WEBVTT - The Rebirth of Vinyl 0:00:04.440 --> 0:00:12.319 Welcome to tech Stuff, a production from iHeartRadio. Hey there, 0:00:12.320 --> 0:00:16.200 and welcome to tech Stuff. I'm your host, Jonathan Strickland. 0:00:16.239 --> 0:00:19.920 I'm an executive producer with iHeartRadio and how the tech 0:00:19.960 --> 0:00:22.759 are you? So Originally I was going to do a 0:00:22.800 --> 0:00:26.079 tech stuff tidbits today to talk about something I just 0:00:26.079 --> 0:00:29.920 think is cool, which is really the history of vinyl 0:00:30.080 --> 0:00:35.040 record sales here in the United States. But it quickly 0:00:35.080 --> 0:00:40.080 grew beyond tidbits size. No big surprise there, y'all know me. 0:00:40.720 --> 0:00:44.239 I'm a chatty kathy at the best of times. But 0:00:44.320 --> 0:00:47.240 I thought we could look at a technology that traces 0:00:47.280 --> 0:00:52.200 its history to really the nineteenth century, the late eighteen hundreds, 0:00:52.479 --> 0:00:56.000 and then evolved and grew gradually until it became a 0:00:56.120 --> 0:01:00.720 dominant technology that waned in the nineteen eighties, really hit 0:01:00.760 --> 0:01:05.480 its lowest point in the two thousands, and then starting 0:01:05.560 --> 0:01:09.479 around two thousand and six and continuing for seventeen years, 0:01:09.480 --> 0:01:13.160 has really made a comeback. So yeah, I am talking 0:01:13.240 --> 0:01:19.839 about the vinyl record baby. Now. I love vinyl records. 0:01:20.360 --> 0:01:24.200 I have a very small collection of vinyl records myself. 0:01:24.319 --> 0:01:27.959 I know people who have huge libraries of vinyl I 0:01:28.000 --> 0:01:32.080 am not that person. I would love to have a 0:01:32.160 --> 0:01:36.160 huge library a vinyl but I just have a modest 0:01:36.200 --> 0:01:39.920 collection couple one hundred records. Now, nothing in my collection 0:01:40.080 --> 0:01:44.160 is rare, nothing is particularly special beyond the connection I 0:01:44.319 --> 0:01:48.400 feel to the recording itself and the musical artists that 0:01:48.440 --> 0:01:52.280 are represented. So it's really just my own small library 0:01:52.360 --> 0:01:55.160 of records that I like to listen to on occasion. 0:01:55.760 --> 0:02:00.000 And there is a ritual to listening to a vinyl 0:02:00.160 --> 0:02:04.520 record because there's so many steps that are involved, physical 0:02:04.760 --> 0:02:07.880 steps that you must take to listen to vinyl records. 0:02:07.880 --> 0:02:11.919 And I truly believe that it's a combination of the 0:02:11.919 --> 0:02:15.440 technology and the steps you have to take to use 0:02:15.480 --> 0:02:21.440 that technology that create a very special situation that enhances 0:02:21.480 --> 0:02:26.040 our connection to the music that's recorded on that medium. Now, 0:02:26.040 --> 0:02:28.120 don't get me wrong, I am not one of the 0:02:28.160 --> 0:02:31.120 true believer audio files out there who swears that a 0:02:31.240 --> 0:02:35.280 vinyl record produces better sound than say, high quality digital 0:02:35.320 --> 0:02:38.600 recording you would get on like a compact disc. There 0:02:38.639 --> 0:02:42.240 are too many factors involved to make that kind of 0:02:42.480 --> 0:02:47.120 sweeping declaration. There are those who will swear that analog 0:02:47.280 --> 0:02:53.600 formats are just by themselves superior to digital formats. I 0:02:53.639 --> 0:02:57.320 think it gets way more complicated than that. There's everything 0:02:57.360 --> 0:03:01.240 from the quality of the recording master, of the type 0:03:01.280 --> 0:03:06.040 of stylists that your tabletop uses, the kind of motor 0:03:06.120 --> 0:03:11.000 setup that the turntable has that can all affect music 0:03:11.080 --> 0:03:13.600 quality all on its own. And that's before you even 0:03:13.600 --> 0:03:18.760 get to stuff like pre amps, amplifiers, speakers, cables, etc. 0:03:19.639 --> 0:03:25.520 Plus hearing and listening that involves psychology, right, That involves 0:03:25.600 --> 0:03:29.200 the gray matter in our noggins. So it's not just technology, 0:03:29.760 --> 0:03:34.040 and that means that my experience is at least to 0:03:34.160 --> 0:03:38.240 some degree unique to me, and that someone else who 0:03:38.280 --> 0:03:40.640 is standing in the exact same spot where I stood 0:03:40.960 --> 0:03:44.200 and listening to the exact same recording on the exact 0:03:44.200 --> 0:03:47.840 same equipment is going to have a different experience than 0:03:47.880 --> 0:03:51.440 I did. Now, it might not be vastly different, it 0:03:51.520 --> 0:03:54.480 might not even be something that they can identify or communicate. 0:03:54.560 --> 0:03:58.360 We might talk with each other and not find any differences. 0:03:58.400 --> 0:04:01.320 But the fact is they're sperience will be at least 0:04:01.360 --> 0:04:03.720 to some degree unique to them, and mine will be 0:04:03.840 --> 0:04:08.080 unique to me. So it's just like west Lee said 0:04:08.360 --> 0:04:12.520 in The Princess Bride, audio quality is subjective. Anyone who 0:04:12.520 --> 0:04:16.480 says otherwise is selling something I might have paraphrased that, 0:04:17.040 --> 0:04:20.480 So I am not here to say the vinyl records 0:04:20.480 --> 0:04:26.760 provide the superior acoustic experience. I don't believe they necessarily do. 0:04:26.880 --> 0:04:30.600 I think they can, depending upon all the other factors 0:04:30.600 --> 0:04:34.440 that play here. But it's more complicated than just what 0:04:34.560 --> 0:04:38.120 format is the music in? Is it in, you know, 0:04:38.200 --> 0:04:42.280 analog versus digital? Is it on vinyl versus cassette versus 0:04:42.360 --> 0:04:48.039 compact disc versus MP three. However, the activity of listening 0:04:48.080 --> 0:04:52.320 on vinyl has other values beyond audio quality. So, for 0:04:52.400 --> 0:04:56.040 one thing, a long playing vinyl an LP or an 0:04:56.080 --> 0:05:00.159 extended play vinyl EP. Those are big, you know. They 0:05:00.200 --> 0:05:04.840 can measure typically ten inches in diameter, that's twenty five centimeters, 0:05:04.839 --> 0:05:07.920 but they can be up to twelve inches that's thirty centimeters. 0:05:08.560 --> 0:05:12.240 And that means these records, these discs of vinyl, have 0:05:12.360 --> 0:05:15.640 to fit into a sleeve and then a cover that's 0:05:15.680 --> 0:05:19.279 even larger than the disc is right, and this actually 0:05:19.320 --> 0:05:22.560 gives artists a fairly large canvas to work with when 0:05:22.560 --> 0:05:26.960 it comes to designing album cover art, which for a 0:05:27.000 --> 0:05:30.400 while ended up becinding kind of a forgotten art form. 0:05:31.000 --> 0:05:35.400 So part of the ritual of listening to vinyls, specifically 0:05:35.400 --> 0:05:40.520 to LPs and EPs is admiring that cover art. Now, 0:05:40.560 --> 0:05:45.080 some album cover art is, to put it, lightly bad. 0:05:45.760 --> 0:05:49.719 Some of it is hilariously bad. So if you want 0:05:49.720 --> 0:05:52.240 to laugh, you can do a Google image search for 0:05:52.320 --> 0:05:58.000 the album Gary Getting down to Business. It's Gary gaar Y. 0:05:58.560 --> 0:06:01.320 So it features Gary Solim on the cover, striking a 0:06:01.440 --> 0:06:05.839 uh well, let's be kind. We'll call it a dramatic pose. 0:06:06.240 --> 0:06:08.640 And it most certainly is a product of the late 0:06:08.720 --> 0:06:12.839 nineteen seventies, and viewed through the modern lens, it will 0:06:12.920 --> 0:06:16.240 look funny to you. Maybe you would want to recreate 0:06:16.279 --> 0:06:20.120 it ironically, and maybe eventually it would become unironic and 0:06:20.160 --> 0:06:23.400 that just becomes your thing. No judgment here. Maybe if 0:06:23.440 --> 0:06:26.240 you're a Simpsons fan and you happen to love that 0:06:26.320 --> 0:06:30.000 meme where Homer slowly walks backwards into some bushes in 0:06:30.080 --> 0:06:34.600 order to disappear, you should look at the entree Amigos 0:06:34.920 --> 0:06:38.960 by Camillo Sesto, because it sure does look like Camillo 0:06:39.120 --> 0:06:42.480 served as the inspiration for that particular moment in the Simpsons. 0:06:42.839 --> 0:06:47.600 He's standing halfway engulfed in a hedge, and I mean, 0:06:47.640 --> 0:06:49.359 you look at it, and if you've ever seen that 0:06:49.440 --> 0:06:52.880 Simpsons mean. You immediately think this must be where they 0:06:53.080 --> 0:06:58.880 got that image. Anyway, other album art can be amazing. 0:07:00.240 --> 0:07:02.839 You could get into like the beef cake and cheesecake 0:07:02.880 --> 0:07:05.839 covers of Molly Hatchett albums because they look like an 0:07:05.920 --> 0:07:10.720 advertisement for like a cheeky Sword and Sorcery film or 0:07:10.760 --> 0:07:15.720 a Dungeons and Dragons expansion set, or you know, something 0:07:15.760 --> 0:07:19.280 like David Bowie's Aladdinsane album with the simple image of 0:07:19.360 --> 0:07:22.440 David Bowie from the shoulders up with that lightning bolt 0:07:22.560 --> 0:07:27.360 makeup decorating his face. The art becomes part of the experience. 0:07:27.840 --> 0:07:33.080 It is augmenting what the entire album is about. But 0:07:33.480 --> 0:07:36.040 beyond that, you've got the actual physical actions you have 0:07:36.080 --> 0:07:39.200 to take. Right there is the action of removing the 0:07:39.280 --> 0:07:43.440 record itself. So maybe you pull the sleeve out of 0:07:43.480 --> 0:07:46.320 the cover and then you take the album out of 0:07:46.360 --> 0:07:49.320 the sleeve. Maybe you're a rebel and you just try 0:07:49.360 --> 0:07:52.440 to remove the album and leave the sleeve inside the cover. 0:07:53.320 --> 0:07:55.240 Or maybe you're really living on the edge and you 0:07:55.360 --> 0:07:58.000 lost the sleeve years ago and now you just put 0:07:58.000 --> 0:08:03.160 a record directly into the unprotected cover. You do you, okay, 0:08:03.520 --> 0:08:05.920 I mean, if you want to, if you want to 0:08:05.920 --> 0:08:09.680 scratch up the vinyl. Oh okay, no, no, no, whatever you 0:08:09.720 --> 0:08:14.120 do is fine. So you carry this vinyl long playing 0:08:14.160 --> 0:08:17.840 album over to your turntable, and you gently place the 0:08:17.960 --> 0:08:20.600 vinyl so that the whole lines up with the spindle 0:08:20.680 --> 0:08:24.640 and settles down on the platform. You lift the tone 0:08:24.840 --> 0:08:27.520 arm with the stylus on the end up. You position 0:08:27.640 --> 0:08:30.160 that stylus at the outer edge of the LP. You 0:08:30.320 --> 0:08:34.200 very softly and gently set it down, and you have 0:08:34.320 --> 0:08:37.360 it catch on the groove of the LP, and then 0:08:37.400 --> 0:08:41.000 you prepare to listen to some music. Depending on the album, 0:08:41.400 --> 0:08:43.760 you might be taken on a journey, one where the 0:08:43.840 --> 0:08:49.160 artists carefully planned out that sequence of songs, the order 0:08:49.240 --> 0:08:54.640 of the tracks, specifically intending to inspire particular moods or reactions. 0:08:55.240 --> 0:08:58.920 Maybe it's even a concept album that tells a story, 0:08:59.040 --> 0:09:02.440 either one that is overtly obvious or one that's just 0:09:02.520 --> 0:09:06.720 merely hinted. At halfway through your journey, you have to 0:09:06.760 --> 0:09:09.439 pause because the needle has reached the center of the album, 0:09:09.800 --> 0:09:13.360 having followed a groove that spirals inward until it gets 0:09:13.400 --> 0:09:15.240 to the end, and then you have to lift the 0:09:15.280 --> 0:09:18.000 tone arm up, move it out of the way, flip 0:09:18.040 --> 0:09:20.840 the vinyl record over, settle it back over onto the 0:09:20.880 --> 0:09:23.720 spindle again, move the tone arm with the stylus to 0:09:23.760 --> 0:09:26.920 the edge once more, and play side to and your 0:09:27.040 --> 0:09:31.240 journey continues. It's like getting a little intermission in the 0:09:31.280 --> 0:09:34.440 middle of a play. Of course, some albums include more 0:09:34.480 --> 0:09:37.120 than one disc, right. That means you're not really halfway 0:09:37.120 --> 0:09:39.400 through when the stylust gets to the center. Maybe you're 0:09:39.440 --> 0:09:42.280 a quarter through or an eight through, so you'll be 0:09:42.320 --> 0:09:44.040 doing this a few times if you plan to listen 0:09:44.080 --> 0:09:47.439 to this album all the way through. But it's all 0:09:47.760 --> 0:09:51.600 part of that ritual. Now, there's no rule saying that 0:09:51.679 --> 0:09:54.679 you have to listen to an entire side of an 0:09:54.720 --> 0:10:00.480 album start to finish, or even the full album start beginning. 0:10:00.520 --> 0:10:03.080 There's no rule saying you have to do that. However, 0:10:03.120 --> 0:10:05.800 it is a little more challenging to do something like 0:10:05.880 --> 0:10:08.640 go to a specific track on the album if it's 0:10:08.640 --> 0:10:11.439 not the first one on either side. You can do it, 0:10:12.040 --> 0:10:14.760 but it's not easy. There's also no easy way to 0:10:14.840 --> 0:10:17.200 skip or to go back and listen to the same 0:10:17.280 --> 0:10:21.040 track again. It's not convenient, and unless you have one 0:10:21.040 --> 0:10:26.079 of the very few models that experimented with the idea, 0:10:26.480 --> 0:10:29.360 it's not portable either, So I think it's fair to 0:10:29.400 --> 0:10:31.840 say that vinyl doesn't lend itself to every type of 0:10:31.920 --> 0:10:36.040 listening situation. It is not convenient, it is not portable, 0:10:36.920 --> 0:10:41.880 it is not for every kind of listening environment, but 0:10:41.960 --> 0:10:46.160 for a specific kind of listening it's fantastic at least 0:10:46.160 --> 0:10:49.160 of the album's good. Now, I've done several episodes on 0:10:49.200 --> 0:10:52.360 the history of recorded audio, so I'm not going to 0:10:52.440 --> 0:10:55.720 repeat everything I've talked about before, but I do want 0:10:55.760 --> 0:10:59.440 to give some context so that we understand why the 0:10:59.520 --> 0:11:03.120 Vinyl albums are the way they are, because that experience 0:11:03.120 --> 0:11:06.040 of sitting down to listen to a full album evolved 0:11:06.040 --> 0:11:11.520 over time. It didn't just magically manifest. The actual medium 0:11:11.960 --> 0:11:16.640 would shape things like music and collections of music. For example, 0:11:16.760 --> 0:11:19.839 if you've ever wondered why most songs tend to be 0:11:19.840 --> 0:11:23.280 between three to four minutes long, the restrictions of technology 0:11:23.720 --> 0:11:28.079 helped determine that. Now, songs were already kind of naturally 0:11:28.160 --> 0:11:30.520 falling into that length that was just sort of a 0:11:30.559 --> 0:11:33.480 comfortable length for a song to be, but the medium 0:11:33.480 --> 0:11:36.680 itself would create restrictions that meant that you really had 0:11:36.720 --> 0:11:39.640 to conform to that length, and it kind of made 0:11:39.640 --> 0:11:43.199 it a standard. The medium is why artists would create 0:11:43.240 --> 0:11:45.720 collections of songs to release at the same time, and 0:11:45.760 --> 0:11:48.040 why they typically do so in groups of ten or 0:11:48.080 --> 0:11:51.640 twelve songs, or if you're an artist like Meatloaf, six 0:11:51.679 --> 0:11:55.559 to eight songs, because your songs are all freakin' epics. Conversely, 0:11:55.840 --> 0:11:59.560 the Ramones first album had fourteen tracks, seven to a side. 0:12:00.000 --> 0:12:01.760 One of those tracks only lasted about a minute and 0:12:01.800 --> 0:12:06.200 a half, so your mileage may vary. But the medium 0:12:06.240 --> 0:12:09.600 shaped all of this and created the trends that we 0:12:09.679 --> 0:12:12.760 see carried through to this day. I would say long 0:12:12.920 --> 0:12:17.839 after the medium itself had sort of faded away, we 0:12:17.920 --> 0:12:20.520 saw those trends continued. However, I can't say that it 0:12:20.559 --> 0:12:22.440 faded away because, as I mentioned at the top of 0:12:22.480 --> 0:12:26.079 this episode, for the last seventeen years, it's been making 0:12:26.080 --> 0:12:29.840 a serious comeback, all right. So let's get into a 0:12:30.000 --> 0:12:36.560 pretty simple early history lesson of the LP in particular. So, 0:12:36.800 --> 0:12:43.600 the precursor to flat discs recorded discs were wax cylinders. 0:12:43.760 --> 0:12:49.559 There're also ten cylinders tin, but wax cylinders became kind 0:12:49.559 --> 0:12:53.520 of the standard. These could hold recorded audio, but they 0:12:53.559 --> 0:12:56.480 were not easy to store. The physical cylinders. You had 0:12:56.480 --> 0:12:58.080 to have like a box, and you had to be 0:12:58.200 --> 0:13:01.280 very gentle with them. They all would wear out relatively 0:13:01.400 --> 0:13:05.840 quickly because the wax would start to degrade. With each playback, 0:13:05.920 --> 0:13:09.520 the stylist being used would essentially be carving more into 0:13:09.640 --> 0:13:13.960 the groove, so each successive playback would be a little 0:13:14.040 --> 0:13:16.880 worse than the one that came before it. In the 0:13:16.960 --> 0:13:20.960 late nineteenth century, an inventor named Emil Berliner came up 0:13:20.960 --> 0:13:24.199 with the idea of recording audio to a flat disc 0:13:24.320 --> 0:13:27.040 as opposed to a cylinder, and he figured that if 0:13:27.040 --> 0:13:29.760 he could devise a way to do that, it might 0:13:29.800 --> 0:13:32.800 be possible to create a means of mass production, which 0:13:32.880 --> 0:13:36.800 wasn't really possible with the cylinders of the time. See, 0:13:36.800 --> 0:13:41.280 cylinders were using devices that could both record and playback audio. 0:13:41.400 --> 0:13:44.439 But if you could create a way of just recording 0:13:44.520 --> 0:13:47.720 audio to a blank, you know, a disc that has 0:13:47.800 --> 0:13:50.800 nothing on it, you could do that much more quickly 0:13:50.840 --> 0:13:55.600 than you would recording in real time to a wax cylinder, 0:13:55.640 --> 0:13:58.080 so that you could playback in real time later on. 0:13:58.760 --> 0:14:01.320 It would be something that would allow business to scale 0:14:01.800 --> 0:14:04.520 and become something more than just a curiosity for the wealthy. 0:14:04.600 --> 0:14:07.440 So he got to work his first version used a 0:14:07.520 --> 0:14:12.520 disc made of zinc, coded in beeswax and gasoline, and 0:14:12.559 --> 0:14:16.520 then put through an etching process where an acidic compound 0:14:16.559 --> 0:14:20.000 etched away at a groove that was made in the disc. 0:14:20.680 --> 0:14:23.680 And I talk about this more in other shows that 0:14:23.720 --> 0:14:27.240 go into the detail of the history of vinyl and 0:14:27.680 --> 0:14:30.400 recorded audio, so I'm not gonna retread all of that. 0:14:30.960 --> 0:14:34.640 But these discs could only record to one side at 0:14:34.680 --> 0:14:37.160 first due to the process that Berliner was using at 0:14:37.160 --> 0:14:40.280 the time, so there wasn't a double sighted album. He 0:14:40.360 --> 0:14:43.520 received a patent for his invention in eighteen eighty seven. Now, 0:14:43.520 --> 0:14:46.720 the zinc discs were not meant to be the final product. Instead, 0:14:46.760 --> 0:14:50.880 these served as a master recording. So Berlenner would then 0:14:51.080 --> 0:14:55.320 electroplate this disc to create a negative, so instead of 0:14:55.360 --> 0:14:58.760 there being grooves, you would get ridgids where the grooves 0:14:58.760 --> 0:15:01.400 had been and the could be used as a stamp 0:15:01.600 --> 0:15:04.800 and you could use it to stamp blanks to imprint 0:15:04.880 --> 0:15:09.520 the grooves into the blanks. Now these blanks would need 0:15:09.560 --> 0:15:12.440 to be pliable for the stamping process, but then strong 0:15:12.560 --> 0:15:17.840 enough to withstand playback. Initially, Berliner tried celluloid, which could 0:15:17.840 --> 0:15:21.920 make a really good, you know recording, but it was 0:15:21.960 --> 0:15:25.000 far too delicate and it would wear out very very quickly, 0:15:25.400 --> 0:15:29.960 so that was out. Uh, there were some celluloid records produced. 0:15:30.360 --> 0:15:33.160 There are a few that still exist, but celluloid itself 0:15:33.240 --> 0:15:36.040 is a very delicate material and it can rot over time, 0:15:36.760 --> 0:15:42.600 so there are very very few existing celluloid records today. Okay, 0:15:42.600 --> 0:15:45.400 we're just getting started. When we come back, i'll talk 0:15:45.440 --> 0:16:00.360 more about the development of the record disc all right. Back, 0:16:00.920 --> 0:16:04.080 we left off with Berlinner working with celluloid and deciding 0:16:04.120 --> 0:16:08.440 that was not a very good material to use for records. Next, 0:16:08.480 --> 0:16:11.600 he tried hard rubber, and this would involve heating the 0:16:11.680 --> 0:16:15.120 rubber blanks to temperature so that they became soft enough 0:16:15.160 --> 0:16:18.560 to stamp, and at first he felt these were far 0:16:18.600 --> 0:16:21.760 superior to celluloid because they could hold up to a 0:16:21.760 --> 0:16:25.480 lot more abuse. They were almost unbreakable being made out 0:16:25.480 --> 0:16:28.120 of hard rubber. But the trouble was quality controlled because 0:16:28.160 --> 0:16:31.320 sometimes the stamps didn't leave a perfect imprint, so you 0:16:31.320 --> 0:16:33.760 could end up with blank spots where there should be 0:16:33.800 --> 0:16:36.000 a groove, and that meant that once the stylus hit 0:16:36.040 --> 0:16:39.160 the blank spot, it could just slide across the record, 0:16:39.280 --> 0:16:42.120 and you know, it was no good it just wasn't 0:16:42.640 --> 0:16:46.600 reliable enough to be able to produce en mass without 0:16:46.960 --> 0:16:50.960 lots of potential problems. So Berlinner's solution was to work 0:16:51.000 --> 0:16:54.160 with a company called Duranoid, which made a shell ac 0:16:54.400 --> 0:16:58.400 compound for coding electrical parts. Shell Ac is a resin 0:16:59.160 --> 0:17:03.600 and it comes from big so shell ack is actually 0:17:03.680 --> 0:17:08.200 it's extracted from the secretions made by a lack bug, 0:17:08.720 --> 0:17:12.080 and it's used for all sorts of stuff like including 0:17:12.160 --> 0:17:17.719 glaze on candies and pills. It also has insulator properties, 0:17:17.800 --> 0:17:20.240 so it made it great for coding electric components. You 0:17:20.240 --> 0:17:23.040 could insulate that so that you're not going to get 0:17:23.040 --> 0:17:25.679 shocked when you handle the things. And then there's the 0:17:25.720 --> 0:17:27.960 fact that it's really good at holding a shape, though 0:17:28.000 --> 0:17:31.440 it can be brittle. So Berlinner felt that the shellac 0:17:31.520 --> 0:17:34.320 coded records were superior to the hard rubber ones. The 0:17:34.320 --> 0:17:38.160 stamping process was far more reliable, and so Berliner switched 0:17:38.200 --> 0:17:42.000 to shellac by the late nineteenth century. Right before the 0:17:42.040 --> 0:17:45.200 turn of the twentieth century, Berlinner and some investors were 0:17:45.200 --> 0:17:48.360 creating companies several over the years, all with the name 0:17:48.440 --> 0:17:51.200 Gramophone incorporated in them. That was kind of the name 0:17:51.200 --> 0:17:55.639 of Berliner's technology, but while the medium had evolved, the 0:17:55.640 --> 0:17:59.360 equipment used to play the media was slower to change. 0:17:59.400 --> 0:18:02.960 So early machines used hand cranked systems, so that meant 0:18:02.960 --> 0:18:04.560 you had to sit there and you had to turn 0:18:04.600 --> 0:18:07.520 a crank in order to listen to your recorded album. 0:18:07.840 --> 0:18:13.439 The ideal sweet spot for speed would be to crank 0:18:13.480 --> 0:18:16.119 at a speed fast enough to get seventy to eighty 0:18:16.240 --> 0:18:20.639 revolutions per minute, because that's where the recorded audio on 0:18:20.720 --> 0:18:23.800 shell act discs sounded the best. But if you crank 0:18:23.840 --> 0:18:26.280 too quickly, you get chipmunks. If you crank too slowly, 0:18:26.840 --> 0:18:30.960 everyone becomes a basso profundo singer like Patrick Page in 0:18:31.000 --> 0:18:33.960 Haities Town. And if you're unsteady then you get a 0:18:34.000 --> 0:18:39.240 real warblee playback, and it wasn't ideal. So there's an 0:18:39.320 --> 0:18:43.240 era of innovation then in creating a motorized turntable that 0:18:43.359 --> 0:18:45.879 is both strong enough to work with the heavy tone 0:18:46.000 --> 0:18:48.720 arms of the time, because back then the tone arms 0:18:48.720 --> 0:18:50.679 put a lot of pressure on discs. That's why they 0:18:50.680 --> 0:18:52.639 would wear out so quickly if they weren't made of 0:18:52.720 --> 0:18:56.080 durable material. And the stylus was made out of steel, 0:18:56.280 --> 0:18:58.680 so you really did have to have something that could 0:18:58.720 --> 0:19:03.560 withstand some damage and some torture in order to be 0:19:04.080 --> 0:19:08.040 a long lasting product. So the motorized movement need to 0:19:08.040 --> 0:19:11.680 be consistent and smooth and strong enough to provide good 0:19:11.720 --> 0:19:15.040 audio quality, and that took a while. Now, another thing 0:19:15.240 --> 0:19:18.399 that helped shape both the medium itself and the music 0:19:18.480 --> 0:19:21.879 upon it was the rotational speed of these motors and 0:19:21.960 --> 0:19:25.560 the design of the albums themselves. So if you designed 0:19:25.560 --> 0:19:29.000 an album to be played at seventy eight rotations per minute, 0:19:29.160 --> 0:19:32.720 you would get superior sound quality, but the stylist would 0:19:32.720 --> 0:19:37.240 travel the groove pretty quickly, right, because it's rotating seventy 0:19:37.280 --> 0:19:40.480 eight times every single minute. So things would sound good, 0:19:40.480 --> 0:19:43.520 but you could not store very much music per disc 0:19:43.680 --> 0:19:48.320 side because the groove for a piece being played back 0:19:48.320 --> 0:19:50.440 at seventy eight rpm would have to be longer than 0:19:50.440 --> 0:19:53.520 one played at a slower speed. So if you designed 0:19:53.560 --> 0:19:55.720 the disc so that the recording was meant to be 0:19:55.760 --> 0:19:58.560 played back at a slower speed, like at forty five 0:19:58.640 --> 0:20:01.440 rotations per minute, or even thirty three and one third 0:20:01.520 --> 0:20:05.640 rotations per minute, you could store more audio on the 0:20:05.680 --> 0:20:08.960 side of a disc, but the quality of that audio 0:20:09.000 --> 0:20:11.680 would suffer. So even in the days of hand cranking, 0:20:11.800 --> 0:20:13.960 like I said, the ideal rotational speed was somewhere in 0:20:14.000 --> 0:20:17.159 the seventy to eighty rpm range. So how did the 0:20:17.240 --> 0:20:21.320 music industry settle on the standard speeds? Well, seventy eight 0:20:21.680 --> 0:20:26.440 rpm is very convenient when you start looking at things 0:20:26.480 --> 0:20:29.320 like gear ratios. So the motors that they were using 0:20:29.440 --> 0:20:33.359 to drive the turntables had their own rotational speed thirty 0:20:33.400 --> 0:20:37.760 six hundred revolutions per minute. So by using a gear 0:20:37.800 --> 0:20:41.720 system you could create a gear ratio of say forty 0:20:41.760 --> 0:20:45.200 six to one and forty six to one ratio gear 0:20:45.320 --> 0:20:48.879 would convert that thirty six hundred revolutions per minute down 0:20:48.960 --> 0:20:52.600 to seventy eight technically seventy eight point twenty six. So 0:20:52.760 --> 0:20:57.040 the turntable speed was set largely because of the actual 0:20:57.080 --> 0:20:59.920 limitations of the motor, the fact that it was an 0:21:00.040 --> 0:21:03.240 thirty six hundred revolutions per minute, and you know, creating 0:21:03.280 --> 0:21:06.200 a ratio that would allow you to step that down 0:21:06.320 --> 0:21:10.160 to a more manageable speed for the turntable itself meant 0:21:10.160 --> 0:21:12.560 that you could go down to seventy eight, which again 0:21:12.640 --> 0:21:15.080 was in that sweet spot between seventy and eighty rpm. 0:21:15.200 --> 0:21:19.560 So sort of the stars aligned for this particular type 0:21:19.600 --> 0:21:24.359 of implementation, but other gear ratios could produce the speeds 0:21:24.400 --> 0:21:26.800 of forty five rpm or thirty three and a third 0:21:26.880 --> 0:21:30.159 rpm without having to change the type of motor that 0:21:30.200 --> 0:21:32.640 you were using to drive the whole darn thing. Now 0:21:32.680 --> 0:21:35.359 these days, you could have had a variable speed motor 0:21:35.880 --> 0:21:41.440 and you could completely change the technology of pressed records entirely. 0:21:41.960 --> 0:21:44.679 But now it's kind of a legacy system, so no 0:21:44.720 --> 0:21:47.280 one has really bothered. A couple people have tried, but 0:21:48.400 --> 0:21:53.280 only small experiments. So the speed of the motor sort 0:21:53.280 --> 0:21:56.760 of determined everything else. So seventy eight rpm became the 0:21:56.840 --> 0:22:00.400 preferred format for early records, and even with a ten 0:22:00.520 --> 0:22:03.840 inch disc, that meant you could store about three minutes 0:22:03.840 --> 0:22:06.840 of audio per side. And again, while many songs already 0:22:06.880 --> 0:22:10.240 fell into that length restriction, the medium really helped cement 0:22:10.320 --> 0:22:13.679 it as the standard song length. It was a limit 0:22:13.800 --> 0:22:15.399 of the medium. So if you wanted to sell a 0:22:15.440 --> 0:22:18.760 lot of records and have people go gaga over your music, 0:22:19.119 --> 0:22:21.680 you really wanted it to be high quality stuff, and 0:22:22.119 --> 0:22:26.960 you know, not sacrifice the sound quality the fidelity of 0:22:27.000 --> 0:22:29.880 your recording, but you would sacrifice how long your track 0:22:29.920 --> 0:22:32.840 could be because you were limited to about three minutes. 0:22:33.720 --> 0:22:37.200 And think about that, these ten inch discs were singles. 0:22:37.240 --> 0:22:40.240 They could usually hold a single track per side, which 0:22:40.280 --> 0:22:44.360 is pretty big disc to hold one song is pretty wild, 0:22:44.440 --> 0:22:47.880 and it would dominate for decades, well into the nineteen fifties. 0:22:48.480 --> 0:22:50.399 So now we're going to do a quick jump ahead. 0:22:50.440 --> 0:22:53.159 So others at the time of Berliner were trying to 0:22:53.160 --> 0:22:55.600 come up with alternatives because they wanted to get into 0:22:55.640 --> 0:22:57.560 this market, but they didn't want to have to pay 0:22:57.600 --> 0:23:01.920 Berliner for his technology. So like Edison was one of those, 0:23:02.520 --> 0:23:05.240 and they were trying to come up with alternatives to 0:23:05.280 --> 0:23:09.480 shell Act too and really to compete with the Gramophone Company. 0:23:10.160 --> 0:23:13.600 But the alternatives were often more expensive, so they had 0:23:13.800 --> 0:23:16.280 very little effect in breaking into the market. People didn't 0:23:16.320 --> 0:23:18.720 want to have to buy new equipment and spend even 0:23:18.800 --> 0:23:23.560 more money to purchase the albums themselves. So even as 0:23:23.640 --> 0:23:26.240 early as the nineteen twenties you had people experimenting with 0:23:26.280 --> 0:23:30.560 plastic and by the nineteen thirties the technology was ready 0:23:30.600 --> 0:23:35.120 to go in some early implementations, but there were some problems. 0:23:35.160 --> 0:23:39.680 One was that companies were making boneheaded mistakes, but another 0:23:39.920 --> 0:23:42.760 was just that the economy in general was not good. 0:23:43.320 --> 0:23:46.320 Just like today, we were in a really bad time 0:23:46.359 --> 0:23:50.600 of economic uncertainty. In the nineteen thirties, the US was 0:23:50.600 --> 0:23:53.520 in the Great Depression and the cost of a record player, 0:23:53.640 --> 0:23:56.000 and then on top of that the cost of records 0:23:56.000 --> 0:23:59.080 to play on the record player. That was a luxury 0:23:59.080 --> 0:24:02.359 that very few were willing to pursue. A radio set, 0:24:02.400 --> 0:24:05.920 while also being very expensive, at least had the advantage 0:24:05.920 --> 0:24:09.280 of providing the content for free, well sort of free, 0:24:09.480 --> 0:24:12.640 like my show, the content was sponsored by companies paying 0:24:12.680 --> 0:24:14.920 to have their products and services highlighted on the air, 0:24:15.240 --> 0:24:18.439 so not really free, but free to the consumer. The 0:24:18.520 --> 0:24:22.479 plastic records were still a thing behind the scenes, however, 0:24:22.640 --> 0:24:25.640 DJs at radio stations were using them, but there wasn't 0:24:25.720 --> 0:24:30.040 much of a consumer market for vinyl or plastic records 0:24:30.520 --> 0:24:33.080 until the end of World War two. Partly that was 0:24:33.119 --> 0:24:36.080 because the war had put high demands on various materials 0:24:36.080 --> 0:24:40.080 and manufacturing facilities, which prioritized war efforts over stuff like, 0:24:40.119 --> 0:24:44.560 you know, civilian comforts and luxuries, which is understandable. But 0:24:44.800 --> 0:24:48.120 after the war things would change. In nineteen forty eight, 0:24:48.160 --> 0:24:52.439