American. Shelter was started in the late 1960s by Leon Russell, Denny Cordell and a number of their friends. Bigger in the States than in Britain, where only J. J. Cale and Tom Petty made any great impression, it closed in 1979 and its artists moved en masse to MCA - a few J. J. Cale records did however come out on Shelter in 1981-82 over here. Initially the company's product was released on A&M in Britain, with the actual Shelter label itself only making its first appearance in 1976. It was marketed and sometimes distributed by Island Records, with whose singles it shared a WIP-6000 catalogue sequence. Manufacture was by EMI; according to 'Music Master' EMI's Licensed Record Division marketed some of the singles. My copy of the Dwight Twilley Band demo single shown above came in a black Island sleeve, which suggests that other Shelter releases may have done the same. Two label designs were used: one with a rather hand-drawn-looking logo (1) until June 1977, and a more planetish one from July of that year onwards (3). Some copies of J. J. Cale's 'Hey Baby' b/w 'Magnolia' (WIP-6339; 10/76) omitted the company's name and just had the logo on its labels (2) - thanks to John Timmis for that scan - as did the replacement label. Promos were marked in whatever style the parent Island label was using at the time. The discography below only covers the 1970s.
Copyright 2006 Robert Lyons.