Return of the Record Album?

So I was reading this article on CNN.com “Who's still listening to vinyl?” and it took me back. In my life time I’ve seen record albums (LP, 78s & 45s), 8 tracks, cassettes, CDs and now MP3s. Well I haven’t done the MP3 thing yet. I know some twenty something(s) who are now into getting records and enjoy listening to them. Of course to me it would be nostalgic to them it’s “Retro”. Ah getting old.

I remember when records were thought to be replaced by 8 tracks. This how my first record collection started, I got them handed down to me from my older brothers mostly Beatles, Rolling Stones and The Who, but I also got 8 tracks. 8 tracks had a great sound and you could take them with you, if you had an 8 track player in your car or a portable player. You could even select a song by clicking thru tracks if your player had that capability. The draw backs of the 8 track was many times it had to change tracks in the middle of a song and they were kind of cumbersome to carry around and of course if the tape broke. First 8 tracks I bought with my own money I saved from doing chores was an Alice Cooper album.

Then came the cassette, it was smaller than an 8 track but the sound quality was not as good a record or an 8 track but as teenager who cares. It was portable and you could play it anywhere there was a cassette player. Plus you could take a blank tape and copy a record album to it and play it in your car. But again a draw back with a cassette tape was if the tape broke or got tangled up in the player. Probably the biggest problem with cassettes is you couldn’t select a song. You had to either fast forward or rewind and keep hitting play until you find the beginning of a song. First cassette was a Beatle album. Needless to say I had many 8 tracks and cassettes but it was records that favored.

Record LP albums were great. First you had a great sound but what was even better was the covers and sleeves the records came in. They had either photos or cover art and sometime you found a poster or a collectable photo or a gift certificate. I remember how I would slide the record out, put it on the turn table then set the stylus (aka needle) on the record and sit back looking at the album cover as you waited for the song to start. Your eyes fixed on the cover you ears listening to the low hiss and crackles or pops of the grooves; I was just waiting in anticipation of the first note or sound. Then lost in the sounds of the record and lost visually in the cover or the slide out the sleeve which usually had liner notes and read it over and over. I remember I knew an old man who had a record player set up in a laundry room of an apartment building in the apartment complex I grew up in and I would go over and sit with him as we listen to old 78 records. These records were heavier feeling than modern vinyl records and if you drop them they would break. But I would sit there with him listening to old operas, classical, big bands and crooners. To me this was just as magical as listening to my contemporary vinyl records. The great thing was the imaginary journey you take through the music and even the covers of the records. You couldn’t take the music with you. You had to stay in one place, you could only go as far has you could hear it. Oh and my first record album I bought with money I saved was a David Bowie album.

So the draw backs for records was not being able to listen to it on the move but the other draw back was that you wanted to listen to just one song you had to careful place on the right grooves which could be a pain. But you could usually find a 45 record and even cooler was sometimes lucked out and got a good song on the B side. Another problem was your records had two sides and when one side was done you had to go over and flip it over to listen to the rest of the record. And having the same problem with 8 tracks and cassettes what is one going to do?

Well, the answer was the CD. The CD seems to be the answer for uninterrupted play. That was the selling point. Oh yea, and you were saving trees. CD’s were small and come in plastic cases with less paper. Of course later it became bad to have all those plastic cases floating out there and getting thrown away, so then CDs came in hard paper sleeves and then back to plastic cases. Anyway, CDs sound isn’t bad but not quite same as records and you could take it with you and play it on a portable CD played then CD players became fashionable in cars not to mention if you had a disk drive in you computer. You can select song tracks and even select random play. But what I didn’t like about CD’s was that it comes in a case that is like 5” by 5” give or take an inch. Sure it’s convenient but you can barely see the cover and if you open it you either have fold out or a booklet which either way even with young eyes you need a magnifying glass to read it. Unlike the 12” by 12” record album cover. Oh well as disappointed as I was with the demise of records I accepted it and began getting CDs. But so far I have resisted MP3s which to me is nothing but creations of an A.D.D. society. My first CD well not sure those days are little fuzzy but it might have been a best of ELO or Brian Eno or maybe Ramones.

But I am hopeful with an apparently resurgent of the record albums I won’t be the last generation to enjoy the magic that comes with whole package of a vinyl album and the imaginations that is inspired.

A friend the other day told me he heard a report that our future will lack American inventors because today’s youth lack creativity and imagination. I’m sure there more to it than the lack of records but that’s a post for another day.

I may venture deep into the back of my closet and bring out what few records I have left and play them. Oh wait I don’t have a record player anymore. Rats, screwed again!

UR