Thursday, October 15, 2015

It's 1983: Stereo Review Previews CD's... and More

At the end of a reel of rather nondescript radio announcer/commercial voices demo, I found a series of five short programs called "Radio Magazine", promoting Stereo Review Magazine.

What interested me about these programs is that the first few of the 90 second features are all about the coming world of the Compact Disc, which was so new at this point (sounds like it must have been June of 1983 - promoting the July issue of the magazine), that few outside of Japan would have seen or heard one.

Editor William Livingston, who tells us, in a marvelously ridiculous, pompous voice, just how wonderful the CD is. I heartily disagree with his finding that they are superior to records. They certainly weren't in the early days, and improvements since then haven't convinced me.

The first two segments are about the sound of CD's, while the subsequent three cover the equipment you might use - what you already own that you can still use with CD's, what portable units are available (and which are worth buying), and the type of speakers you might want.

Download: William Livingston - Previewing the Compact Disc Revolution
Play:

3 comments:

  1. I'm looking at a very similar Sony machine as I type! It's still going strong. What I found interesting is that I had cause to take the cover off a few years ago. Most of the box was empty: the machinery and electronics inside occupied very little space. Of course it would have to be the right shape to stack up with other separate hifi units but I suppose manufacturers were often very concerned then to make electronic equipment look the way people expected it to look.

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