PM me the next time you’re in SE Michigan! I’ll throw in a pile of VHS tapes for your trouble.
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YES PLEASE! That’s amazing!!!
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omg, no love for eno’s “Thursday Afternoon”?? i guess i’ve never seen 9 1/2 Weeks, because i had no idea that album was used in it. it’s one of my favorite albums.
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I love it too! My post mentions that it’s Eno in the clip. In fact, when I get my Nakamichi, I may have to make a tape of my “Music for Airports” LP just so I can play it on the deck.
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oh, sorry – i didn’t mean to include you in the “no love” dig… your mention of it was why i clicked on the link to watch the clip in the first place. i love eno, and wanted to see which song they used in the scene. i didn’t expect Thursday Afternoon, though… that was a pleasant surprise.
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I saw those settings and my first thought was, “mono-spoken word, human voice” and it bugged me instantly.
Some years ago I worked in a recording studio. A volunteer of mine brought in a beautiful bluefaced rack mounted mon equalizer with something like 50 seperate sliders/pots. For live work, even after cleaning, there was crackle when adjusting so it was useless unless one wanted to add noise. For post production it was fantastic for setting up notches to reduce harmonic noise, multiples of the AC hum, and hum from one particular set of fluorescent lamps that couldn’t easily be grounded. The problem was, while it was great for presetting and allowing untrained people to use, it was sad that it was effectively rarely used, because it was easier setting up parametric notches on virtual equalizer and loop that into the recording setup.
It really was beautiful and so much of the kit I used on the analogue production side was from peoples loved hi-fi setups or hand built by local engineers. Our bucket brigade pitch-changer, it worked even when dubbing at double speed (a tool of last resort), had a speaker grill that looked to be machine made, but was hand drilled, and the documentation and circuit design was beautiful. It was built by and engineer in retirement who had all-sorts of neat gear in his garage, including a gold colored high-gain parasol antenna from some space project. - But I digress. I miss those days, but mostly for the people.
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Beyond the cassette deck:
So often minimalism seems to be conjoined with pretension and conspicuous consumption. The spaces look more like well curated aquariums, beautiful spaces that are easy to clean but are used, if at all, only to temporarily store a person. I think that was directors purpose here, but I wonder about the larger movement. I read Uncrate and other sites dedicated to design, but wonder at the true utility and comfort of such spaces. For instance, look up minimalist EDC (Every Day Cary) and you find people with beautiful, seemingly unused “minimalist” kit, that often includes multiple folding knives.
My bookbinding teacher had a tiny house, mostly with modern furniture from the 60s. It also had heart and warmth. Her workshop had only the items needed to fix and bind books. It was far from what is considered minimalist, but everything there had a purpose and was used and was easy to find. She also thinned constantly, refusing in her later years to work with hide gules and the accompanying irons, pots, and brushes. The work surfaces were stained but clear of anything other than the projects of the month.
So often people make videos of these lovely minimalist houses and lofts and tiny homes. I just can’t see going to the store everyday and wasting money buying only small pre-bagged greens and single servings of everything or eating out as often as it seems they must. I just don’t have time for that, nor the money.
…But I have a want to appear minimalist and truly live uncluttered. I have a desire to live only the near future. Would it be nice to appear conspicuously green yet modern. Part of me wants to have immaculate tools that can be upgraded when they get nicked, scuffed, look used, or are lagging behind a generation or two. Most of me then thinks about how I love good tools that stand the test of time and that I can use till they can no longer be repaired. I also have hobbies, and kids, books, tools for creation, and art. I also don’t have near limitless means, so I tend to hold onto what I’ll likely use.
I think I just want a clean desk. Damn it. This post, a post about a cassette deck, has driven me to clear my desk.
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If you want the perfect thing to put yourself or the kids to sleep, this is what was playing during the scene:
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I’ve seen that Nakamichi deck in stores. An interesting, if clearly overkill solution for ensuring that the tape is played precisely the same way in either direction.
I had a Mitsubishi DA-L70 system in the early 90’s, which wasn’t in the same price class to be sure, but had another gimmick that hasn’t been mainstream. It held 7 cassettes in a sliding drawer, with a grabber mechanism that pulled them into an auto-reverse player. Basically, it was a cassette jukebox. When a tape was playing, the drawer/tray would close instead of just hanging out, and when that tape was done, the drawer would open to the same position to put it back. Then, it would try the next slot to see if it was populated or empty, and continue. You could program it to play all 7 tapes, both sides, in series. You could also program it to play specific tracks like a CD player, but I never really figured out the controls. All sorts of little nubs and beige and mocha triangles to press. It was bewildering.
The transition from one tape to another was really slow, though. Mine sometimes locked up with tapes stuck inside.
The record turntable had a linear-tracking head, and you could program it to seek and play individual tracks too. It had poor isolation, so you’d hear bad rumble and vibration.
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That’s Music for Airports not Thursday Afternoon.
Here is the sultry video that features Thursday. Warning: NSFW but probably not that sultry either.
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The other amazing apartment in a Mickey Rourke movie is in Year of the Dragon.
I had a CD-45z up until recently. Excellent audio quality with Burr Brown DACs and that super basic 90s design. Hell 20 years later their in car CD players still look like cheap 90s gear. It lasted me 15+ years and the main reason I left it in the car I traded was the lack of standard DIN layouts in modern cars.
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Well, whadda you know… I’ve never watched 9.5 weeks as I filed it under ‘Meh’ when it came out - now it seems like I did miss out after all.
BTW, anyone interested can have a big box of 1980ies/1990ies cassettes. Mostly Post Punk New Wave and some obscure stuff. Most of it on TDK SA90 cassettes, neatly labelled. Excellent storage conditions.
I can also throw in another big box of VHS tapes.
Caveat: you’d have to pick them up in Krautistan.
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Interesting! When I got my MiniDisc player in the mid to late 90s, the truly amazing feature was just this, to be able to directly play a certain track, even from self-recorded material!
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