A sister label to Ted Carroll and Trevor Churchill's 'Ace Records', and a successor to Chiswick (q.v. both). After Carroll and Churchill licensed their Chiswick label to EMI, in mid 1978, they started two more labels: Ace, for reissues, in November of that year; and this one, Big Beat, in July 1979. According to 'Music Week' of the 4th of August, Big Beat was intended for '60s material and other recordings 'of a specialist nature'. Both shared two numerical series which had previously been used by Chiswick: NS-00 for singles and SW-0 for EPs. The last Chiswick NS was NS-41, 'Little Queenie' by Johnny Moped, which came out in June 1978. Numbers NS-42 to NS-48 weren't used, and Ace and Big Beat used NS-49 onwards. Big Beat released only four singles in the 1970s, and did most of its business in the '80s. The first Big Beat single, 'School Day Blues' b/w 'You Know That I Love You' by Johnny & The Jammers (NS-55; 7/79) had a yellow label in a basic design (1); the reissue of 'Motorhead' b/w 'City Kids' by Motorhead (NS-3) kept the design but was coloured white. Both were pressed by Lyntone. A more ambitious design (2) took the place of the basic one after that. Distribution in the '70s was by Swift initially and then by Pinnacle. The discography below only covers the 1970s.
Copyright 2009 Robert Lyons.