What types of unusual records have you heard of/have?

Discussions on Records, Recording, & Artists
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poodling around
Victor V
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Re: What types of unusual records have you heard of/have?

Post by poodling around »

Menophanes wrote: Tue May 11, 2021 6:20 am
poodling around wrote: Mon May 10, 2021 11:58 am I have some 'Filmophone' records. Absolutely amazing, surreal colours ! The 'When We Were Very Young' 'Now We Are Six' three set is my favourite !
I too have a couple of these, one being a potpourri from Verdi's Rigoletto played by a very respectable orchestra (band and conductor both unidentified). This is pressed in dark-green translucent plastic, the other (two military-band marches) being pink. I am surprised that these flexible records were not more successful; they have quieter surfaces than many conventional discs of the period, and they stand up perfectly well to playing on acoustic machines. Their only drawback is that they tend to distort if not stored either horizontally or with something (I use another record) included within the sleeve to keep them rigid.

In terms of content, perhaps my oddest record is a Favorite, from 1908, of two English hymn-tunes played on the carillon of the Town Hall (Rathaus) of Munich, Germany – forty-three tower bells, played from a keyboard. I have digitised one of the sides on my web-page http://www.horologia.me.uk/discs.html (near the bottom).

Oliver Mundy.
I agree with you entirely Oliver, when you say 'they stand up perfectly well to playing on acoustic machines'.

I too am surprised 'that these flexible records were not more successful; they have quieter surfaces than many conventional discs of the period,'

Maybe they lasted too well, so other companies 'got rid of them'. A bit like if someone invented an everlasting light-bulb.

The 'mgthomas' website considers as to whether they essentially 'curled' too much, but with respect I am not entirely convinced by this view.

http://www.mgthomas.co.uk/Records/Label ... ophone.htm

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Re: What types of unusual records have you heard of/have?

Post by CarlosV »

poodling around wrote: Tue May 11, 2021 11:53 am

The 'mgthomas' website considers as to whether they essentially 'curled' too much, but with respect I am not entirely convinced by this view.

http://www.mgthomas.co.uk/Records/Label ... ophone.htm
I have a number of these in different colors. Some of them are quite playable, but others became too wavy causing even a heavy tonearm to jump. I have also some French counterparts, that have the same issues. To be playable today they would have to be stored under compression and at very controlled temperatures over all these decades. I tried to flatten them by storing horizontally under load, but some months of the regime did not help much. I don't know why they disappeared from the market, but I speculate that it is because none of the large well-established manufacturers of the period cared to produce them. Small labels could not compete and these records were only seen as a novelty gyzmo. Quality of reproduction was never a major factor for the big companies: the glaring evidence is the replacement of the silent Columbia laminated records for the crackly HMV pressings when the Gramophone Co swallowed Columbia and formed EMI.

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nostalgia
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Re: What types of unusual records have you heard of/have?

Post by nostalgia »

I got some Soviet Union records with a DGAG machine that I recently purchased. They are probably not at all rare, but I still add them since they are not what we see most often on the forum I suppose, and the record sleeve is also interesting, pay also attention to the year on the coin..1961.
I was told by the seller that some of the records received don't fit the spindle, the hole being too small. I always thought this was a standard agreed on worldwide, but obviously some of these records are not standard that way too. I have not had time to test any of them yet, being too busy restoring, but will test them for fun in the next few weeks.

I don't read cyrillic letters..( remember only a few letters), so I don't know anything about the music or artists...apart from that I guess it says "accordion" on one of the records, and I will not be surprised if there is a choir too on some of the records...
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52089
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Re: What types of unusual records have you heard of/have?

Post by 52089 »

The sleeve is quite interesting. It contains the usual greeting for New Year's, a rocket labeled "CCCP" (USSR), a ship called "Lenin" and a 1 ruble coin dated 1961, which is on the later side of 78 production. I have not deciphered the titles.

I did have some confusion in your calling these "red" records. Perhaps "Soviet" would have been a better choice.

Phono48
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Re: What types of unusual records have you heard of/have?

Post by Phono48 »

Menophanes wrote: Tue May 11, 2021 6:00 am Barry's 33 r.p.m. disc is a great curiosity. The conductor Percy Pitt died in 1932, so that this must be one of the earliest records made to play at that speed. What kind of machine could have sustained such a low speed in those days, while coping with the considerable weight of an early pick-up? And how on earth, if at all, can such a record be played today?

Oliver Mundy.
I have played it on an electric Garrard turntable with a GC8 cartridge. I have to say this is one very boring record!

Barry

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nostalgia
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Re: What types of unusual records have you heard of/have?

Post by nostalgia »

Yes, Soviet would have been a better choice, and it is corrected.

gramophoneshane
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Re: What types of unusual records have you heard of/have?

Post by gramophoneshane »

Some of my more unusual records would be my 6 × 20" Pathés, a 14" Odeon, a 12" Vitaphone 33 ⅓ rpm Victor pressing, a small (5"?) green plastic disc by Mussehl & Westphal Mfg, Fort Atkinson Wisconsin of 2 saw solos, an early Columbia 10" disc with a green label depicting a dragon and recorded in Cantonese if I remember correctly,

One that I'm surprised nobody else has listed as owning is a World Record (constant speed recording). It's a record that was used with the fairly common World Record controller.
Each side of a 12" disc played for around 10 mins by slowing the starting speed of the record to around 33rpm and gradually speeding up. They apparently were made from 1922-25, and is probably the first long play record ever made.
I've never hooked up my controller and played my record, but the late" Colonel" uploaded a video of his playing.
https://youtu.be/s_TW3ns1e1I

2 other discs I'd consider rare are 2 Australia pressing that are pretty rare even here in Australia, are pictured below.
One is of the Kookaburra and was issued by the Australian National Travel Association.
They had offices here in Melbourne, as well as in London and San Francisco so there's likely a few copies floating around England and USA.
The other is another bird record, The history and song of the Lyre Bird.
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drh
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Re: What types of unusual records have you heard of/have?

Post by drh »

I don't know that any of the individual records is "rare," exactly, but years ago I lucked into the first 100 L'Anthologie Sonore records in like-branded albums, ten records each. Since then, I've added records 111-120 in a generic album that someone labeled to go with them. More uncommon would be one of the Moritz Rosenthal Edison lateral records, and definitely rare are three Columbia test pressings of soprano Amy Evans; as the masters were destroyed in a truck accident, they may well be her sole surviving electrical recordings.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amy_Evans

They show her to have been a lovely singer. She did make some acoustic recordings; I have a few (Edison cylinder, Pathé disc), and all suggest hers was a voice that simply did not register well by that method.

tim w
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Re: What types of unusual records have you heard of/have?

Post by tim w »

Have some samples of ones already mentioned. Also have Western Electric wide range test pressings vertically cut, 33rpm,& pressed in vinyl. I think they were early 30’s. Rather high fidelity for the time period.

bensfractals
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Re: What types of unusual records have you heard of/have?

Post by bensfractals »

Lucas wrote: Mon May 10, 2021 12:28 am What types of unusual records have you heard of or own? I'm mostly talking about 78 rpm era records. I have the following.
i have a cardboard-backed 7-inch postcard record under the Valentines record label.

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