Gerry Rafferty

The Humblebums were a Scottish folk band, based in Glasgow. Its members included Billy Connolly, who later became a renowned stand-up comic and... actor, guitarist Tam Harvey and the singer-songwriter Gerry Rafferty. The band was active from the mid-1960s until the early 1970s. Connolly co-founded the band with Harvey in the mid-1960s and played in the pubs and clubs around the city, most notably the Old Scotia Bar. Connolly sang, played banjo and guitar, and entertained the audience with his humorous introductions to the songs. Harvey was an accomplished Bluegrass guitarist. Rafferty joined later and for a short time they performed as a trio. However, the nature of the act had changed and Harvey departed shortly afterwards. The remaining duo broke up in the early 1970s after recording two albums of material: The New Humblebums and Open Up the Door, the former graced by a cover by John "Patrick" Byrne, marking the beginning of a long working relationship between the pair.
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Transatlantic Records was a British independent record label. It was established in 1961. It started began primarily as an importer of American folk, blues and jazz records - by many of the artists who influenced the burgeoning British folk and blues boom. Within a couple of years, the company had... started recording British artists. The company's philosophy was intentionally eclectic. The label was founded by a young Englishman Nat Joseph who started the company at the age of 21 after visiting the USA and realizing that there was a wealth of music of interest to British music fans that was not being made available in the UK. They imported labels from the USA such as Prestige, Tradition and Riverside. From the outset, many of the covers included photography and design by Brian Shuel. Transatlantic were also instrumental in the importation of MK records , which were then issued with the original Russian labels, but with an English printed sleeve. The company's first commercial success came not from music but from three sex education albums.
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United Artists Records was a record label founded by Max E. Youngstein of United Artists in 1957 initially to distribute records of its movie soundtracks, though it soon branched out into recording music of a number of different genres. In 1959, United Artists released Forest of the Amazons, a... cantata by Brazilian composer Heitor Villa-Lobos adapted from the music he composed for MGM's Green Mansions, with the composer conducting the Symphony of the Air. Brazilian soprano Bidu Sayao was the featured soloist on the unusual recording, which was released on both LP and reel-to-reel tape. Besides the movie soundtracks and the few classical releases, UA had quite a few rock 'n roll and r&b hits from 1959 with hits by The Clovers, Marv Johnson, The Falcons, The Exciters, Patty Duke, Bobby Goldsboro, and later Manfred Mann and The Easybeats. Berry Gordy placed a number of early Motown acts with UA including Marv Johnson and Eddie Holland in 1959. UA signed Jerry Leiber and Mike Stoller after they left Atlantic to produce artists. They had hits with The Exciters, The Clovers, as well as Mike Clifford.
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Pop music is a genre of popular music which originated in its modern form in the 1950s, deriving from rock and roll. The terms popular music and pop... music are often used interchangeably, even though the former is a description of music which is popular , whilst the latter is a specific genre containing qualities of mass appeal. As a genre, pop music is very eclectic, often borrowing elements from other styles including urban, dance, rock, Latin and country; nonetheless, there are core elements which define pop. Such include generally short-to-medium length songs, written in a basic format , as well as the common employment of repeated choruses, melodic tunes, and catchy hooks. So-called "pure pop" music, such as power pop, features all these elements, utilising electric guitars, drums and bass for instrumentation; in the case of such music, the main goal is usually that of being pleasurable to listen to, rather than having much artistic depth.
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