Atari 5200 Guy Posted October 28, 2020 Report Share Posted October 28, 2020 (edited) Who here remembers vinyl records/albums? Who remembers K-Tel? For those who don't know here's a bit of a summed up history. Music. Before cellphones and music compressed so much you could fit almost an entire library of music on those phones music came on pressed disc made out of vinyl. And before the Now series of music compilations there was a company before them that did the same thing known as K-Tel. K-Tel made music compilations on 33 1/3 albums, cassettes, and 8-tracks. The did try to make the transition to CDs but didn't last long once CDs were introduced. Ah...good old K-Tel. If you wanted the latest hits but couldn't afford to grab every single or all the original artist's album releases you grabbed a K-Tel album. These discs contained anywhere between 12 to 20 songs in both rock and country genres. They were very popular items. Sometimes they had that one song you never heard before that was also really good...yet could not be found anywhere else. Once I had finished finally setting up my TT I began going through my K-Tel collection. Look what I found inside of one of them. Advertisements for the double ender 2600 games. I thought you guys would enjoy seeing this. Oh...and... ..my TT. Technics direct drive semi automatic. About as old as me and still ready to rock. So...if you have one spin it while playing Atari. You might just surprise yourself. Edited October 29, 2020 by Atari 5200 Guy socrates63, GRay Defender, RickR and 2 others 5 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HDN Posted October 28, 2020 Report Share Posted October 28, 2020 Wow! That's pretty cool! Almost all of the Xonox games were total garbage, but Artillery Duel is really, really fun with another player! I'm not sure if I have any K-Tel albums in my vinyl collection. It looks and sounds familiar though, so I think I might. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Atari 5200 Guy Posted October 28, 2020 Author Report Share Posted October 28, 2020 5 hours ago, HDN said: Wow! That's pretty cool! Almost all of the Xonox games were total garbage, but Artillery Duel is really, really fun with another player! I'm not sure if I have any K-Tel albums in my vinyl collection. It looks and sounds familiar though, so I think I might. Ghost Manor wasn't too bad. I have that Xonox double. I tried to enjoy Spike's Peak but it expects way to much from the player. HDN 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RickR Posted October 28, 2020 Report Share Posted October 28, 2020 Here are the K-Tel records I had from my youth. I loved them because it was such a bargain. A bunch of hits on each record for one low price! socrates63 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HDN Posted October 28, 2020 Report Share Posted October 28, 2020 @Atari 5200 Guy yup. I was right, I did have one laying around from K-Tel. Not sure if I have any more as I am posting this right after I found it. Here it is, from 1972. And here is the track list. It has quite a few songs for a single disk. Some pretty good songs on here. I don’t think I have ever played this one. I’ll give it a spin right after I post this. socrates63 and RickR 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Atari 5200 Guy Posted October 29, 2020 Author Report Share Posted October 29, 2020 Haha. I have a variant of that I found local but it was made in Canada. Yours is the one I've been hunting for. Here...see for yourself. See...yours has Beautiful Sunday on it where as mine doesn't... And that's one reason I'm after the USA version of this album. I love K-Tel as much as I love Atari so anytime I see that unmistakable logo on an album I make sure the album is in there and I bring them home. Over the years our K-Tel collection has grown but there are still some I'm after. And yes...Mr. Manilow is there for a reason. It too is a K-Tel album. See for yourself. socrates63 and HDN 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HDN Posted October 29, 2020 Report Share Posted October 29, 2020 Wow, I never knew! Thanks for bringing K-Tel to my attention. It’s nice to see compilations of the original recordings instead of crappy covers. Too many albums are like that. I will have to check through my other records and see if I have any more. I have some more stored away, and thankfully catalogued. I will check tomorrow. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Atari 5200 Guy Posted October 29, 2020 Author Report Share Posted October 29, 2020 (edited) 3 hours ago, HDN said: Wow, I never knew! Thanks for bringing K-Tel to my attention. It’s nice to see compilations of the original recordings instead of crappy covers. Too many albums are like that. I will have to check through my other records and see if I have any more. I have some more stored away, and thankfully catalogued. I will check tomorrow. The nice thing about K-Tel albums are you can just let em play. There is enough variety on those that you rarely have to skip a song. Most original artist albums I have just for one or two songs. There are very few albums I like from beginning to end but those are either music from the original motion pictures or greatest hits albums. With K-Tel I can just starter an album a enjoy. They make for great background music while playing card games with family and friends. If you are hunting might I suggest Discogs? Its a great way to track your collection, research what all is out there, and find used records for cheap. Sadly, most vinyl albums never made it over to the digital age. Who knows, just like your 7800, you may discover something new. Oh and for the record I can only recall two albums I enjoy from beginning to end. Crisis? What Crisis? and Breakfast in America...both from Supertramp. If you have never heard them before YouTube them. If you have seen any Amazon commercials with singing boxes then you would know Give A Little Bit. Others include Its Raining Again, Another Man's Woman, Goodbye Stranger, and Take The Long Way Home. Very unique, creative, and original music...the likes of which this world may not hear ever again. Edited October 29, 2020 by Atari 5200 Guy HDN 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LeeJ07 Posted October 29, 2020 Report Share Posted October 29, 2020 Man, things were so wild in the '70s that companies literally WERE advertising games everywhere. I'm not sure whose idea it was to advertise video games on album covers, but that's really quite an inspired idea for the 1970s. That said, not Chuck Norris Super-Kicks, surely they could have advertised ANYTHING else, lol. Quote "I'd buy that for a dollar!" -Smash T.V. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HDN Posted October 29, 2020 Report Share Posted October 29, 2020 I finally found (and checked) my record catalog. Nothing. Then again, the only records cataloged are the ones I have put away. I might just be missing one of the ones I have out. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Atari Creep Posted October 29, 2020 Report Share Posted October 29, 2020 I have a few K-Tel Halloween records around here somewhere. LOL Oh I remember them. HDN and Atari 5200 Guy 2 Quote Don't just watch TV, PLAY IT! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DegasElite Posted October 29, 2020 Report Share Posted October 29, 2020 (edited) K-Tel is a Canadian company from Winnipeg, Manitoba, that had a US office in Minneapolis, MN. I used to think that they were based in Minnesota. But, I looked it up on Wikipedia and found out it is Canadian. Interesting factoid. Edited October 29, 2020 by DegasElite HDN and RickR 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HDN Posted October 30, 2020 Report Share Posted October 30, 2020 I didn't know this until I was browsing AtariAge today, but K-Tel actually made some 2600 games of their own! Check it out: https://atariage.com/company_page.php?SystemID=2600&CompanyID=63 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DegasElite Posted October 30, 2020 Report Share Posted October 30, 2020 That's right. Xonox Double-Ender games were a K-Tel brand. Xonox were based in Minnesota, I know that. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DegasElite Posted October 30, 2020 Report Share Posted October 30, 2020 (edited) But, I didn't know that about K-Tel branded games like what are on AtariAge. Interesting. :O) Edited October 31, 2020 by DegasElite Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Atari 5200 Guy Posted October 30, 2020 Author Report Share Posted October 30, 2020 I know Colecovision had a game called K-Tel Rock n Roll something. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DegasElite Posted October 31, 2020 Report Share Posted October 31, 2020 It was called "It's Only Rock 'N Roll." Xonox made it for the ColecoVision. I used to have it for mine, until I sold my ColecoVision collection and went strictly collecting Atari items. It's a strategy game. But, since Xonox was owned by K-Tel anyway, it was a K-Tel game. :O) HDN 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Atari 5200 Guy Posted October 31, 2020 Author Report Share Posted October 31, 2020 I had it lol. Wasn't bad really but more text than graphics. DegasElite 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
socrates63 Posted November 1, 2020 Report Share Posted November 1, 2020 Thanks for sharing @Atari 5200 Guy. I had no idea about K-Tel music. I didn't get into buying music until CDs came along. With CDs, the cheap source was one of those clubs (Columbia?) that let you get a dozen CDs for a penny to get you into the club. HDN 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Join the conversation
You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.