- Telstar Records
Telstar Records was a
record label founded in 1982 bySean O'Brien and Neil Palmer with a government loan of £120,000. It was founded as a specialist compilation marketing label and had hits with a range of compilation franchises such as the Deep Heat,Kaos Theory and 100% ranges. As well as these brands the company would licence a number of major artist recordings (for exampleABBA and theFour Tops ) to release telemarketed compilations.In the mid 1990s it diversified its output into the singles market and long-term artist development with the launch of the
Multiply Records andWildstar Records subsidiaries. Prior to these developments Telstar would normally only release singles that were tele-marketed and associated products like The Chippendales or PJ and Duncan aka. Acts signed in this period includedConner Reeves ,Sash! , Phats And Small andBasement Jaxx , whileCraig David brought the first ever UK number one single for the label.Other artists included
Victoria Beckham (a sub-licence deal from19 Records ),Rosie Ribbons ,Skream! andMis-Teeq .In the late 1990s, Telstar became closely associated with BMG Records, especially with the Telstar TV compilation arm and The Hits Album releases.
Telstar Records went bankrupt in 2004, largely due to the company's habit of giving large advances to artists such as
Claire Sweeney ,Victoria Beckham andRosie Ribbons who failed to make them any money. In the media much of the blame for the label's failure was placed on their most high profile signing, Victoria Beckham. However as most of Telstar's roster were not directly signed to the label, instead being either sub-licenced or part of number of joint ventures,BMG (soon to be merged withSony ) declined in buying the label's assets outright.Artists
Telstar
*
Ant and Dec (also as PJ & Duncan)
*Victoria Beckham (from 19)
*Ladytron
* Crush (ex-Byker Grooove)
* E-17
*Vinnie Jones
*Mis-Teeq (from Inferno Cool - recordings owned by Twenty First Artists Ltd)
*N-TYCE
* Project D
*The Greenhornes
*Skream! (3-piece boyband)
* Harry
*Maria Willson
* Specialist Compilation Marketing:
**ABBA (compilation with tracks licenced from Polar)
** Daniel O'Donnell
**Marvin Gaye (compilation with various licencing deals)
** Maggie Moon
**Jive Bunny and the Mastermixers
**Bonnie Tyler
**Heatwave (Disco remixes)
**Bad Manners
**Boney M. (compilation with tracks licenced from MCI/BMG Germany)
**Electric Light Orchestra
**Roy Orbison T2
*
Claire Sweeney
*Rosie Ribbons Telescope
*
London Symphony Orchestra - "Classic Rock series"Multiply
*
Sash! (licenced from mainland Europe)
* Phats And Small
*Basement Jaxx (licenced fromAtlantic Jaxx )Wildstar
*
Alda
*Conner Reeves
*Craig David Joint venture with Capitol.
XSrhythm
* The Chippendales
* PJ and Duncan akaCompilation Brands
* Deep Heat
* 100%
* Euphoria (toMinistry of Sound )
* The Greatest Hits of... (yearly compilation series e.g. "The Greatest Hits of 1987")
* Hits 93 / Hits 94(these were listed as part of the Hits Album brand in the Complete Book Of British Charts due to Telstar TV's later involvement with the series, but actually released by Telstar alone without joint venture status with Sony, BMG or Warners)
* Box Hits (toUMTV )
* Megabass
*BRIT Awards (toSony BMG )
*Kaos Theory Chart Attack
"Chart Attack" was Telstar Records first chart hit in the UK Top 75 album charts. It was released in the autumn of 1982 and reached number 7 in the main chart in the days before the exclusion of such various artist albums.
See also
*
List of record labels
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