Record Collector was a GREAT and essential magazine back in the day
they always got in top guys to write about bands they specialised in - our own Rob Bradford re The Shads, an Aussie guy named Simon Smith re The Hollies (Simon kindly thanked me among others in his 'RC' article), author Alan Clayson re The Dave Clark Five and guys who had done books or even TV shows on artists etc
I too recall dealers like Peter Monk who advertised in 'RC' pages - Peter was a nice bloke and I had a number of albums from him too !
The magazine was well written in a positive objective and very down to Earth manner with a both considerable knowledge and a real sense of appreciation of classic artists both those who achieved great fame and the lesser known but equally deserving acts too
they would write about Cliff Richard & The Drifters/Shadows ...and Dave Sampson and The Hunters with equal enthusiasm and detail
they used to regularly feature The Beatles - presumably to ensure a wider public appeal (Johnny Dean was the original editor of RC so that was to be expected) but they also gave a good amount of in depth appreciative attention to The Shadows, Hollies, Rolling Stones, Small Faces, Moody Blues, Dave Clark Five etc....and NONE of the almost obligatory 'knocking' or 'belittling' of the other groups some Beatle obsessed music papers seemed obliged to do
while heavy rock and progressive rock bands careers were looked at in detail minus any silly 'trendy' insults about 'dinosaurs' (who existed on Earth a lot longer than man has !) or calling The Rolling Stones 'Wrinkly Rockers' that the mainstream pop press was forever doing (yawn)
you learned ALOT from the pages of 'RC' and it helped both younger new music buyers and older guys completing collections to both plug any gaps or 'get into' bands and artists you either missed or never really delved into back then when SO MANY magnificent records were being issued....
as music papers like NME and 'Melody Maker' had gone increasingly downhill so badly full of jumped up self opinionated reviewers - leading to the demise of most - magazines like 'Record Collector' were a breath of serious informative fresh air for music history - with great detail not only about artists but records themselves, labels, re-issues, even corner record shops !
.... even if their 'values' of records was often laughable !
for me...and I suspects others too...'RC' began to lose it when their better staff began to move on, and some 'know all self opinionated' newer writers later came in ....and the focus began moving towards later artists whose music held no interest whatsover for me
I remember one newer writer who just went into complete 'squee' mode over Jimi Hendrix and to big up his hero duly 'belittled' every other noted guitarist !
- guys like him put me off the mag a fair bit
the mag's 'records for sale' pages began to shrink as the internet took hold, also their reviews became less objective and positive (to me) and evermore self opinionated and derogative (reminding me of latter era 'NME' and 'Melody Maker') as the later writers seemed to think THEIR views were the 'be all and end all' important ones (Deja Vu ?)
while a later more apparently "with it" editor featured a pic of himself on his editor's page unlike his less 'self featuring' predecessors of (in my view) stronger days for the mag which again suggested to me the thing was rather losing something....
I gradually lost interest in it, only got the occasional issue, and as it's price grew and grew finally gave it up...
Ironic but earlier copies of 'RC' must now themselves be collector's items !
- certainly their coverage of fifties, sixties and seventies artists ('my era' !) was really excellent and The Shadows always got a very good feature in the pages of 'Record Collector' !