Capitol Records "Walking Distance" Photo Shoots

Not sure who's star she's standing on, but this probably ain't too far from 1750 N. Vine.

 

That would've been awfully premature.

 

I have been trying to find, on the net, a photo of the first office. So far, no luck. Very elusive, though perhaps not surprisingly so: my mind pictures it as some tiny second floor space, barely showing any identification?

 

Thank you; you are THE man!

Happy to oblige. After reading your post, I did a little more digging, and I think I found the original online source: an April 9, 2006 post from Mark Heimback-Nielsen's blog about Capitol Records, which is still active. Here is the link: popculturefanboy: April 2006 »

There is an intermediary source, too. It is a post from a thread about "Noirish Los Angeles," which has some great historical LA photos: SkyscraperPage Forum - View Single Post - noirish Los Angeles »

The following photo is captioned as having been taken inside the office on July 21, 1943.




Peggy Lee was apparently referring to this location when she wrote in her autobiography that "those fellows were conducting business upstairs over Sy's tailor shop on Vine, just below Sunset ... Sy Devore was the leading tailor of the day ... "

That reference to Devore threw me off, because everywhere else I have been reading that Devore leased space from ABC. If he was on ABC space, then the location of his shop would have been a little further past Wallichs' record store. So, based on the Devore-ABC connection reference, I thought that Lee was misremembering. I thought that she was confusing Devore's shop with that of a tailor shop named Beni Garson, located on the first floor below the main wing of the second Capitol offices.

However, now that I am reading Heimback-Nielsen's aforementioned blog, it is looking like Peggy Lee was remembering correctly, after all. This is what he writes:

"Capitol Records officially opened for business on June 4, 1942 in a small 15’x50’ second floor office at 1483 Vine Street, just south of Sunset Boulevard (currently the entrance to the Bank of America parking structure), above Sy Devore’s Tailor Shop."

From this I am gathering that, before moving to space leased by ABC, Devore was using the 1483 Vine street space.

Maybe an LA resident can corroborate that the location of Bank of America (if it is still there) corresponds with the location of the entrance to the first office, as seen in the photo above? From a look at Google Maps, it would seem that Bed, Bath & Beyond is there now, while Bank of America is across, in what was NBC.

Here's yet something else that is confusing me: was 1483 Vine Street supposed to be the address for the entrance to the first office? From a look at the photo, I'm not sure that the would have a Vine Street address. (Then again, maybe the office itself was a long distance from the entrance -- all the way to what I'm thinking as being the Vine side of the street.)

 

A friend gave me the promotional LP Capitol Hits Through The Years, with short excerpts from 1942-1969:

http://discogs.com/Various-Capitol-Hits-Through-The-Years/release/4471380

 

Scratch the NBC mention; I had in mind the wrong corner side.

 

In the mid 90s I went to an employment agency and filled out the paperwork just so I could be sent to the Capitol Tower to work on temp assignments. I asked for A&R, Promotion, or Marketing depts. It took many weeks to get the calls, but I did get to work in those three depts. and the view from above was cool. I took lots of promo keepsakes, and had a great time. But I did see some negativity setting in too. People rushing around, and cussing out people after they hung up the phone with them. One young kid looked at me and flat out said "This Job SUCKS" as he was answering phone calls in the promotion dept.

 

Bigger-size version of the photo:



I do not see any name on the star being occupied by Nancy ... Thoughts about that? Could it have been a star on which no name had been placed yet? Or was "digital" deletion of the name a possibility back then? (The Capitol LP is from 1963.)

And how about the star seen next to the one on which she's standing? Is that Glenn Miller's name on it, or are my eyes deceiving me? .... A Google search is telling me that Miller's star is at 6915 Hollywood Boulevard.



Currently, the following acts also have their stars at or near that address: The Munchkins, Zsa Zsa Gabor, Marion Martin, Basil Rathbone, Dick Powell, Johnny Grant, Creighton Hale, Richard Zanuck, Queen Latifah, Bruce Willis, John Singleton, and Elton John.

 

Cue up Bernard Herrmann:

 

I see the Miller, but can't really make out the first name. He did get his star in early 1960, so it's probably him.

 

These photos are awesome to look at, neat taking in the views of the area. I'd love for my wheelchair to visit Capitol and see that big stack of wax motif.

 

if I had a delorean, this is exactly the period where I'd go back to 55'/56'. must have been amazing to see life
during that time with the cars and the hot 50's chicks! music wasn't too shabby either
the changes music was about to face over that 55 - 65 period, unfreakin' believable!

 

It's a really good, swingin' Jazz LP.

 

ahhhhh! and to think that Brian Wilson walked through those doors, picked up a 'four freshman' record to play in
one of these listening booths that blew his mind, and changed his life forever.
The geneses of The Beach Boys was founded.

edit: I wonder who is the artist on that 'Specialty' 45? only artist I could come up with Frankie Lee Sims...?....

 

Thought about this one.