Ted Carroll’s top thirty

August 17, 2026 By admin Off

Earlier this year, Fredrik Ekander the main man at Cosmos Records, the Swedish company that bought all the Ace Records copyright off Roger, Trevor and myself, asked if we would let him have a top thirty of our favourite records for promotion purposes.

I wasn’t quite sure what they were going to do with it and forgot about it and out of the blue, this arrived last month. They’ve only gone and posted the whole thing onto Youtube.

I’ve listened to it and I have to say that I really love it, although I have a few comments to make.

‘BAD BOY’. Next to Chuck Berry, I think that Larry Williams was one of the most inventive lyricists in Rock’n’Roll, however, I prefer the Beatles version of ‘Bad Boy’ which is better than the original and shows what a great rock’n’roll vocalist John Lennon was.

‘SHOUT BAMALAMA’ by the Detroit Cobras, I meant them to use the original great recording of this, however, they have used a live video instead, which shows what a great live band the Cobras were, despite the sound here not being so great.

‘WHISKEY IN THE JAR’. Again a video of a live TV appearance on the German Musicladen show, however this time the sound is perfect and it’s such a buzz to see the original trio playing live! Brilliant!

‘JET BLACK BLUES’ This record by Blind Willie Dunn’s Gin Bottle Four was the very first 7″ record that I ever bought in 1956 when I was 14. It’s also of note because it was probably one of the earliest ever integrated recordings in Jazz [1928]. It cost 1/6d ( 7.5p)

These are just 30 of perhaps at least 100 records that I could have chosen, as you know, your preferences change all the time. I’m very pleased with this bunch, hope that you enjoy them and don’t mind me taking the liberty of sharing them with you.