I was cleaning my vinyl today and I came across an odd matrix on a 12". It's a white label of A Kind Of Magic. This is not the white/pink label I've seen, it has a plan white label on both sides.
It has a normal stamped matrix number, but also a very small hand writen 'Townhouse Kev'. My question is what does this mean? That is was pressed in the Townhouse Studio by someone called Kev? A Kind Of Magic was recorded there afterall...
Quite often the guys at the pressing plants would stamp their mark on vinyl records. I believe certain versions of Madness vinyls have becaome quite valuable depending on what is printed on the run-out groove.(What a brilliant job to have had back in the day...)
It seems that the Kev in question is Keven Metcalfe, mastering engineer at Townhouse studios. I found the same thing on the standard AKOM magic 12" as well. This would seem to suggest that he made the master at Townhouse, which was then used for all the pressings.