Something of a mixed bag. Galaxy was set up by expatriate Irishman Phil Solomon, the man who had previously owned Major Minor records and whose brother Mervyn was behind Emerald (q.v. both). 'Music Week' of the 18th of October 1975 said that Galaxy marked Solomon's return to the record business; it was owned by Irish company Ashtree Holdings but was being run by him from premises in Regent Street, London. As had been the case with Major Minor its catalogue offered a broad range of material, from the poetry of Pam Ayres to the cast recording of the African musical Ipi Tombi, but in general it seems to have had a rather middle-of-the-road slant - Lena Zavaroni and the Bachelors both made records for the label. Initially it came under the wing of President Records (q.v.), and distribution was by the Enterprise / Lugton / H.R. Taylor group of independents. A year later, 'MW' (18th December 1976) reported that Solomon had attempted to launch Galaxy in the USA, but as the name was already in use over there he had had to call the new label Ashtree Records. In 1977 Galaxy almost gained a sibling: 'MW' of the 16th of April revealed that Solomon intended to launch a Rock orientated label, 'Image', and that the project was 'shaped for launch in the next few weeks'. Sadly, however, nothing seems to have come of it. In February 1978 Galaxy moved from President to CBS, which took over both manufacture and distribution. Singles were issued in a GY-100 numerical series; the numbers jumped from GY-119 to GY-150 at the time of the move to CBS. No Galaxy single ever slipped into the Top 75, but the Pam Ayres LPs sold well enough at the time to be quite commonly found in charity shops nowadays. The company doesn't seem to have survived long into the 1980s, the highest number that I have seen being GY-177, which was from 1980. The discography below only covers the 1970s. The President (1, 3) and CBS (2, 4) issues had basically the same design, but there were several differences in layout and in demo markings.
Copyright 2008 Robert Lyons.