“3 Songs By Any Band and Music History”
Dr. Rox Remember When?
Article #153 November 2023
By: RLSchwinden aka MrZerr0
Being in the Record Business Since 1985 I learned straight away that most customers assume you love the artists they love and or that you love the format that they love. In many cases this is simply not true, after over 100 years (the 1st recording was made in 1877) there are now literally thousands of artists and bands, and dozens of genres of music to choose from. Let’s start off with the reproduction medium.
Vinyl Records
The very 1st format was the Cylinder introduced as a “Record” originally round like a drinking cup with no bottom made by putting wax on the outside of the cylinder, later a hard wax was developed topping out at a 2 minute run. Finally a hard plastic version was released that could hold 4 minutes. This format was offered from 1896 to 1929.
Then came the 10 inch 78rpm Record requiring a thicker heavier grade stylus (needle). They were made of shellac and then in the 1940s they were made from polyvinyl chloride (PVC) henceforth “Vinyl”. Usually double sided (holding 2 songs) The machines were both manual and electric. This format was manufactured from 1912 to 1959. The typical music genre offered was, Big Band, Vocal and Easy Listening, therefore the original “Blues” music is very sought after, very rare and highly collectible and expensive. At the time a kind of photo album was made and sold to hold your records in, usually 50 to 10 sleeves, which evolved into calling “Records” by the name of “Albums” as they held 10 songs by themselves.
Edison Diamond Disc Record 10 inch record holding up to 5 minutes running at 80 rpms, rather than the standard 78 rpms, these discs were almost twice as thick as the standard 78 rpm, and typically were single sided (containing only 1 song) they are not compatible with 78 rpm machines. Having a very short lifespan being manufactured from 1921 to 1929.
Transcription Records from the 50s into the 60s. They ran at 16 rpm and up to 20 min per side albeit with very low fidelity designed for mainly speaking voices, such as interviews or documentaries and occasionally background music in business’. Chrysler actually offered a factory under- dash record player from. 1956 to 1958
7 inch 45 rpm Single, with usually 2 songs, on rare occasion 2 songs on the B-Side. They often had a “Non-LP B-Side” meaning a song that was left off of the original album and in some cases both songs not being on the current album. Until 1969 all 45 rpm singles were mixed in “mono” (vs stereo) and usually an edit or even alternate version from the LP cut. in the 60s these still had a price point of .98 cents, unless you found them in the “Cut-Out” Bins then they were generally .25 ot 10 for a $1.oo. RCA was the biggest supporter on the 45 Single. These were made from 1948 to about 1992.
In 1948 Columbia Records rolled out the 33 1/3 rpm “album” usually containing 10 songs, in the 50s and 60s usually 12 songs holding up to 18 minutes per side, in the UK 14 songs. In the 70s the time was expanded to and past 20 minutes. In a last ditch effort the industry had figured out a way to compress the recording in get 30 minutes per side on a vinyl record such is the case of Def Leppard’s 1987 release “Hysteria” alas by then, no one, and I mean NO ONE was buying vinyl Cassette was the chosen format.
In September 1987 “NARM” and the 6 major labels at the time: BMG, CBS, EMI, PGD, UNI and WEA agreed and announced that 1987 would be the last year of Vinyl Records on a major scale and offered to us Record Stores to turn in 2 Vinyl Records for credit towards 1 CD, in a combined effort to boost less than stellar CD sales and plumitiing vinyl sales but all vinyl must be returned by 2 January 1988. They did offer a “Special Order Program” until October 1989. This was the predominant selling format until 1982, when Cassettes took over the number 1 selling format.
Many people have disputed this information, however one time my former boss Matt M. chimed in “Not only is he correct he left out part of the story, he only had 2 days off in Dec 1987 (5 Dec 1987 Sat & Christmas the 25th) and the first one was the Saturday after KISS played Vets (Fri 4 Dec 1987) when 1 one of the roadies, Jim, who he met the day before in our store and another roadie, Romeo who Rik knew from years before, brought Paul Stanley of KISS into our store to see Rik, so Rik didn’t get to see Paul that day as I gave him the day off because he had to spend the whole month of Dec handwriting vinyl returns, because the deadline was 4th Jan 1988”
12 inch Extended Mix Single up to 5 mixes of 1 song and usually a Non-LP song, with the popularity of Disco in the late 70s these were rolled out and became very popular, until they turned into CD5 or Maxi-Singles in the early 90s.
Universal Fire 1 June 2008 BLDG.6197 somewhere between 117,000 and 185,000 master tapes that could possibly be up to 500,000 songs Master Recordings
180 Gram Vinyl “Digital” Recordings
In 1982 Steppenwolf’s album “Wolf Tracks” was completely digital. Starting in 1985 almost all recordings went to digital from analog. Essentially this is the same digital file used to make a CD, but now pressed to vinyl. The reason for using 180 gram vinyl is to hold a broader sound range. A 180 gram record has about 10% of the high end and 10% of the low end cut off when transferred to vinyl from the digital file. Also by using colored vinyl it creates better reproduction as colored vinyl is virgin vinyl with no impurities, as opposed to black “recycled” vinyl. Translucent vinyl simply has less impurities. While vinyl has been available in one way or another since the massive extinction in 1989, for example the UK never really walked away from vinyl as did Eastern European Countries, who purchased the USA record presses when “The Wall” came down and the Eastern Block opened up in Dec 1991.
Mobile Fidelity Half Speed Master Recordings
Founded by Brad Miller in 1977, began releasing “Half Speed” Vinyl records boasting the best reproduction sound possible, by transferring the master tapes at half speed, a process he discovered while trying to get the best possible transfer of nature sounds to vinyl. Mobile Fidelity would generally only print 3500 to 7500 copies of each of their titles. However in August 2022 the company was exposed about the fact that up to 60% of their releases were made using the DSD system, creating doubt that analog is truly better than digital. This same year the company lost a fraud lawsuit costing them $25 million in damages.
Reel To Reel:
Invented by the Germans in 1939 it was rolled out to USA consumers in 1958 and was available until 1984. This format could hold up to several hours of music depending on which one of the 6 available speeds the info was recorded at. It was Bing Crosby that championed this format, investing $50k in Ampex in 1947 to get this format into production. In my opinion this is the best quality reproduction ever made available. This format co- existed with Vinyl and 8 Track, however Reels were primarily for the Audiophile or business’.
8- Tracks:
The stereo 8 was rolled out in 1966 primarily for portable music for automobiles and was manufactured until 1983. A lot of muscle cars from the 60s and 70s were equipped with stock 8 Track Players. This ran at a faster speed therefore having great sound reproduction, the set back having 4 channels songs could be split up and with an 8 channel playback head the tracks could sometimes bleed over in sound. In the mid 70s 8 Tracks sold up to 40% of the market with Vinyl being the chosen format.
Cassettes 4 Track:
Introduced in 1966 named “4 Track” as a more compact alternative to 8 Track and Reels, this format ran at a slower speed therefore not the same sound quality as Reels or even 8 Track, it did however hold 15 minutes up to 2 hours of music depending on the cassette you purchased. As with all “Tapes” they were a $1.oo to pay the mechanical royalty to Ampex, until the royalty ran out in the mid 80s. Cassettes really did push Vinyl out of the main selling format in 1982, and ruled the sales market until 1991 when the price of car stereo CD players were greatly reduced. So you know all that 80s music you’re looking for on Vinyl, you know why it is so expensive and so hard to find, well that’s because Cassettes sold about 80% of the market share during the 80s.
Cassingle:
Introduced in the UK in 1982, as an alternative to the 45 Single, this format rolled out in the USA in 1987 as the end of Vinyl was near. Initially only one song per side, very quickly went to both songs on both sides. This format lasted until 2001.
CDs:
Invented by the Phillips CO. in 1974, this format got the green light in 1981 when the then President of Sony in Japan, who was also a Classical Conductor wanted to get all of Beethoven’s 5th Symphony on a single recording format without interruption. The 1st CD sold in Japan was The Beatles “Abbey Road” master from a vinyl record in 1982. rolled out in the USA in September 1985, I know because I had to attend a class on the new format at that time. Also many of the early CDs titles sold then contained a Video on the disc that needed a CD Player with a Video out to view, an example Jimi Hendrix “Smash Hits” 1st press.
CD5 and CD Maxi-Single:
With the end of vinyl and the intention to eventually end cassettes too, the labels introduced in 1990, 2 new types of CD singles, one with 2 songs like a 45 singles and the 2nd to replace 12″ vinyl singles. The cool thing about the Maxi Single is that you usually got a song not contained on the full CD. Imports from the UK or Japan were the absolute best as sometimes they contained up to 3 Non-LP or Live tracks not on anything else.
Napster:
A Peer To Peer (P2P) file sharing program introduced in 1999 ushered in the collapse of the Music Industry, as once a person bought a CD they could share it with anyone at no cost, and therefore no revenue to the Artist or Record Label that created it. A lawsuit was filed immediately and Napster was shut down in 2001, only to reopen as a subscription service only to end in 2002. This however did lead to other streaming services.
Ipod:
A portable media player rolled out in 2001 which held 512 MB to 256 GB depending on which version you bought and when you bought it. It is my understanding that when a single song cost .99 cents, Apple Music paid about .10 cents to the artist and .25 cents to the Record Label and Apple received the rest as they were the ones to offer the service. Sometime in about 2007 many Sony artists banded together and filed suit against Apple claiming they should get a larger share, as they created the music they are selling and the record labels recouped their investment decades ago. An agreement was reached and Apple agreed to pay the artists .25 cents by raising the cost of a single song to $1.29. I personally saw many music listeners sell off their entire collection after they loaded it onto their Ipod, only to find out later, the information could not be transferred from one device to another, so I would see them return to repurchase their favorites once again. This format came to a close in 2022.
Streaming:
As a result of Napster this option was created in the late 90s. It seems to be the most popular format of the day, what consumers may not know is that some artists only receive a .008 of a cent for every play. What does that mean? The artist gets .08 cents for every 1000 plays. Hum … this just doesn’t seem right to me.
Now myself, my chosen format is Reel To Reel, analog recordings with no pops or clicks. but only a few hundred rock titles were ever made on reel, I own less than 100 of them. Next I would have to say CD would be my preference, they can hold up 79min. and many CD reissues have the Non-LP B-Sides, which I love, included on them, I own about 8000 CDs. Then vinyl, I probably have over 2000 Albums and 1500 Singles.
I have said for many years Love ALL Kinds of music, and I do mean all kinds, However that does not mean I am a fan of every band, and specifically the most popular bands.
But As I started off talking about I love all music I can most generally find 3 songs by any artist that I do love no matter who they are, here are just a few examples:
Garth Brooks:
That Summer: 1992
The Night I Called The Old Man Out: 1993
Hard Luck Woman: 1994
The Cars:
Bye Bye Love: 1978
Since You’re Gone: 1981
Drive: 1984
Johnny Cash:
Ring Of Fire: 1963
Long Black Veil: 1965
Hurt: 2002
Cinderella:
Shake Me: 1986
Don’t Know What You Got: 1988
Gypsy Road: 1988
Neil Diamond:
Cherry Cherry: 1966
Love To Love: 1966
Solitary Man: 1966
Foreigner:
Long Long Way From Home: 1977
Girl On The Moon: 1981
I Want To know What Love Is: 1984
Guns N Roses:
Knockin On Heaven’s Door: 1988
Pretty Tied Up: 1991
Locomotive: 1991
Rick James:
You And I: 1978
Give It To Me Baby: 1981
She Blew My Mind: 1982
Led Zeppelin:
Battle Of Evermore: 1971
Achilles Last Stand: 1976
Ozone Baby: 1982
Loverboy:
Turn Me Loose: 1980
When It’s Over: 1981
Lucky Ones: 1981
Metallica
Fade To Black: 1984
Wherever I May Roam: 1991
Memory Remains: 1997
Pink Floyd:
See Emily Play: 1967
Wish You Were Here: 1975
Comfortably Numb: 1979
Public Enemy:
Bring The Noise: 1988
Fight The Power: 1989
911 Is A Joke: 1990
Quiet Riot:
Slick Black Cadillac: 1978
Metal Health: 1983
Wild And The Young: 1986
Bob Segar:
Feel Like A Number: 1980
Her Strut: 1980
You’ll Accompany Me: 1980
Bruce Springsteen:
Pink Cadillac: 1984
Trapped: 1985
Brilliant Disguise: 1987
Rod Stewart:
Passion: 1980
Baby Jane: 1983
Infatuation: 1984
Warrant:
Heaven: 1989
Uncle Tom’s Cabin: 1990
I Saw Red: 1990
Winger:
In The Day We’ll Never See: 1990
Who’s The One: 1993
Down Incognito: 1993
Be sure to tune in to my “PsychoGello Show” weekly Radio Show on Radio WDGY 8am Sundays, since 2017. You can hear the past 90 Episodes at www. MrZeroS.Com -Podcast. You can find MrZerro’s “Evolation Show” at www.MixCloud.Com for 32 Programs under Mr. Zeros as well as my guest spot on Rick Burnett’s “Hits And History” for 17 Programs.
Until my next installment …
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Roseville, MN. 55113
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