One record at a time: 495. Various Artists - The Singing Detective (Music From The BBC-TV Serial)

The Singing Detective was a TV series that was originally broadcast in the UK during 1986. I first saw it when it was repeated sometime after the millennium and I enjoyed lots of the music used in the show. 

The series was set in the 1950's so it featured lots of jazz and novelty recordings from the thirties and forties. Normally I wouldn't be a fan of this sort of music, but it really worked in the context of the show and got into my head. 

Not long after I first saw the show I bought a CD compilation but this vinyl came into my possession in 2022. To be honest I'm not really sure why I bought this record as the fidelity of the source material is inferior to the carrier and everything is in mono. Equally, the vinyl has half the number of tracks that were featured on the CD release, so it is really difficult to make a case for this record at all. 

The main theme from The Singing Detective is an instrumental version of "Peg o' My Heart" which was recorded for the series by composer Max Harris. The original recording that inspired the writer of the series, Dennis Potter, dates back to 1947 but one would presume the producer of the television programme needed a high fidelity version of the tune for broadcast.

Almost all of the other tracks on this album are sourced from an old shellac 78 records, so there's plenty of crackles and additional noise accompanying the music. I have no doubt this record adds some of its own noise on top of the source recording so the result is almost constant crackles. There are a few tracks that sound like they are sourced from tape, such as "Dry Bones" by Fred Waring And His Pennsylvanians, but generally everything here is best consumed in short doses due to the extra noise.

However, for me, there are two significant elements on this record. The first is the appearance of The Ink Spots. There's something about the voice of lead singer Bill Kenny that is magical and I have admired the group's work since this compilation introduced me to them.

From an electronic music perspective you could argue that the inclusion of "We'll Meet Again" by Vera Lynn is quite significant as it features an instrument called the Novachord. This keyboard was manufactured by Hammond and Wikipedia asserts that it was the first ever commercially available polyphonic synthesizer. I'm not really sure what sounds the machine was capable of, but the end result sounds just like an organ to me. Disappointing, but historic nonetheless. 1/5