The second Silver Dollar label was the Country music offshoot of a company called VFM Record and Tape Distributors, which was based initially in Harpenden but seems to have moved around a bit - from 1977-79 the address on its products was in Spalding, Lincolnshire, or latterly Tring, Hertfordshire; in 1980 it was in Northampton; in 1980-81 it was in North Elham, Norfolk, with a P.O. Box number in Cromer; and from 1985 onwards it was in Dereham, Norfolk. VFA specialized in budget-priced cassettes, which retailed at 99p; it was founded in 1977, and it supplied tapes to the likes of retailers W.H. Smith ('Music Week', 14th April 1979). According to 'Music Week' of the 20th of January 1979, Silver Dollar was intended as a new outlet for British Country acts; it was the brainchild of VFM managing director Roger Markwell, and singer / songwriter Dave Travis had been recruited as A&R manager. Initially the idea had been for the records and tapes to be sold at gigs, but the response to the idea of the new label had been enthusiastic enough for nationwide distribution to be arranged, via Lugton and H.R. Taylor. Recordings were to be made at the Ivan Berg studios in Swiss Cottage. 'MW' of the 14th of April supplied a few extra details: it named Robin Markwell as the founder of VFM, and said that of the first 80 tapes the company had put out, 30 were of Country music; the profits from these were being used to fund Silver Dollar. 'The Steel Mills of Cleveland', an LP by Ken & Billie Ford, was scheduled to be the first release, and it would be numbered SDLA-400. In the event, while Silver Dollar did put out an LP by the Fords, its title was 'Remember The Alamo' and its catalogue number was SDLA-4002; 'The Steel Mills Of Cleveland' appeared on a VFM cassette by the duo in 1980, but not as the title track.
The first incarnation of Silver Dollar seems to have been a short-lived one. In addition to 'Remember The Alamo' it put out a couple more LPs: a Various Artists compilation called 'The Best Of British Country' (SDLA-4001; 1979) and Dave Travis's 'Rockabilly Fever' (SDLA-4003; 1980). All three were available as cassettes, with an SDCLA prefix instead of the SDLA one. It also earned itself a place on this site by issuing a couple of singles: 'Our Little Girl' b/w 'Wanderin' Willie' by Ken & Billie Ford (SDSN-0001; 1979), and Al Doherty's 'I've Gotta Find Linda Again' b/w 'A Million Songs' (SDSN-0002; 1979). Subsequent Country product appears to have reverted to the parent label, VFM. Happily, however, Silver Dollar was given a new lease of life in 1986, albeit in cassette-only form. Numbering was now in an SDC-5000 series, which had reached SDC-5222 by 1991; releases included licensed American material and some tracks from the 1979-80 period. The label doesn't seem to have survived long into the 1990s, and VFM, by that time known as VFM Cassettes Ltd, was dissolved on the 14th of October 2003.
Copyright 2008 Robert Lyons.