In June 1959, West's nomadic tendencies took him to his most famous address, 65 East Forrest.

Bumble Bee and Flick would be administered from here in their final days but it was a new label, Contour, which provided  the fanfare.

Cyril Clarke of the Majestics recalls the basement address as an office with a small rehearsal area.

Robert West's wife Catherine carried out the administrative work from these premises.

Motown's future stars, the Contours, took their name from the sign above the door.

It is difficult to date the Contour releases but the numbering system suggests that the first release was by Bob Hamilton under the guise of Professor Hamilton and the Schoolboys. It was called "Juanita of Mexico" and was written by Hamilton himself.

The follow up may well have been by the Fabulous Playboys who had been together for several years prior to the release of "Sweet Pea and the Broncbusters"/"I fooled you" on Contour004. The group at that time was made up of songwriter James Gibson, Johnny Alvin, Chester Fleming and Carlis "Sonny" Monroe.

The Playboys next port of call was Davis-Coleman's Daco Productions on East Canfield. 

Saxi Kari (with the Newports) recorded  "Hurry Arthur Murray"/"Chicky chop chop" on Contour 301 in late '59.

Contour issued another five 45's after this release, all under a "500" series. Willie Hamilton, Knight Hawks, Dave Atkins and the Minor chords, Pauline Cooper all flopped.

The other Contour release, number 501 rather summed it up. It was "Hard times" by the Majestics.

Johnny Mitchell image courtesy SisDetroit. Other scans Graham Finch

It was their debut and group member Cyril Clarke recalls that the group was made up of himself, Johnny Mitchell, Alvin English and C Autry (Breeze) Hatcher.

The writing credits show "Jonny and Ben" and  Cyril speculates that this was Mitchell in collaboration with Ben Knight of the Falcons who was always hanging around rehearsals and sessions.

The Majestics recorded for Willie Ewing's Chex label a couple of years later.

Whilst based at East Forrest, West used Bristoe Bryant's studio at 93 East Alexandrine as it was within easy reach, just a few hundred metres north, off Woodward. Avenue.

Bristoe Bryant

The studio was in the basement and Music City record store was on the ground level. Bristoe was also a disc jockey on radio station WJLB, which means there was possibly much  to be achieved by making recordings there. 

Also using the studio were Berry and Raynoma. Raynoma recalls paying $10 per hour studio time and $10 for radio advertising.

In August 1959 Bristoe's recording equipment found it's way to the new Hitsville studio on West Grand Boulevard.

The matrix number on some of the Flick/Contour/Bumble Bee 45's are preceded by the letter 'S' as per the above label scan. 

Ron Murphy explains. "The letter 'S' is for Sheldon Records in Chicago. When they received a tape from a record company which did not bear a matrix number Sheldon would assign one.

By 1961, they were pressing so many Detroit 45's that they eventually changed the prefix to 'D' to highlight that it was a Detroit recording.

I visited Sheldon in 1966 and again in 1969. They had a nice set up, all in-house, from the lathe to cut master records, printing labels, pressing machines and recording studios too.

In my opinion they cut the best sounding records of those times."

Continued