J.M. was owned and run by agent / manager John Miles, who in 1976 had guided The Wurzels to the No.1 spot in the Singles Chart with 'The Combine Harvester' b/w 'The Blackbird' (EMI, EMI-2450; 4/76) and to the No.3 position with their follow up, 'I Am A Cider Drinker' b/w 'The Back Of My Old Car' (EMI, EMI-2520; 8/76). J.M. Records came into being after the band's hits had dried up, but it still put out several singles by them. Its first release, 'For The Love Of Children', was an album in support of the National Children's Homes and told the story in song of the origins of that institution. It came out in 1979 with a catalogue number of NCH-1869, 1869 being the year in when the NCH was set up. JM-1870 was another album, an electric organ record by Iain Anderson, 'Everything's Coming Up Roses' (1979), but fortunately for us NCH-1871 was a single. It featured children from Gyde House, an NCH home, singing 'Christmas Morning - Long Ago' and 'Childhood Dreams' (1979), and presumably it came out towards the end of the year. As yet I haven't been able to source a scan of it, but the early J.M. label design was the same as that shown above except that the colouring was brown-on-cream.
The remainder of the company's singles came out in the early 1980s and were numbered in a separate JM-1000 series. First out of the blocks was a topical novelty song by The Wurzels, 'I Hate J.R.' b/w 'I Love J.R.' (JM-1001; 4/80), which seems to have sold a decent number of copies on the back of the popularity of the TV programme 'Dallas'. The Wurzels weren't the only Chart act to feature on the label: Billy J. Kramer had a couple of singles on it, including the one pictured, 'Sun Tan' b/w 'Gone Away' (JM-1007; 7/81). Catalogue numbers got as high as JM-1009 - another record by The Wurzels, 'The Coughin' Song' b/w 'Shovel It Here'- which came out in March 1982. Manufacture and distribution were by Pye / PRT. Thanks to Klepsie of the 45Cat site for letting me know about the 1979 J.M.s.
Copyright 2022 Robert Lyons.