The Stylophone was a very basic battery-operated
hand-held synthesizer. It was invented by Brian Jarvis and made by a
company called Dubreq, which he and the Coleman Bothers, Burt and Ted, had
set up in 1967 as a film production and recording studio. The instrument
first came on the market c.1968. A number of books of music arranged
for the Stylophone were made available by the company, four of which were
accompanied by a 7" record. Two of these, one featuring Glenn Miller
tunes, the other Traditional and Christmas songs, date from 1970 - the date is
on the back of one of the books. In 1972 these EPs were re-pressed by
Lyntone, with a different address at the top of the label: 120-132 Cricklewood
Lane, as opposed to the 249-289 Cricklewood Broadway of the 1970 issues.
They were also given Lyntone matrix numbers, the black-labelled Glenn
Miller EP shown being LYN-2507, which indicates a pressing date of
1972, and the Traditional / Christmas EP, which now sported an orange label
instead of its original silver-on-blue one,
LYN-2495. Catalogue numbers consisted of appropriate
initials followed by a single digit - the Glenn Miller EP was numbered
GM-1, and a yellow-labelled EP of Latin American tunes was numbered
LA-3. The blue-labelled introductory EP, the scan of which Steve of the Low Down Kids site has kindly
provided, is numbered DBQ-72 -1, which may combine Dubreq
and the year the record was made; it too comes with the two different addresses
on it and with Lyntone and Non-Lyntone pressings. The music EPs were also
available as a set.
