Cameo was a USA

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

 based budget record label

Record label

In the music industry, a record label is a brand and a trademark associated with the marketing of music recordings and music videos. Most commonly, a record label is the company that manages such brands and trademarks, coordinates the production, manufacture, distribution, marketing and promotion,...

, first flourishing in the 1920s, not connected with a later record label of the same name

Cameo-Parkway Records

Cameo-Parkway Records was the parent company of Cameo Records and Parkway Records, which were major American Philadelphia-based record labels from 1956 and 1958 to 1967...

 which was active in the 1950s and 1960s.
The Cameo Record Company was based in Manhattan

Manhattan

Manhattan is the oldest and the most densely populated of the five boroughs of New York City. Located primarily on the island of Manhattan at the mouth of the Hudson River, the boundaries of the borough are identical to those of New York County, an original county of the state of New York...

, New York

New York

New York is a state in the Northeastern region of the United States. It is the nation's third most populous state. New York is bordered by New Jersey and Pennsylvania to the south, and by Connecticut, Massachusetts and Vermont to the east...

. Cameo records were introduced in February 1922, selling for 50 cents each, and soon Cameo became one of the more popular budget labels.

Cameo Records are noted for a wealth of jazz

Jazz

Jazz is a musical style that originated at the beginning of the 20th century in African American communities in the Southern United States. It was born out of a mix of African and European music traditions. From its early development until the present, jazz has incorporated music from 19th and 20th...

-influenced 1920s dance music. While there is little of outstanding importance on Cameo, a high percentage of Cameo Records have fairly good hot music. New York based musicians such as Red Nichols

Red Nichols

Ernest Loring "Red" Nichols was an American jazz cornettist, composer, and jazz bandleader.Over his long career, Nichols recorded in a wide variety of musical styles, and critic Steve Leggett describes him as "an expert cornet player, a solid improviser, and apparently a workaholic, since he is...

, Miff Mole

Miff Mole

Irving Milfred Mole, better known as Miff Mole was a jazz trombonist and band leader. He is generally considered as one of the greatest jazz trombonists and credited with creating "the first distinctive and influential solo jazz trombone style." His major recordings included "Slippin' Around",...

, Adrian Rollini

Adrian Rollini

Adrian Francis Rollini was a multi-instrumentalist best known for his jazz music. He played the bass saxophone, piano, xylophone, and many other instruments. Rollini is also known for introducing the goofus in jazz music...

, and Frank Signorelli

Frank Signorelli

Frank Signorelli was an US jazz pianist of the 1920s. He was a founder member of the Original Memphis Five in 1917, then joined the Original Dixieland Jazz Band briefly in 1921. In 1927 he played in Adrian Rollini's New York ensemble, and subsequently worked with Eddie Lang, Bix Beiderbecke, Matty...

 made many trips to the Cameo studios. Cameo also featured a series of recordings by noted early blues

Blues

Blues is the name given to both a musical form and a music genre that originated in African-American communities of primarily the "Deep South" of the United States at the end of the 19th century from spirituals, work songs, field hollers, shouts and chants, and rhymed simple narrative ballads...

 singer Lucille Hegamin

Lucille Hegamin

Lucille Nelson Hegamin was an American singer and entertainer, and a pioneer African American blues recording artist.-Life and career:...

. In 1926, Cameo started recording using a microphone-electrical process. An interesting blues number is 583, "Crazy Blues", by Salt & Pepper

Jack Pepper

Jack Pepper was an American vaudeville dancer, singer, comedian, musician, and later in life a Dallas, Texas nightclub manager....

. Listen to the podcast at 26:46, where the disc is mentioned as an "early electric".

Cameo also owned the Lincoln Records

Lincoln Records

Lincoln Records was a United States record label in the 1920s.The bulk of material on Lincoln were dance tunes recorded by bands of no particular note. Lincoln Records filled a market niche for people who wanted inexpensive, danceable records of popular tunes and did not particularly care who...

and Romeo Records

Romeo Records

Romeo Records was a record label based in the United States of America in the 1920s and 1930s. It was a subsidiary of Cameo Records, manufactured to be sold exclusively at the S. H. Kress & Co. department store chain...

labels, as well as a subsidiary for making records for children, Cameo-Kid

Cameo-Kid

Cameo-Kid was a United States based record label in the 1920s.Cameo-Kid was a subsidiary of Cameo Records, marketing recordings intended for children. Cameo-Kid used professional artists with known names in their recordings, including star Vaudeville singers and noted dance-band musicians...

. Cameo was purchased by Pathé Records

Pathé Records

Pathé Records was a France-based international record label and producer of phonographs, active from the 1890s through the 1930s.- Early years :...

 in 1928; the label continued in use until 1930. Pathé was in turn acquired by the American Record Corporation

American Record Corporation

ARC, the American Record Company, also referred to as American Record Corporation, or as ARC Records, was a United States based record company...

.