“Chad Kassem, founder of Kansas vinyl record giant Acoustic Sounds, turned his hobby into a career–but his journey to success was anything but straightforward.” CBS Saturday Morning co-hosts Michelle Miller and Dana Jacobson interviewed Kassem at his warehouse/manufacturing plant in October, 2025. Watch it on youtube by clicking here.
Frederick Hart was an English engineer who immigrated to New York in 1884. He established a company in Poughkeepsie in the early 1900s to build steam-powered automobiles, but soon became a manufacturer of Hollerith punched-card equipment for a nearby company that, as it turns out, would be a predecessor to International Business Machines (IBM). Hart eventually became president of a new IBM munitions division in the 1940s, located in Poughkeepsie. His original company, which by 1944 was making military gun parts, was purchased by the American Type Founders Company, and later became part of Daystrom Corporation. Hart apparently formed a new firm, which manufactured something called the Recordgraph. How and why Hart got into that business is unclear. Read More …
I just discovered that Malcolm Riviera (pseud. of Gary C. Broyhill, b. Sept. 17, 1956) died in late July or early August, 2023. No formal obituary has been published online, but he was memorialized in the September 2, 2023 edition of the Trash Flow Radio show on WAIF FM, Cincinnati. The link takes you to Read More …
Wired magazine jumped on the cassette culture bandwagon with a “how to” article on getting started with cassettes. I predict that this marks the beginning of the end for the cassette. Again.
This just in: Apple has discontinued the iPod. This is the worst news since Microsoft discontinued the Zune in 2012. Apple still makes iPods? Who knew. They will be selling the remaining ones until supplies run out. 2024 Update: If you wanted to try to be the last person to buy a new iPod, you Read More …
Ok, this isn’t really sound recording history, but once upon a time I published a how-to article on installing the dust cover and hinges on a Technics SL-1200 turntable. The SL-1200 is a legendary turntable first manufactured in 1972 that became a favorite of DJs in the 80s and later. While it superficially resembles other Read More …
This post originally appeared on the earliest version of this site, back in 2001, when it was hosted at Rutgers University (the old url was www.rci.rutgers.edu/~dmorton). Some body actually asked me about it recently (I dropped it years ago), so here it is, with updates. Why have there been so many different, incompatible audio technologies? Read More …
