I’ve had this in mind for some time….

Porky’s Prime Cuts are legendary – well, they are if, like me, you are a music fan of a certain age. Porky was the cutter for most of the indie records of the late 70s and 80s. He cut all the ‘Stiff Stuff’, including this - BUY 20 – the very wonderful ‘Watching the Detectives’ by Elvis (THE king and don’t you go getting all sniffy on me about the other Elvis’s right to the crown).

Stiff was the greatest label of the late 70s – it had on its roster many of the early punk/new wave bands and a whole load more, including EC, the Damned, Dr Feelgood, Ian Dury and the Blockheads, the Go-Gos – well too many fabulous acts to mention – if you want to know more about the Stiff roster – go here!

What I loved about the label was its complete irreverence and lack of adherence to the ‘norms’ of the day. Their manky very un-swish office was above a taxi-cleaning centre somewhere in West London, I can’t for the life of me remember exactly where even though I went there a few times.

Their marketing was witty and naughty all at once. They had tee-shirts printed with the Stiff logo and ‘If it ain’t Stiff, it ain’t worth a fuck’ (sorry Mum, but there was no star where the u is so don't tick me off) in rubber on the black cotton tee shirts. I once had a promo clock that they’d made, remember record clocks – with the hands coming through the centre of the record – theirs said ‘if you kill time, you murder success’.

What happy, happy days.

Unfortunately for Stiff, they always spotted the talent and then a bigger label came along and snaffled their verge of breaking bands – it happened over and over again. Mind you, they’d have waited a long, long time for someone to come and snaffle Wreckless Eric – a legend but sadly not a success….

I don’t think anyone knew what Porky looked like but his scratched comments on his cuttings could be profound, funny, sincere or plain silly. Even now, I find myself checking the run-out groove on my singles looking for one of his gems. The one on this single was ‘I think you know what I mean’ – BUT I DON’T! Was he referring to the song, or the label, or something completely random?……I doubt I’ll ever know because even if he’s still around, I doubt he’d remember why.

Porky’s wit and wisdom still makes me think and makes me chuckle today. My precious 45s still make me feel like a million dollars even though to anyone else they’re probably worthless, to me they’re absolutely irreplaceable and loved every bit as much as they were then. I’m afraid that there is no substitute in the world of CDs. I know, I know, it makes me sound old – well sometimes, when I think these records were cut in 1977, I realise that I AM old……

Oh I have made it to heaven (NOT that heaven exists - it's just a turn of phrase) - after a pleasant half-hour mooching around 'bestiff', I followed a link to www.stiff-records.com to find that Stiff is redoing a series of tee-shirts.....put me down for one of each design please....I am now in rapture because I had totally forgotten the one that said 'Stiff says try anything but incest and folk dancing'. I can't wait for my delivery of that one!!!!

My pic from last year was used in an ad campaign....