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Re: World War 1 - Centennial
Posted: Wed Jul 30, 2014 1:50 pm
by Wolfe
One of my favorites, along with Caruso's
Over There and a few others.
[youtubehd]
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1skS3GTXZi8[/youtubehd]
I used to collect 78's of WWI songs - still do, from time to time. Some of them are good, some are Gawd-awful.
Re: World War 1 - Centennial
Posted: Wed Jul 30, 2014 3:33 pm
by welshfield
Did anyone else notice that the website blog declared the Gas Bombing recording a fake?
Re: World War 1 - Centennial
Posted: Wed Jul 30, 2014 5:39 pm
by Wolfe
I've read elsewhere (in print) claiming the Gas Bombing record a fake. Can't remember where that was, though.
Re: World War 1 - Centennial
Posted: Thu Jul 31, 2014 2:15 am
by Starkton
welshfield wrote:Did anyone else notice that the website blog declared the Gas Bombing recording a fake?
It was no fake, but the transfers for this and another (unissued) gas shell bombardment disc were made (combined?) from an unknown number of test recordings, taken on 9th October 1918 near Lille.
Does anybody have an original HMV pressing of December 1918 ?
Re: World War 1 - Centennial
Posted: Thu Jul 31, 2014 3:00 am
by bart1927
welshfield wrote:Did anyone else notice that the website blog declared the Gas Bombing recording a fake?
As I understood it, it was not completely fake, but they dramatized it in post production by adding the whistling sounds and the shouting of commands. Apparently they found another take of this recording that contained just the shooting sounds.
Re: World War 1 - Centennial
Posted: Thu Jul 31, 2014 3:58 am
by Lucius1958
bart1927 wrote:welshfield wrote:Did anyone else notice that the website blog declared the Gas Bombing recording a fake?
As I understood it, it was not completely fake, but they dramatized it in post production by adding the whistling sounds and the shouting of commands. Apparently they found another take of this recording that contained just the shooting sounds.
Considering the state of recording technology at the time, it seems rather unlikely that anyone would be able to add "post-production" effects without compromising the original recording…
Bill
Re: World War 1 - Centennial
Posted: Thu Jul 31, 2014 8:52 am
by epigramophone
Clearly a location recording made under battlefield conditions would have required some editing before release, but that does not make it a fake. Will Gaisberg's expedition to the front did take place and is well documented.
The record was released in December 1918, and here is the announcement in the monthly catalogue supplement :
Re: World War 1 - Centennial
Posted: Thu Jul 31, 2014 9:20 am
by epigramophone
The label image posted by gramophone78 is, as indicated, a later issue from the sought after HMV Catalogue No.2 :
Re: World War 1 - Centennial
Posted: Thu Jul 31, 2014 10:12 am
by bart1927
Lucius1958 wrote:bart1927 wrote:welshfield wrote:Did anyone else notice that the website blog declared the Gas Bombing recording a fake?
As I understood it, it was not completely fake, but they dramatized it in post production by adding the whistling sounds and the shouting of commands. Apparently they found another take of this recording that contained just the shooting sounds.
Considering the state of recording technology at the time, it seems rather unlikely that anyone would be able to add "post-production" effects without compromising the original recording…
Bill
Well, that's what it said on the blog that was referred to:
Close listening at slow speeds – just careful attention and notation, nothing more elaborate – revealed inconsistencies and oddities in the firing noises. The bongs, plops and whistles seemed internally inconsistent. Some of the artillery sounds – ostensibly a battery of four, firing in quick succession – varied implausibly with each successive firing. Physical evidence from the record’s groove, as well as extraneous noises – surface crackle and fizz, and, audible within the recording, the swish of a turntable – seemed to indicate at least two rudimentary overdubs, in which the output of one acoustic horn was relayed into a second, possibly using an auxetophone, an early compressed-air amplifier. All this resulted in a double- or triple-layered sonic artifact. Finally – the crucial evidence, although oddly it was hardly noticed at the time – an alternative take was located. In this take, according to its discoverer, the entire theatrics of gunnery command is simply absent, and there is no sound at all of whistling shells in motion. What was left was a skeleton sequence of clicks, thuds and cracks, supplemented with only a single closing insert, the portentous injunction “Feed the Guns with War Bonds!”
Re: World War 1 - Centennial
Posted: Fri Aug 01, 2014 4:12 pm
by gramophone78
epigramophone wrote:The label image posted by gramophone78 is, as indicated, a later issue from the sought after HMV Catalogue No.2 :
And here is a later (circa 1936) #2 catalog that shows the record still available. Price 6/6.