RCA Victor introduces “a miracle,” their Orthophonic, high-fidelity, home stereo sound system.

Bob Banks, one-time RCA Victor marketing manager of radio sales and their Victrola division, narrates this short film introducing the RCA’s new “living stereo” records and stereophonic hi-fi gear. The year was 1958, ground zero for the birth of the “space age bachelor pad” as my pal Byron Werner so famously dubbed it.

The demonstration utilizes left and right-hand sections of orchestra married together to create the fullness of “living stereo” and gives you a stereo stylus’s POV as it travels across a record groove (“a canyon of sound!”). If you are a vinyl fan, it’s pretty fun and informative.
 

 
Via Douglas Hovey

 
Oh noes! I’m scared!
 
(via Das Kraftfuttermischwerk)

 
I’m going to have mine pressed into Eddie Murphy’s “Party All The Time.” From Wired UK:

Music lovers can now be immortalised when they die by having their ashes baked into vinyl records to leave behind for loved ones.

A UK company called And Vinyly is offering people the chance to press their ashes in a vinyl recording of their own voice, their favourite tunes or their last will and testament. Minimalist audiophiles might want to go for the simple option of having no tunes or voiceover, and simply pressing the ashes into the vinyl to result in pops and crackles.

Company presses your ashes into vinyl when you die

(via Nerdcore)

 
I Need That Record, Brendan Toller’s documentary on the life and death of indie record stores, has finally hit the streets. Initially released to record stores only on May 17,  the DVD as of today is available everywhere.

Seeing the shot of Vinyl Mania shuttered in the first few seconds of the trailer breaks my heart. I spent many hours shopping for obscure vinyl in that place, mecca for vinyl junkies.

Greedy record labels, media consolidation, homogenized radio, big box stores, Ecommerce, shoddy “stars” pushed by big money, and the digital revolution all pose threats on the very well being of our favorite record stores and the music industry at large. Will these stores die? Will they survive

You can buy I Need That Record at Amazon.