Columbia Record and Tape Club Magazine (January 1978)

 

Do you remember the Columbia House Record and Tape Club? Do you remember the little sheets of stamps crammed into infinite junk mail, or the cards in your Sunday newspaper that you were supposed to tape a penny to?

Lots of people use the word "scam" in the same paragraph when talking about the Club.  I was lucky enough to find out ahead of time that they begin sending you albums each month--that you didn't order--and then expect you to pay for them because, hey, remember? They gave you some free (or 1 cent) records for joining? Otherwise I would've been one of the unsuspecting teenagers jumping on board. (Wikipedia tells us that this business practice is known as negative option billing.)

What I didn't know was that they sent out a monthly catalog, and here is one with a cover promoting the hugely-selling STAR WARS soundtrack! Going through this catalog is interesting, because while there is stuff you will know (some of it kept on life support over the years by "classic rock" radio), there's also a quite a large amount that you will not know! You will hear yourself saying "who in the world is that?" quite a bit.

Here are the highlights, and I left the order form in there so you could sign up if you wish (just kidding; the Club is now long defunct, and I got dizzy keeping track of the number of times the company has been sold or absorbed...see aforementioned Wikipedia page for the full story!)

Huh. Neil Diamond in the "Rock" category...