS.

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OUR REFUND POLICY :

Cash refund will be granted only for DEFECTIVE items, but we are flexible and reasonable in reviewing the merits of each individual case. We do NOT play-grade records and can only make reasonable inference on the item's condition based on its visual appearance. Every bid carries a risk that purchased item might play worse than its visual grade may indicate. Still sealed items MUST be returned sealed in order to be eligible for a refund. Please read our complete refund policy before placing a bid. ►Click here for the full text of our policy .

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