What the hell is a broken record?

HemlockGrey · Post by **HemlockGrey** » 2002-12-11 09:03pm

I keep hearing people calling other people 'broken records' if they repeat themselves for too long.

So what the hell is a 'broken record', anyway? I'm assumng it has something to with 'breaking the record for repeating themselves' or somesuch...

The Dark · Post by **The Dark** » 2002-12-11 09:06pm

It has to do with the old vinyl records. Occasionally if they got a scratch on them, the needle on the player would skip back to a previous portion of the record, leading it to repeat a short portion of the music over and over again.

And let me say it's depressing to find people who don't remember vinyl records when I used to own them. Nothing against you, Hemlock, I'm just too young to be saying "when I was a kid" yet.

Joe · Post by **Joe** » 2002-12-11 09:07pm

Vinyl music records tend to repeat themselves when scratched.

HemlockGrey · Post by **HemlockGrey** » 2002-12-11 09:07pm

Vinyl records?

Crown · Post by **Crown** » 2002-12-11 09:07pm

If you can throw back your mind to the time of vinel records when a record was 'scratched' the needle would reach the scratch and (if it was scratched in a particular angle) jump back on the groove that it just passed over. So basically you would hear the same thing over, over, and over again. Hence why somebody sounds like a broken record when they repeat themselves.

Spanky The Dolphin · Post by **Spanky The Dolphin** » 2002-12-11 09:08pm

Jesus, haven't you ever played records?

Do you even know what a record is?

Seriously, I'm practically dumbfounded by this.

data_link · Post by **data_link** » 2002-12-11 09:09pm

Vinyl records - ah, back when I was a kid - they were still obsolete!.

HemlockGrey · Post by **HemlockGrey** » 2002-12-11 09:09pm

Jesus, haven't you ever played records?

No, actually, I haven't. I've seen record players, but I didn't make the connection.

Spanky The Dolphin · Post by **Spanky The Dolphin** » 2002-12-11 09:10pm

How old are you?

I'm 20, and I had a record player as a kid.

The Dark · Post by **The Dark** » 2002-12-11 09:11pm

HemlockGrey wrote:Vinyl records?

In the semi-immortal words of Garth Brooks, "I'm much too young to feel this damn old." Yes, vinyl records. They were still used until the late 80s. I should know, I owned some and I was born in the 80s. Not as convenient as cassette tapes, but (IIRC) easier to produce, and thus cheaper. They looked like giant black Compact Discs (which is why they're "compact" discs, they're smaller than records). Look it up on Google, I'm sure you'll be able to find pictures. Or ask your folks, they'll remember them.

Spanky, I'm younger than you and I owned Michael Jackson albums (back before he was a total freak). It was scary my senior year of high school when I had freshmen under me (I was a band officer) who had never even heard of vinyl records.

Post by **Dalton** » 2002-12-11 09:15pm

My sister wants a record player...she's 19 and she's got a bunch of Led Zeppelin LPs she wants to listen to. Vinyl lives on

HemlockGrey · Post by **HemlockGrey** » 2002-12-11 09:16pm

Kelly Antilles · Post by **Kelly Antilles** » 2002-12-11 09:18pm

Hey, anybody got a working 8-track? THere's a few sound tracks I'd like to hear again.

LP?? Long Play records. Plays at 33 1/3 RPM. Then you have 45s and 72s.

Uraniun235 · Post by **Uraniun235** » 2002-12-11 09:18pm

LPs died when they did because of the music industry wanting to push CDs on us; they cancelled the "buy back" policy on LPs, leaving stores with cassettes and CDs as the only "risk free" products for music stores to buy from the record companies.

Oddly enough, CD players came down in price at just about that time. At the time, the record companies promised that CDs would come down in price as manufacturing them got cheaper...

Of course, we all know how THAT turned out.

Sam Or I · Post by **Sam Or I** » 2002-12-11 09:18pm

Dang, I feel old.

The Dark · Post by **The Dark** » 2002-12-11 09:19pm

Uraniun235 wrote:LPs died when they did because of the music industry wanting to push CDs on us; they cancelled the "buy back" policy on LPs, leaving stores with cassettes and CDs as the only "risk free" products for music stores to buy from the record companies.

Oddly enough, CD players came down in price at just about that time. At the time, the record companies promised that CDs would come down in price as manufacturing them got cheaper...

Of course, we all know how THAT turned out.

Yes, it's truly ironic that CDs cost more than cassettes, considering they're less expensive to make. Smith was wrong again.

HemlockGrey · Post by **HemlockGrey** » 2002-12-11 09:19pm

Plays at 33 1/3 RPM. Then you have 45s and 72s.

Duh..wha...?

Post by **Dalton** » 2002-12-11 09:19pm

HemlockGrey wrote:LP?

Shorthand for a vinyl record. It means "Long Play". When records were first made you couldn't fit much music onto them since the mechanisms weren't yet refined and thus the grooves were a bit far apart. As technology advanced, space between grooves shrank and the records played longer, hence long play or LP.

Think of it in terms of the three different VHS recording speeds: SP, EP/LP, and SLP.

HemlockGrey · Post by **HemlockGrey** » 2002-12-11 09:21pm

Ah. But my question is, how do you fit music onto grooves?

Kelly Antilles · Post by **Kelly Antilles** » 2002-12-11 09:21pm

HemlockGrey wrote:
Plays at 33 1/3 RPM. Then you have 45s and 72s.
Duh..wha...?

*groan* we've got a live one here. Are you really that clueless?

RPM: Rotations Per Minute.
You haven't taken physics yet, have you?

Phil Skayhan · Post by **Phil Skayhan** » 2002-12-11 09:23pm

HemlockGrey wrote:LP?

Long Play album
EDIT: or does it come from the German Langspiel Platta (sp?)

And out of curiosity, what did you think the hip-hop DJ's were using to make the scratching sound found on many songs?

Spanky The Dolphin · Post by **Spanky The Dolphin** » 2002-12-11 09:23pm

I didn't really start listening to music until I was about 13 (~1995), so I had a bunch of those story books and 78 RPM records (you know, the ones that chimed/told you when to turn the page). We still have a whole bunch of them, including ones for the Star Wars Trilogy, Raiders of the Lost Ark, Temple of Doom, Gremlins, and Star Trek I-III (I think. I know we had up to II).

Some of the records eventually would get cracked, so I'm quite familiar with how a broken record sounds.

I've never actually had the pleasure/displeasure of meeting someone who didn't know what a record was.

The Dark · Post by **The Dark** » 2002-12-11 09:23pm

HemlockGrey wrote:Ah. But my question is, how do you fit music onto grooves?

As the needle moves up or down, it reads it as frequency shifts (if I'm recalling my music class correctly). CD Players do the same thing by measuring the time the light takes to reflect off the disk.

Post by **Kuja** » 2002-12-11 09:23pm

What the hell is a broken record?

.....................you know, I always knew my kids would be asking me this someday far in the future, but not like this!

HemlockGrey · Post by **HemlockGrey** » 2002-12-11 09:24pm

Well, no, actually, I haven't taken physics yet. I thought it meant something like 'Revolutions per minute' but wasn't sure.

And, for the stratching thing, I don't actually listen to much hip-hop, so I never really wondered.