It is easy to forget that before cassettes went out of fashion, recording audio used to be very popular. Nowadays, recording is done mostly on mobile phones or ipods. The recording is done digitally and can be saved to a computer or sent via email or text message to someone. Most of the time people are just recording voice notes or funny things their kids are saying etc.
Back in the day though, we recorded music! Why? Well i suppose it was a rather primitive type of illegal downloading. The technological landscape was rather different at the time.
In these days of itunes and mp3s, audiophiles scowl at each other over what bitrate they are ripping CDs at or whether you should ever listen to lossy audio formats. Perfect copies of CDs can be made now by anyone with a computer. In a few minutes browsing on your computer you can download a digital copy of any song you are looking for, whether it be legal or illegal.
In the 1980s though, you only had the choice of actually going to the shop and buying the music or going down a more controversial route.
more to come...
5 comments:
Interesting reading John. I remember it like it was yesterday. And I think that low bittate mp3s recording is the new high speed dubbing!
Dave, i agree with you. It's "the frequency" you see :-)
Oh Yes John,I remember those days...practically sitting on top of the radio waiting for the DJ to play that great song he promised with "record" paused....recording The Bangles,Bananarama,OREO Speedwagon and all the greats :-) and then rewinding and fast forwarding all night. Actually my greatest memory of recording from the radio was the night Johnny Logan won the Eurovision with "Hold me now", what a song!!
Myself and my friend just loved it and when the contest was over we ran up to the room and got the radio ready. We always did the recording in my house cos her radio didn't even have a RECORD button! We knew that all the stations would be playing the song so we were trying our best to get a recording that wasn't interrupted by the DJ chatting. Do you remember how annoying that was? "Shut up DJ, I'm trying to illegally record this one!" Oh those were the days! I'm feeling very old now. I can't believe there's a whole generation out there who haven't experienced this. They probably think your blog is a joke.
hey john
i like the sentiment, Recording tapes eh? What fun, trying to get the timing right when you made a mix tape. I remember doing it as late as 2002 (c.d.'s kinda passed me by - i hate dutch technology) i also remember recording Creep by Radiohead one time on Dave Fanning's fab fifty. I was slow pressing the stop button at the end of the song, so after Thom Yorke sings 'i don't belong here', i have fanning saying 'ah you do Thom, you do'. Nice. the one thing i like about downloading music is the immediacy. last year, i came home form a night out, bit of a bop you might say. anyway, i heaed a song that i really liked. as soon as i got up the next morning, i was listening to it, and half the block, within 5 minutes. if i had had to go into town and buy the album, i probably would have forgotten about it. however, it does take away from the effort and pleasure of going and buying it and coming home and sticking it on. i totally agree with the c.d. point, being able to skip songs you are too impatient to listen to. i do think that we must blame ourselves however, and not technology. plenty of people are capable of downloading an album and giving the whole thing a few listens, getting that 'growing on me' feeling. it's a bit like gary and facebook. he doesn't realise that it is possible to be in a virtual sharing environment and still go for pints, watch a movie or go to the theatre. they are not mutually exclusive. facebook is not killing sociability, people are. final point - the one thing i hate about mp3 downloading and playing is that so many people have 20gb ipods and don't know what music is on it because they just copied someone else's as soon as they bought it. what the hell is the point. if you can't make your own choices, then just give up now. man, ranting is good. talk to you soon. remember, if you feel like golf, or a couple of pints, shout.
harry
toc - I also loved "Hold me now", i definitely felt proud when he won the Eurovision. How times have changed - eh?
Harry - You are right to say that people make there own choices whether or not to listen to full albums etc. but i guess i have grown too impatient and trigger happy when it comes to the ipod. My own fault!
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