Surprise Surprise - mfp on 45

This recent find is one of a series of 7-inch releases from mfp, which tie in with their Hot Hits album series. It's also one of a run of more than 130 singles released on the label between 1970 and 1975, aimed at the children's market and released under the Surprise Surprise brand name. (Of course, those were the days when kids actually had toy record players, as opposed to gadgets like MP3 players.)

This particular single takes its A-side, "I'd Like To Teach The World To Sing", from Hot Hits 9 (early 1972), while the B-side, "Morningtown Ride" appears to have been recorded especially. As was the case with all of these kids' releases, the sleeve had a colour-in drawing on the back.

Looking at releases like this, which contain one or both of their songs from the Hot Hits LP series (plus the earlier ...Hits... albums), mfp released a tally of 16, putting them on a par with Pickwick in this respect. These singles are surprisingly little noted, but still better known than mfp's brief foray into the adult market, for which they created another label, Double Top. In the event only three Double Top singles ever appeared, while the kids' Surprise Surprise singles continued apace. Like the record above, all these Double Top singles featured tracks from Hot Hits 9, and one of them also has this same recording of "I'd Like To Teach The World To Sing":

Hear the song in question here: Id Like To Teach The World To Sing.mp3