"Upon the United States’ involvement in World War II, shellac (the main ingredient in record production) became strictly rationed to be used for the war effort. In Hawaii, this meant the end of what was then the only local record company, “Hawaiian Transcription Productions” (HTP). Bill Fredlund, who had since the late 1930’s been mostly unsuccessful in the Hawaiian record business with his “Leo Kupina’i Studios” (lkS), finally got a break in 1944, when he discovered a forgotten cache of shellac in an old Honolulu warehouse.
He speedily shipped it to California along with other ingredients needed in the record-making process (including large amounts of sugar), and so began Bell Records (not to be confused with an earlier, by then defunct, mainland label with the same name). Fredlund hired experienced engineer Young O. Kang, and began recording locally, competing well with the major Mainland and European labels in sales. The output of Bell seems to be mostly tourist-oriented, thus the label tends to be largely overlooked by record collectors today. However, one of their earliest recording sessions, issued in 1945, absolutely breaks the mold. It was of a Tahitian group lead by George “Tautu” Archer, consisting of a pahu (Tahitian bass drum) player (playing two different sized drums), a guitar player, and male chanting. Little to nothing is known about Archer, only that his first two recordings, “Toreau” and “Ama Ama,” for the lack of a better term, “really cook.” They have a sense of both the islands and the Mainland; of the old traditions, and the youth and flavor of “modernity.”
-- Jeff Weiss
FROM:
http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/music_blog/2010/06/frank-fairfield-starts-new-label-releases-rare-gramophone-records-compilation-unveils-new-mp3.html