American. Little David started out in late 1969 or early 1970 as a Comedy label, run by comedian Flip Wilson and his manager Monte Kay, who served as the company's president; according to the Discogs site it was named after Wilson's son. It was an immediate success. Its first release, Wilson's LP 'The Devil Made Me Buy This Dress', entered the Billboard Chart in February 1970 and enjoyed a long run in it, eventually selling more than a million copies. His second album, 'The Flip Wilson Show', came out in December that same year and again proved very popular, sufficiently so for Little David to link up with Atlantic for distribution. 'BB' of the 18th of December 1971 revealed that a deal had been done and that the two albums were now available through that company. The first LP issued under the arrangement was by another comedian, George Carlin ('BB', 22nd January 1972), and the comedy pair of Burns and Schreiber soon joined him on Little David's books.
In the summer of 1972 Little David broadened its horizons, with albums by singer / songwriters Dan Cassidy and Kenny Rankin ('BB', 1st July), but the comedy field remained its most lucrative area: 'BB' of the 3rd of November 1973 reported that two LPs by George Carlin had earned gold records for sales. Despite these successes the relationship between Little David and Atlantic came to an end in May 1974, as mentioned in 'BB' of the 11th. According to the article vice-president and general manager Jack Lewis and president Kay were looking for a new deal. The search bore fruit, and 'BB' of the 5th of October was able to say that a longterm worldwide manufacture and distribution deal had been signed with Warner Bros. In passing, the article drew attention to Little David's impressive track record of three gold discs and three-and-a-half million sales from its eight releases. It also highlighted an atypical forthcoming release: an album by the Modern Jazz Quartet, 'In Memoriam'. The link between the MJQ and Little David was Monte Kay, who was the group's manager - he managed most of the artists on Little David as well. According to Kay, Atlantic had not been prepared to come up with the cost of the symphony orchestra that was featured on the LP, so Little David had stepped into the breach. That album and Kenny Rankin's 'Silver Morning' were to be the first issued under the agreement with Warner Bros.
Despite the Warner Bros deal being described as 'longterm', it lasted less than a year. 'BB' of the 9th of August 1975 reported that Atlantic was back in the picture, and that when the Warner Brothers arrangement ended, on the 31st of that month, Little David would again be distributed by Atlantic. The first record to come under the new deal was to be a single by Flip Wilson, 'Berries In Salinas'. Three albums were released in 1976, and two more in 1977, but in the latter year Wilson and Kay parted company. At some point around this time Little David was sold to George Carlin. Its sole release of 1978 was a compilation LP of his material, and an album by John Lewis and Hank Jones was added to the catalogue in 1979, but no more were forthcoming and the Little David label was closed down the following year.
In Britain, Little David enjoyed a much briefer and far less successful existence. The 'Music Master' catalogue lists several Little David LPs as being issued on Atlantic here during 1972-73, but there is no sign of them online; the only Little David tracks on Atlantic that can be found there are a pair by Kenny Rankin, 'Comin' Down' b/w 'Stringman', which came out on a single in February 1973 with the catalogue number K-10275. Out of interest, the albums listed were: Flip Wilson's 'The Devil Made Me Buy This Dress' (K-40365; 1972, deleted 6/75) and 'What You See Is What You Get' (K-40410; 1972, deleted 5/74); 'Don't Fight The Feeling' by Geraladine (an alter ego of Wilson) (K-40403; 1972, deleted 5/74); and Kenny Rankin's 'Like A Seed' (K-40464; 1973, deleted 6/75). It may be that their releases were planned but cancelled. With regard to the deletion dates, it may be significant that 5/74 was the month when Atlantic and Little David parted company in the States.
There were only five records issued on the actual Little David label here, all of them during the period when the company was linked to Warner Bros in America. Three of them were albums: the MJQ's 'In Memoriam' (K-59650; 11/74), and Kenny Rankin's 'Silver Morning' (K-59651; 4/75), plus 'Toledo Window Box' by George Carlin (K-59652; 4/75). The two which earned Little David a page on this site were both singles, and they were numbered in a dedicated K-19650 series. 'Silver Morning' b/w 'Catfish' by Kenny Rankin (K-19651; 6/75) was the first, Flip Wilson's (non-comic) 'Berries In Salinas' b/w 'There Oughta Be A Law' (K-19652; 8/75) the second. Manufacture and distribution were by CBS, as was usually the case with WEA products at that time. The singles are rarely seen nowadays. Come to think of it, they weren't very often seen thenadays. As the scans show, there were differences in the position and / or the font of many of the credits on the two singles' labels.
Copyright 2006 Robert Lyons.