ROULETTE RECORDS
Roulette Records is an American record label founded in late 1956 by George Goldner, Joe Kolsky, Morris Levy, and Phil Khals, with creative control given to producers and songwriters Hugo Peretti and Luigi Creatore. Levy was appointed director. The label had known ties to New York mobsters. Levy ran the label with an iron fist. (More from Wikipedia)
The label for the Stratavarious album is Roulette Records; back when, I loved the orange-and-yellow, roulette-wheel design of their record labels. One of my favorite songs for a while was on Roulette; it was “Rip Van Winkle” by the Devotions. It was basically a novelty song retelling the famous legend that also featured a lot of bowling sounds for some reason (I can’t recall ever hearing that on another song!). I was on a bowling team in those days, so maybe that’s what got me going.
Anyway, I have since found out that Roulette Records was owned by the notorious music mogul Morris Levy. Some of the information that I have read about him is praiseworthy, but most people think he was basically a gangster. Tommy James and the Shondells was one of Roulette’s big artists; they had a lot of records on the charts – including one of the biggest psychedelic hit songs of the 1960’s, “Crimson and Clover” – and their albums are really good as well. I picked up one not too long ago; at the beginning of the album, there was an older man with a gruff voice who was trying to be hip, saying things like “don't mind me, you just do your thing”. In another context, I would have just thought that it was corny; with Roulette though . . . I don’t know if that was Levy or not, but it sounded pretty sinister to me.
Levy and Roulette also figure in the story of Milan (also known as the Leather Boy), one of the most mysterious figures in 1960’s garage rock.
(March 2012)
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Milan is among the most enigmatic figures in 1960’s rock music; he recorded under a number of other names and also wrote and produced songs for a number of obscure bands. Along the way he worked with several well-known figures in popular music, including the notorious music mogul Morris Levy of Roulette Records; Artie Kornfeld, the “father of Woodstock”; and Melanie’s husband, manager and producer, Peter Schekeryk.
(July 2012)
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Sugar Hill Records is an early hip hop label that was founded in 1979 by the married couple of Joe Robinson and Sylvia Robinson plus Milton Malden, with financial backing by Morris Levy of Roulette Records.
(September 2016)
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The five songs by the Choir on the EP called The Choir, however, did not include their September 1966 release “It’s Cold Outside”, which was picked up by Roulette Records in May 1967, hitting #1 on all three Top 40 radio stations in Cleveland and peaking at #68 on the Billboard charts. “It’s Cold Outside” is one of my very favorite 1960’s garage rock songs, and this song has fans across the country and around the world. “It’s Cold Outside” gained more attention when it was included on Pebbles, Volume 2 and later in the first Nuggets Box Set.
(December 2017)
