Blue Horizon

Blue Horizon Records was a British blues independent record label, founded by Mike Vernon and Neil Slaven in 1965, as an adjunct to their fanzine, "R&B Monthly." and was the foremost label at the time of the British Blues boom in the mid to late 1960s.

Blue Horizon's first release was a 45 rpm single by Hubert Sumlin, then working as Howlin' Wolf's guitarist. Other releases soon followed on the Outasite and Purdah labels, the latter of which released just four 7" singles; including "Flapjacks" by Stone's Masonry (featuring Martin Stone, later to join Savoy Brown and Mighty Baby); and another by John Mayall and Eric Clapton "Bernard Jenkins", and "Lonely Years". Only 99 copies of each are thought to have been pressed - limited originally to avoid purchase tax - although it has also been said that the number was as high as 1000.

45 rpm releases continued on the Blue Horizon label, generally reissues of rare and hard-to-find singles from a handful of American blues musicians, although two releases — one by guitarist J.B. Lenoir, and another, by Champion Jack Dupree and British guitarist Tony McPhee — presented new material. Blue Horizon's first LP was by one-man band Doctor Ross, recorded in a London hotel room while he was on tour with the 1965 American Folk Blues Festival. A world-wide licensing and distribution deal with CBS, reached late in 1967, heralded the glory years of the label. Starting with two 7" singles with combined CBS/Blue Horizon stamps featuring Peter Greens Fleetwood Mac and Aynsley Dunbars Retaliation there followed a string of singles and albums by both British and U.S. blues artists, both licensed and newly recorded. Some releases featured Mike Vernon produced recordings of U.S. artists such as Otis Spann and Champion Jack Dupree, backed by British blues players including Peter Green, Rory Gallagher, Paul Kossoff, Stan Webb and Pete Wingfield. Other UK artists signed to the label included Chicken Shack, Duster Bennett, Gordon Smith, Jellybread and Christine Perfect (later to be Christine McVie).

...
Wikipedia