Thank you for buying this record. What follows is its documentation: the pressing identified, the matrix / runout transcribed by hand from the dead wax, and the condition as assessed before it was listed. It is yours to keep with the record.

— Paul, Vinyl Curator

Bobbie Gentry

Ode To Billie Joe

1967 · Capitol Records T-2830 · Mono · US (Capitol Records pressing plant, Jacksonville, Florida — identified by the “0” stamp in the runout) · LP · 33 1/3 RPM

Pressing details

Label	Capitol Records
Catalogue number	T-2830
Year	1967
Mono / Stereo	Mono
Country	US (Capitol Records pressing plant, Jacksonville, Florida — identified by the “0” stamp in the runout)
Format	LP
Speed	33 1/3 RPM
Genre	Pop/Country – Blue-Eyed Soul
Producer	Kelly Gordon
Composer	Bobbie Gentry (all tracks except “Niki Hoeky,” written by Pat Vegas)
Conductor	Jimmie Haskell
Musicians	Bobbie Gentry (vocals, guitar); studio session musicians uncredited on the jacket and labels

Matrix / Runout

Side A:  T1 2830 G5#2 O 0
Side B:  T2 2830 G5 0

Condition

Cover: EX
Vinyl: NM

Variant chronology

1967 - US Capitol T-2830, mono, rainbow label (Los Angeles pressing)
1967 - US Capitol T-2830, mono, rainbow label (Scranton pressing)
1967 - US Capitol T-2830, mono, rainbow label (Jacksonville pressing)  <- this copy
1967 - US Capitol ST-2830, stereo, rainbow label
1967 - UK Capitol T 2830, mono
1967 - UK Capitol ST-2830, stereo
1967 - Canada Capitol T 2830 / ST 2830, mono and stereo
1969 - Canada Capitol ST-2830, stereo reissue
2010 - UK Pure Pleasure Analogue PPAN ST 2830, 180g stereo audiophile reissue

This Pressing

1967 US mono first-year pressing - Capitol black rainbow label, Jacksonville plant stamp in the runout.

The Album

Bobbie Gentry arrived at Capitol Records in early 1967 with a spare guitar-and-vocal demo tape that included a hypnotic story-song called "Ode to Billie Joe" alongside "Mississippi Delta," the track that actually won her the contract. Producer Kelly Gordon rushed the single into release and, needing a fuller arrangement, called in Jimmie Haskell to write and record a string chart at the tail end of another artist's session, giving the song its now-iconic orchestral hush. The single's mysterious narrative of a Southern family's supper-table indifference to a young man's suicide became a sensation, and Capitol quickly built an entire album around it, filling out the LP with additional Gentry originals recorded in only a few days. The record topped the American charts, displacing the Beatles'

Tracklist

Side 1

1. Mississippi Delta
2. I Saw An Angel Die
3. Chickasaw County Child
4. Sunday Best
5. Niki Hoeky

Side 2

1. Papa, Woncha Let Me Go To Town With You
2. Bugs
3. Hurry, Tuesday Child
4. Lazy Willie
5. Ode To Billie Joe

The Label

Both sides carry Capitol's black rainbow colorband label: a brown field with silver-white print, a rainbow band running round the rim, and the Capitol dome logo set in a light blue oval at top centre, with ‘RECORDS’ printed beneath the logo on side two. The rim text reads ‘MFD. BY CAPITOL RECORDS, INC. U.S.A. T.M. MARCA REG. U.S. PAT. NO. 2,631,859’ and is a flat label, with no deep-groove ridge. This rainbow, logo-at-top design was Capitol's standard pop-album label from the early 1960s through 1968, and the catalogue number reads ‘T-2830’ rather than ‘ST-2830’, identifying this as the mono edition of the debut LP. The runout carries a ‘0’ stamp, the mark Capitol used at its Jacksonville, Florida plant, placing this copy among the several US plants - Los Angeles, Scranton and Jacksonville among them - that struck the mono edition in its first year on the market.

Fidelity

This mono mix was cut and pressed in the first year of release at one of Capitol's US plants, without a mastering engineer credited on the jacket or labels. Collectors generally regard the original 1967 mono and stereo Capitol pressings as the most authentic listen to Jimmie Haskell's string arrangement and Gentry's vocal, with later reissues - including the 2018 Record Store Day 12-inch and the 2023 mono vinyl remaster - offering cleaner surfaces but a different tonal balance. Within the original US pressings, plant-to-plant differences (Scranton versus Jacksonville) are considered minor and mostly a matter of collector preference rather than an audible fidelity hierarchy.

Notes

This is the mono edition of Capitol's 1967 debut LP, catalogue T-2830, on the black rainbow/colorband label with the Capitol logo at top. The runout carries a "0" stamp identifying Capitol's Jacksonville pressing plant, one of several US plants used for the title in its first pressing year. The back cover's altered track titles ("An Angel Died," "Papa, Won't You Take Me To Town With You," "Hurry Tuesday Child") and mismatched running order against the labels are characteristic of this early jacket printing.

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