Randy Wood, the founder and original owner of Dot Records, the record label best remembered for, among other things, hit cover recordings of rhythm and blues hits (Pat Boone's recordings of "Ain't That A Shame," "I'll Be Home," Tutti Frutti" come to mind), passed away this past Saturday at his La Jolla, California of complications from injuries suffered from a fall down stairs at his home at age 94.
Dot Records, started in Gallatin, Tennessee in the early 1950s, sprang from a mail-order business that Mr. Wood owned called Randy's Record Shop.
Besides Mr. Boone, who would be the label's biggest hitmaker, other artists who had big hits on Dot included The Hilltoppers (one of whose members, Billy Vaughn, who would have hits of his own and who also became the label's musical director), Johnny Maddox (a ragtime pianist), the Fontaine Sisters (who also had success with cover recordings and who had formerly sang backup for Perry Como), Gale Storm (singer and actress), Jim Lowe (a disc jockey, whose big hit came in 1956 with "The Green Door"), Wink Martindale (DJ and future TV game show host), Lawrence Welk (whose recording of "Calcutta" would prove to be his only #1 hit), Jimmy Gilmer and the Fireballs ("Sugar Shack," 1963), and the Surfaris ("Wipe Out," also 1963).
Mr. Wood moved his label to Los Angeles in 1956 and sold it shortly thereafter to Paramount Pictures. He would remain head of the label until 1967, when he left to form Ranwood Records along with Lawrence Welk.
Gulf and Western, the conglomerate that bought Paramount Pictures at that time, made Dot Records a division of Famous Music. By the mid-1970s, the label was sold to ABC. By 1977 the Dot Records name disappeared, having been absorbed into ABC Records, and in 1978, ABC sold its' record division to MCA.
The Universal Music Group now owns the Dot Records catalog.
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