A small independent or custom recording label, from Scratby, Great Yarmouth. City Music was owned and run by Tony Palmer. As far as the '70s are concerned, it seems to have issued records from c.1969 to c.1973; in or around 1973 it dropped the 'Music' and become just plain 'City' (q.v.). It went on to put out several more records in the mid to late '80s. The blue label looks to have been the commonest design, and it was maintained into the 'City' era. Initially numbering appears to have been generally in the EPC / CMSTP / CMSP-70Y0s, with the 'Y' showing how many records had been made so far. It may be that the '70' referred to the year of release, as the catalogue numbers of subsequent issues did, though the very first record made - EPC-7010 - has a copyight date of 1969 on the label. From 1971 numbers took the form 'XX0Y', with XX being the year and Y the number of records issued in that year; thus CMSP-7202 was the second single made in 1972. There were two prefixes for EPs, CMEP and CMEPC; the 'C' at the end of the latter may indicate 'Country', as the records with that prefix are both in that genre. The gaps in the discography below hint that there should be several other City Music records out there, but not many of them seem to have strayed far from Great Yarmouth. The Singing Postman had previously enjoyed a fair amount of popularity as a recording artist for Parlophone. He went on to record for Gemini, as did Jim West & The Texans, which suggests that there may have been lines of communication between that company and City Music. Thanks to Sam Mauger for the first scan.
Copyright 2006 Robert Lyons.