Do you know the speeds on a phonograph?

shotglass is going to be very unhappy with crimsonace.

 

Beck.

I bridge all generations.

 

I think the idea behind 16 2/3 (yes, I have actually seen a record player with that speed, so I am old) was that the speed would be used for spoken word records because more could be put on there.

While I may be old, I am not so nostalgic to believe that vinyl records sound better than CDs on typical record players. Maybe if you had a really, really nice turntable and an expensive needle it might sound better, but a portable CD player which you can purchase in Wal-Mart for $30 sounds better than the record player you would pay $60 for with 1970 dollars.

 

Fast, faster, fastest.

 

And as the skip got worse, you'd go from a penny to a nickel, and then multiple pennies. :

 

I have me some 78s squirreled away at the Old Home Place.

 

I've got a turntable that feeds directly to the USB port on my computer. Great for recording albums that aren't on CD.

 

Of course, I do. Not only am I old and decrepit, I have a turntable and was just listening to a Sam Cooke album last night.

The fourth speed was for those records my dad had from when he was a kid -- you know, Benny Goodman and Glenn Miller and that kind of stuff.

 

What's a phonograph?

 

Some of the phonographs I had access to as a kid/teen had a sort of neutral option too. It wasn't intended for it, but you could play records backwards or DJ scratch, if you wanted to ruin your needle and come off like a poser.

One day, my buddy and I played Ratt's Round And Round backwards. All of the sudden we hear, "Saaaaatan worship". We freaked!

"Record that shit!" I told my friend.

So we repeated the backwards Ratt and when he pressed the record button on his built-in cassette player, it broke.

OK, no biggie. We went over to my house to use my phonograph and built-in cassette player to record it. All of the sudden, my Dad, who couldn't have given more of two shits about any other thing my friends and I did at the house, strolls in.

"What are you doing?"

"Dad! We played this record backwards at Brice's house and it says, 'Saaatan worship.' We're going to record it, and maybe, tell the world!"

"No you're not. Stop that shit now."

"But dad, it's MY record-player and we have to do this. Ratt might be evil!"

"I don't care whose record player it is. Take the record home and don't try this again or else!"

We never did get it on tape. Clearly, we were foiled by forces from hell.

You can't imagine my horror upon the realization my dad was not only an agent for Satan, but a sycophant for Ratt.

Damn you, Steven Pearcy! Release my dad's soul! Lay it down!

 

I would have been more shocked had you played an entire Ratt song frontwards.

 

I use to listen to a Queen greatest hits album on my parent's old record player. I loved that shit when I was 13.

Then our house burned down and melted the album to the player. It was a terrible moment in my life.