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, including jazz . The company recruited Alan Douglas in 1960 to run its new jazz department. There were only a few jazz titles after about 1963.
Around 1966 a subsidiary jazz label Solid State was founded, which lasted until 1969. The following year United Artists acquired the complete Blue Note Catalogue from Liberty, which was followed by a chequered history of Blue Note reissues.
1.United Artists US 1958
Deep groove mono, pressing by Plastylite, NJ. Muted colours with beige linking “United” corporate colours. Note Plastylite “ear” in run-out. That said, it does not especially sound like a Blue Note Plastylite. That is attributable to many other factors including Van Gelder engineering, not present.
2.United Artists Jazz Series (1962-3)
2.1 Stereo US - “bendy tenor” label
2.2 Mono UA Jazz – 1962-3 German pressing. Bright primary colours.
The short-lived initiative by United Artists Jazz to rival Blue Note and Prestige nevertheless threw up some interesting titles, some of which have not been released elsewhere. Some of the US mono versions were pressed by Plasylite and have the cursive “P” in the runout; though there are differing views as to audio quality coompared to Blue Note pressings
Selection of covers from UA Jazz series (from Personal Collection, Popsike, Discogs and Ebay)
See UA Jazz full listing of titles
3. Early 1970s United Artists US label
Reissue of United Artists Jazz recording made a decade before under Alan Douglas. The sound is much more “modern” stereo, silky vinyl quality is very good on my copies.
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