Island Records Founder Chris Blackwell Curates 'The Vinyl Series'

Coming February 26

ISLAND RECORDS was founded in JAMAICA in 1959 by 22-year old CHRIS BLACKWELL. The label has been inextricably linked to the story of its founder who, has recently curated a series of compilation LPs, featuring his hand-picked tracks that correspond with his and ISLAND’s legendary history.
 
Next month, ISLAND RECORDS/UMe will release Volume One of The Vinyl Series, a 14-track album covering the years 1962 to 1969. Volumes Two and Three will follow later this year and explore ISLAND’s history in the decades that followed. 
 
BLACKWELL writes in the liner notes, "When I moved ISLAND RECORDS’ base from KINGSTON to LONDON in 1962, all I wanted to do at first was just release the really great music that was coming out of JAMAICA. But then I got caught up in all the music that I was hearing in LONDON, much of it from AMERICA."
 
Included in the first volume are such groundbreaking hits as MILLIE SMALL's "My Boy Lollipop" and DESMOND DEKKER AND THE ACES' "Israelites," songs which introduced much of the world to the sound of JAMAICAN music. The set also includes the 1966 smash "Gimme Some Lovin'" by the SPENCER DAVIS GROUP, whose lead singer, STEVE WINWOOD, would later further influence the label’s direction. 

Future volumes of The Vinyl Series will illustrate the role that ISLAND played in the folk, hard rock, singer-songwriter, glam, and progressive movements and, of course, the records by BOB MARLEY AND THE WAILERS and JIMMY CLIFF, among others, that defined reggae around the world.

In track-by-track essays by noted author and longtime ISLAND RECORDS chronicler CHIS SALEWICZ, the album package features reminiscences from the perspective of BLACKWELL, a member of the ROCK & ROLL HALL OF FAME, who states, "Clearly, the culture was moving in a new direction, and I wanted ISLAND RECORDS to mirror that shift and be in this new world."

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