While digging around in the local record store, I ran across this gem: K-Tel’s Music Machine.
What caught my attention of course was Robby the Robot. For those of you who don’t know, Robby the Robot made his film debut in the 1956 sci-fi classic Forbidden Planet.
Based on his appearance on a bad K-Tel compilation album, you have to think Robby hit hard times somewhere in the 1970s.
I assumed that K-Tel had used a stock photo of Robby the Robot for the cover of their album, but no — apparently, Robby was actually involved in the marketing of the album. Don’t believe me?
Thanks to RetroJunk.com for uploading the commercial. They may have the footage, but I now have the album!
Why do I never find these in Goodwill, etc? These are great period pieces for the year they were released, which is exactly how I want to listen to music; one old song will remind me of what was on the radio right at that point in time. In fact back in the day, each song would remind me of the next song snippet that was played on the K-Tel commercials!
I had this record! My mom bought me K-Tel compilations every year for Christmas!
My first album ever – of all time – was K-Tel’s “Fantastic.” I lost my original copy – played the heck out of it on one of those old kiddie-type 16-33-45-78 floor-sitting close-n-play (but not the actual Close-N-Play) sort-of record-ruining devices. Today I think I have about 1/2 dozen K-Tel records and they show up in thrift stores every now and then – but like my original copy – they have been played to death.
Good find Flack! I was very thrifty with my money as a youngster and so I bought several K-Tel albums and cassettes for maximum music!
Have owned this album since it was new! What struck me eventually was that all of the songs were edited down to about 2 minutes each, presumably to fit more songs on the record. I believe this was common among all K-Tel compilations.