MetaFilter posts tagged with sound and recording

Enjoy Nature Electronically

23 — Tue, 07 Aug 2012 07:55:25 -0800

The Psychologically Ultimate Seashore was the first in the Environments series of records, an early entry in the field of white-noise nature sound albums. One interesting aspect of the albums was that most were designed to be played on a loop at any speed; another was that selections were included on the Voyager Golden Record as "Sounds of the Earth". The NYT article contemporary with the release is online, but paywalled. The creator of the series, Irv Teibel, died in October, 2010.

Listening to the past, recorded on tin foil and glass, for the first time in over a century

filthy light thief — Fri, 10 Feb 2012 14:35:03 -0800

Towards the end of the 1800s, there were three primary American groups competing to invent technology to record and play back audio. Alexander Graham Bell worked with with Charles Sumner Tainter and Chichester Bell in at their Volta Laboratory in Georgetown, Washington, D.C., while Thomas A. Edison worked from his Menlo Park facilities, and Emile Berliner worked in his independent laboratory in his home. To secure the rights to their inventions, the three groups sent samples of their work to the Smithsonian. These recordings became part of the permanent collections, now consisting of 400 of the earliest audio recordings ever made. But knowledge of their contents was limited to old, short descriptions, as the rubber, beeswax, glass, tin foil and brass recording media are fragile, and playback devices might damage the recordings, if such working devices are even available. That is, until a collaborative project with the Library of Congress and Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory came together to make 2D and 3D optical scanners, capable of visually recording the patterns marked on discs and cylinders, respectively. Six discs from Bell's Volta Laboratory have been scanned, and made available on Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory's page for the project, as well as posted on YouTube, and high quality images have been posted to Flickr (Flash-based slideshow). The National Museum of American History blog has a two-part post on the audio recovery: Trilled R's and the dawn of recorded sound in America, and Forgotten early sound recordings given a voice. IRENE (Image, Reconstruct, Erase Noise, Etc.), previously, in 2007 (Archive.org view of irene.lbl.gov), before work on these hundred-plus year old audio recordings were scanned. And Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory previously worked on audio recreation: the 1860 phonautogram, first thought to be a female voice, later determined to be the (male) inventor himself, and Edison's phonograph doll, the actual first recording of a woman's voice. All this work is different from the Digital Needle software written by Ofer Springer, a university student from Israel (previously, twice), which was more of a proof-of-concept project than an effort to archive broken or fragile media. One more prior post, this on Phonozoic, dedicated to the history of the phonograph and related media.

78 78s

carter — Sun, 29 Jan 2012 18:00:29 -0800

78 78s - In Search Of Lost Time - is a streaming mix of beautiful 78s from around the world, collected and curated by Ian Nagoski. "I started sifting through boxes of junky old 78s that no one else wanted about 15 years ago, and almost right away, I made a rule: Anything that wasn't in English, buy it." Ian's projects have been discussed here before.

It's for you!

Miko — Thu, 06 Oct 2011 15:41:15 -0800

It's a ring-tone! It's place-based community art! Well, you don't have to choose any more. In Locally Toned, artist T. Foley sources sound in the wild to create hundreds of unique ringtones.

Snap, Crackle, Rattle and Hum.

goodnewsfortheinsane — Wed, 07 Sep 2011 16:53:17 -0800

40 Noises That Built Pop [parts 2 • 3 • 4]

The Present Sound of London

nthdegx — Tue, 21 Jul 2009 04:13:40 -0800

The Present Sound of London -- "I’ve been lured to London by money at the hottest, stickiest time of year. Every time I visit, I’m struck by the noises—not necessarily their volume, but their strangeness and variety in comparison to the quiet humdrum of the provincial town where I live. So this time I’m equipped with an audio recorder." By Giles Turnbull.

Dinosaur Jr. apparently too old (not really)

auralcoral — Sun, 12 Jul 2009 13:41:22 -0800

[musicnewsfilter]: European copies of Dinosaur Jr.'s new album Farm have been recalled after duplication software "doubled the sound layers, resulting in a 3 dB increase in the overall sound volume." Thankfully, if you have a defective copy you can exchange it for a working copy free of charge. Also, listen to J Mascis' other band Witch to understand further why this happened.

Oldest recorded voice

stbalbach — Mon, 01 Jun 2009 16:34:55 -0800

Last year we discussed a recently discovered 10-second audio recording from 1860 that was thought to be the oldest known recorded human voice, a girl or woman singing the 18th century French folk song “Au Clair de la Lune”. Turns out, it was being played too fast - slow it down and it's the voice of the inventor himself. As well, a number of other recordings have been found, pushing back the oldest recording to 1857. Hear it all on NPR (5-min). “Au Clair de la Lune” various renditions. *France Gall - Au clair de la lune (1964) *Café Crème 2 *au claire de la lune *Au Clair de la Lune

Researchers Play Tune Recorded Before Edison See also Phonoautograph

y2karl — Thu, 27 Mar 2008 07:49:18 -0800

Researchers Play Tune Recorded Before Edison
The Phonoautograph
The history of the Phonoautograph. A technology in which you can still buy stock.

The Sound Of Clothes

jack_mo — Wed, 12 Mar 2008 09:58:05 -0800

The Sound Of Clothes features the precise sound of fashion materials such as feathers, sequins, glass crystals and beads, nylon, taffeta, leather, velvet, jacquard, zips and metallic chains, recorded in an anechoic chamber. Videos linked from the page might be NSFW.

(NSC) - RIP Ron Murphy, master vinyl cutter.

loquacious — Wed, 13 Feb 2008 02:55:52 -0800

Ron Murphy cut records, but not just any records. Responsible for cutting the actual vinyl master plates of much of the now revered Detroit Techno including Jeff Mills, Carl Craig, Underground Resistance's seminal Knights of the Jaguar, and much more - he demonstrated impeccable craftsmanship and skill in both mastering records for sound and aesthetics at company known as Sound Enterprises source link AKA National Sound Corporation. Schooled in Motown, dubplates and jukeboxes, he is the bespoke-crafted, analog link between the digital future and analog past that is the roots of Techno music and modern techno DJ culture. One hour interview here, in mp3 format. (Coral Cache link. Original link here. Which includes gems such as "Richie Hawtin? Well, here's the Elvis of Techno!". He's a lovely curmudgeon, I promise. It's worth the download just for the tracks they play in the background and breaks in the interview, all NSC-cut tracks.) Are you a DJ? Own any older techno, club or pop-remix club vinyl? Look for the handwritten (NSC) tag on the run-out spiral on the inside of the record, nearest the label. Ron Murphy cut the plates for that record. Ron Murphy also pushed the the boundaries of plate cutting with his NSC-X2 technique, spiraling two separate tracks together in a paired helix on the platter. He also experimented with reverse spirals, locked ending grooves, and hybrid platters where the outside track spiraled in normally, and the inside track spiraled out and they met between mid-record in a locked groove. Thanks, Ron, for making it sound so good, and caring.

Audible Illusions

sambosambo — Thu, 13 Dec 2007 05:34:26 -0800

Holophonic sound is an audio recording technique which operates on a principle similar to Holography. The result has been reported to be realistic and life-like three dimensional sounding audio recordings. You'll need your headphones to get the most out of the three audio demonstrations provided here. Close your eyes, and it's quite an effective illusion.

HOMOPHONI

hama7 — Sun, 07 Oct 2007 18:19:19 -0800

HOMOPHONI

sound trapping

ginbiafra — Mon, 18 Jul 2005 19:22:33 -0800

DIY Guide to Recording. Set up a home studio. This seems to cover a lot, and not being a pro at audio recording, I found it pretty useful.