Scarce & bizarre DUPONT record - Country songs about BENLATE FUNGICIDE

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60

If you've seen "Bathtubs Over Broadway" or read "Everything's Coming Up Profits," you know that private pressing "industrial musical" souvenir albums are some of the rarest and weirdest records in existence. These motivational musicals were only for dealers, salesmen, distributors and other industry insiders at sales meetings and conventions, and the souvenir vinyl records were not available to the public. And many of these shows boasted outstanding music and performances along with the bizarre corporate subject matter.

I'm the collector and historian profiled in the documentary "Bathtubs Over Broadway," and the co-author of "Everything's Coming Up Profits - The Golden Age of Industrial Musicals." I'm thinning out my stash of duplicates, and offering an assortment of records that range from the scarce, to the very rare, to the "you'll probably never encounter this again."

Here's a crazy corporate record that as far as I know was not a souvenir of a live show. So it's what I call "industrial musical-adjacent."
But if a record can't be a souvenir of a live corporate show, it can still win my heart if, say, it contains a batch of slickly-produced country songs about how a certain fungicide can prevent foliar disease and aerial blight in soybeans. Dupont's 1985 "Five Bushels Closer to My Heart" is exactly such a record.

Yes. Dupont's Benlate fungicide is the star of this record that was apparently distributed to soybean farmers worried about their crop yields. There are other topics besides Benlate, such as good heartland value songs such as "We Make Things Grow" and "Good Day's Work Done." But it all keeps coming back to the benefits of Benlate, in "Louisiana Losses" ("But there came a proven answer, Benlate's saved the day -- Use Benlate twice a season and your beans won't waste away"), "Just Give Me the Facts Jack" ("And when they talk about Benlate, it ain't hot air and hype, Cause when they're talking about some good hard facts I won't tell my dog to bite"), "Seedy Seeds" ("Once a field's infected it ain't just gonna go away, Unless you use some Benlate first some dues are gonna be paid"), "Boast Beans," "Irrigation Irritations"...
Very competent pop country 80's sounds on these songs bring the messages across effectively, if you're a soybean farmer who needs to hear the messages. Or if you're a weird record collector. Either way, it's good listening.
And good reading! Lord, what a lot to look at with this album. All the lyrics on the back, sure, but also the gatefold which is jam-packed with a masterclass on the problems facing soybean farmers and the much-needed relief provided by Benlate.
I'll leave to you to Google Benlate and learn about the dark side of this sunny story.
Anyway, it's a super-awesome super-weird record, and this example is lovely, with a sharp clean cover (with a little bit of something stuck to the back, no big deal, see the last picture) and a minty disc.
Grab this one for your collection of industrials and almost-industrials, and/or for your collection of bizarre agricultural musical ephemera!
Check out my other listings for many examples of the deliciously strange and secret industrial show genre, as well as an assortment of other miscellaneous weird records from my hoard.

Buyers of multiple records get a break on shipping charges.

**** PLEASE NOTE -- SHIPPING WILL BE DELAYED -- I WILL BE OUT OF TOWN FOR A FUNERAL WHEN THE AUCTION ENDS. THANK YOU FOR YOUR PATIENCE. ****