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Post by ratedpg on Dec 5, 2012 16:45:58 GMT -5
8 3 for all the jingles and 5 for the songs.
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Post by caseysawesome on Dec 5, 2012 16:58:17 GMT -5
0 I think they used tape decks
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Post by skuncle on Dec 5, 2012 21:20:05 GMT -5
Wouldn't AT40 have been playing singles for the most part? I think skuncle is confusing how radio stations played the shows vs. Shannon's query about how the shows were created. Yeah I was thinking the shows once they were sent to radio. As for the creation process, they could get away with one, but two would be easier. The jingles and everything would have been on carts. Back when I was DJ-ing I only ever had two turntables and that was plenty since you can only spin one at a time anyhow, except when you overlap at intro and fade out.
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Post by snarfdude on Dec 8, 2012 11:53:54 GMT -5
correct.....anything jingle oriented would be on broadcast cartridges or "carts" which could be considered the father of the 8 track. Some background is there: www.jimprice.com/prosound/carts.htmThey revolutionized the industry in the early 60s. The shows were delivered on reel tapes until Oct 71 (according to the book) when they finally pressed vinyl which was common for syndicated shows dating back to the late 1930s-1940s on 16 inch radio transcriptions (the grandfather of the LP) As for show production, one can speculate the jingles on carts, 2 tables for music a reel machine for the edited voice track (once he started doing voice tracks) and another reel machine for final mixdown of all elements. The reels I would think would be running at 15ips, for 2 reels/hr. for the best quality on 1/4 inch tape. The limitations of vinyl can certainly hide tape hiss, which can help quality. I can actually see carting the music from vinyl that is used every week and playing the carts to avoid wear and tear of the vinyl and "cue burn" so associated from backcueing the vinyl. A lot of stations did this on a regular basis for that reason. I have a few carts I bought off ebay from NBC in NYC with oldies on them.
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Post by skuncle on Dec 8, 2012 12:48:21 GMT -5
Initially one turntable to copy from record to cart. After that I don't think they'd keep spinning the records. But we know they used at least one turntable because there are instances where the record skipped or had surface noise. Nowadays everything is digital, but wasn't almost everything on carts in radio? The turntable (or later CD player) was just for a one off or infrequently played track.
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Post by Shannon Lynn on Dec 8, 2012 20:56:20 GMT -5
Sorry for not following up and watching this, I have been in Denver, St. Louis and Memphis the past week.
The correct number of tables is 2.....but do you know how you can tell? 2 is repeating theme to the answers by the way....
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Post by snarfdude on Dec 8, 2012 20:56:21 GMT -5
Initially one turntable to copy from record to cart. After that I don't think they'd keep spinning the records. But we know they used at least one turntable because there are instances where the record skipped or had surface noise. Nowadays everything is digital, but wasn't almost everything on carts in radio? The turntable (or later CD player) was just for a one off or infrequently played track. As one who worked in the industry for many years, it really depended on the station, format and year. Carts were used for everything but music in a lot of stations in the golden age of top 40, mainly because of cost of the carts. upwards of $10 each when I worked in the industry in the 80s. Into the 70s and 80s you saw a lot of the major markets putting everything on cart that went to air. Some smaller stations still spun vinyl to air still, but that was taken over eventually by CD players...often Denon CD cart players. You would put the CD in a plastic cartridge and put it in the machine that way. it keeps DJ hands off the CD and less chance of skipping that way. This started to go the way of the dinosaur in the early and mid 90s with the start of the DOS based radio automation systems and it's been computer based ever since. As one who collects broadcast technology and still have cart machines and CD cart players and reel machines and turntables, and 16 inch radio transcriptions, technology has changed quite a but in the last 25-35 years. Some of the watermark produced old soundtracks of the 60s shows have noticeable cue burns on some of the oldies used...polystyrene 45s are bad for that.....it's hard to avoid it with those things.
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Post by skuncle on Dec 8, 2012 22:21:43 GMT -5
Sorry for not following up and watching this, I have been in Denver, St. Louis and Memphis the past week. The correct number of tables is 2.....but do you know how you can tell? 2 is repeating theme to the answers by the way.... I would say because if you hear them in mono, it'll flip back and forth from the right and left side depending on which side which turntable was connected to.
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Post by Shannon Lynn on Dec 8, 2012 22:30:16 GMT -5
Skuncle, man that was great logic and closer to the answer. Actually, it indeed was mono and all of the music and Casey are on the left track. The right track was all of the sound effects, like drum roll for #1 or the siren sound effects/beeping sound effects as Casey would tell a story.
The answer is that one turntable ran 2% faster so that every other song is off by 2%.
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Post by dukelightning on Dec 8, 2012 22:38:21 GMT -5
I had guessed that it was 2 turntables simply because all of my experience was with such a setup and it made the most sense given how the shows were produced in the early days.. But it is worth pointing out while on this subject that in 1970 especially and less so in 1971, there were a lot more breaks than in later years. For example, in the 7/25/70 show, there were no segments with 3 songs in them even though songs are quite short in those days. Furthermore, there were 16 segments that featured only one song. You really notice this when you listen to an original show. In later years, virtually every segment had at least 2 songs and in some cases 3 songs. With that many one song segments, you might think they are trying to make do with one turntable!
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Post by skuncle on Dec 8, 2012 22:50:23 GMT -5
Skuncle, man that was great logic and closer to the answer. Actually, it indeed was mono and all of the music and Casey are on the left track. The right track was all of the sound effects, like drum roll for #1 or the siren sound effects/beeping sound effects as Casey would tell a story. The answer is that one turntable ran 2% faster so that every other song is off by 2%. d**n! My orginal thought was that the speed was off slightly on one turntable but you said two figured in so I went with the two speaker idea. I wasn't thinking percentages.
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Post by snarfdude on Dec 9, 2012 17:15:57 GMT -5
Yes, but what did they use for turntables back then? russcos? gates, collins? the new Technics SP 10? and with what tone arms? Are there pics of the studio used?
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Post by at40petebattistini on Dec 9, 2012 19:22:44 GMT -5
Yes, but what did they use for turntables back then? russcos? gates, collins? the new Technics SP 10? and with what tone arms? Are there pics of the studio used? A very early Watermark memo references the need to purchase at least one turntable, and possibly two. This may be where the 2% discrepancy lies. One turntable being used at the time was manufactured by Russco, Model 12-BID. Another one was being priced for purchase, Russco's Cue Master. Other turntable components considered as part of the buy included a 980-A Audio Empire Arm and a Shure M-55E cartridge. The question at the time was whether to buy one Cue Master and keep the 12-BID, or buy two Cue Masters. I don't have any additional information that determined the outcome. Obviously it's possible they might've kept the old one and bought just one new. The 2% mystery solved? Perhaps...
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Post by matt on Dec 9, 2012 23:12:02 GMT -5
Goldangit...I have to admit I am way out of my league talking turntables like this...clearly the digital music age has ruined me in that way.
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Post by snarfdude on Dec 10, 2012 22:29:26 GMT -5
That would makes sense given the era. The ole idler wheel driven Russco Cue masters or anything Russco was common in studios into the 80s. They were manufactured under many different names, RCA, BE, QRK, Harris, but basically all the same Russco design. They were often called "rumblemasters" as the idler wheel/motor capstan drive could be rather noisy, but you often went for dependability and durability over sound quality in a radio studio. That would change with the direct drive of the Technics SP 10.
Given the 2% difference, a slight adjustment with the height of the idler wheel on the motor shaft could easily account for that. I have 2 of the "Canadian Russco" as some call it, The Mccurdy CH 12. It was as common in Canadian radio stations in the 60s, 70 and 80s as the Russco. The design is pretty much the same, and can be a pain to set up the idler correctly.
In some cases though, radio stations would tweak their tables in the 60s and 70s upwards of 4% to "make the record sound better" everything from running scotch tape around the inside of the turntable, to doing the same thing to the motor shaft.
Those tables are built like tanks, be it Russco or Mccurdy and both are highly collectable.
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