No nickel required!
June 2, 2005 9:50 PM   Subscribe

Turtle's 78 RPM Jukebox
Popular Victor, Edison, and Columbia recordings, 1900-1930.
posted by Dr. Wu (40 comments total)
 
This is way cool!
posted by arse_hat at 9:53 PM on June 2, 2005


THANK YOU!
posted by mrs.pants at 10:11 PM on June 2, 2005


Nice!
posted by mazola at 10:18 PM on June 2, 2005


This is absolutely wonderful!

(And makes me snarl inwardly upon remembering that my Victorola and collection of 78s got pinched from storage a few years back.)

Thanks Dr. Wu (for the link, if not the memories)!
posted by Absit Invidia at 10:19 PM on June 2, 2005


(And makes me snarl inwardly upon remembering that my Victorola and collection of 78s got pinched from storage a few years back.)

Hit Ebay. A few years ago I bought a portable Victorola and about 200 78's and then a Edison phonograph and 22 of the tube type recordings.

With shipping both deals cost about $300 USD total.

The evenings spent listening and dancing in the basement entertainment room; priceless.
posted by arse_hat at 10:30 PM on June 2, 2005


F*cking awesome!

*is rendered completely inarticulate by the general coolness of this*

Thank you.
posted by jokeefe at 10:42 PM on June 2, 2005




Thanks for the kind words, all! Glad you like it!
posted by Dr. Wu at 11:12 PM on June 2, 2005


[This is absolutely brilliant]
posted by tellurian at 12:04 AM on June 3, 2005


And the link from there is sweet too. The jukebox is full of blues this month.
posted by tellurian at 12:20 AM on June 3, 2005


I am loving this stuff. Thanks Dr. Wu

Rosetta Howard and the Harlem Hamfats
If You're a Viper
Dreamed about a reefer 5 feet long
Mighty Mez but not to strong
You'll be high but not for long
If you're a Viper

posted by tellurian at 12:42 AM on June 3, 2005


If you dig this, you might also like WFMU's Antique Phonograph Music Program Archives and its sister site, Tom Edison's Attic for many hours of streaming ancient audio.
posted by crunchland at 8:24 AM on June 3, 2005


Great find!
posted by piratebowling at 8:26 AM on June 3, 2005


Yay! Yay! Minstrelry!! Auntie Skinner's Chicken Dinner--A great piece of Americana?! Blech. Are you people serious?
posted by crapulent at 9:42 AM on June 3, 2005


crapulent, the past is sometimes ugly, but that doesn't necessarily preclude it from being interesting and/or even entertaining, especially 100 years on. Better to see it in the proper historical context than to condemn it outright for not conforming to modern-day standards of propriety.

Plus, that's just one song out of many. There's probably the same percentage of racist/sexist music made today - it just doesn't hit the mainstream. Ever hear of Oi!?
posted by Dr. Wu at 11:16 AM on June 3, 2005


Awesome. What a wonderful link. Thanks so much Dr. Wu.
posted by sleepy pete at 11:31 AM on June 3, 2005


Great link. Many thanks
posted by Outlawyr at 11:34 AM on June 3, 2005


There's probably the same percentage of racist/sexist music made today - it just doesn't hit the mainstream.

Or, speaking of minstrelsy and misogyny, a couple of little acts called 50 Cent and Snoop Dogg? It hits the mainstream, allright.

This site is so moving because you can sit back and hear what people were actually listening to in 1924; it's a window into a world lost, not an object lesson in social progress. Thanks again, Dr. Wu.
posted by jokeefe at 12:06 PM on June 3, 2005


i hate lumus !
posted by svidrigailov23 at 12:16 PM on June 3, 2005


I thought it was important to interrupt all of these Awesome! Nice! Thank you! comments and point out that some of this music is horribly racist and demeaning. And no, I do not find it interesting or entertaining. If you find this amusing I'm sure you can dig up some German music from oh, approximately 1939-1944.
posted by crapulent at 12:41 PM on June 3, 2005


[Is he gone yet?]

Anyway, there was an AskMefi question about the cliche "Chinese" musical theme. I hear a couple of others in these songs.

1) About 0:07 into Old King Tut (1923).

2) About 3:30 into Oh, Gee! Say, Gee! You Ought To See My Gee Gee From The Fiji Isle (1921).
posted by pracowity at 1:19 PM on June 3, 2005


Oops. "About 3:10 into Oh, Gee!..."
posted by pracowity at 1:23 PM on June 3, 2005


crapulent, with all due respect, you need to develop a sense of perspective.

For the record, I've actually heard a few Nazi-era cabaret songs, and, upon reading the translations, found them to be offensive. Still, some of them were pretty good songs, and fascinating historical documents. And I'm Jewish.
posted by Dr. Wu at 2:54 PM on June 3, 2005


Ha ha. Dr. Wu got upset because people stopped kissing his sweet little butthole about his banal post. The shit is racist. And the shit that ain't racist is still racist 'cause it's a bunch of crackers stealing ragtime from its originators.
posted by svidrigailov23 at 3:32 PM on June 3, 2005


svidrigailov23, you are so very perceptive! Keen observational and analytical skills, there, pal.

Thank you also for perpetuating racism by using the term "crackers." Good show!
posted by Dr. Wu at 5:21 PM on June 3, 2005


I still keep a VV-260 running, but most of my 78s are too precious to play with a heavy steel needle.

Lots more early recordings lovingly digitized are available at archive.org, and here's another collection of early jazz mp3s.

The Red Hot Jazz Archive is an incomparable resource for scholars and music lovers- all the bands and musicians are meticulously cross-referenced, but the huge quantity of audio there is all encoded in .ra format and a little hard on the ears. While there give a listen to Eddie Lang, who was inventing jazz guitar while a young Django was still out stealing chickens....
posted by squalor at 7:46 PM on June 3, 2005


the cliche "Chinese" musical theme

This was also being used in other musical genres of a more serious nature, as in Puccini's Turandot (1926). Orientalism was alive and well in Europe in the 1920s, in cabaret and vaudeville as well as popular music, party to do with the spectacular discovery of Tutankhamen's tomb.
posted by jokeefe at 8:12 PM on June 3, 2005


Oh, and svidrigailov23, please do shut up. This particular thread isn't the place for a debate on cultural appropriation; it's a discussion, at least in part, of how amazing it is to have these historical documents available for us to hear at the click of a mouse. If you want to talk about ragtime and mainstream (or white) culture feeding off the cultural productions of African Americans (something which is far from over, as I am sure you know), put together an FPP and post it on the blue. Ta.
posted by jokeefe at 8:18 PM on June 3, 2005


And squalor, thank you, excellent.
posted by jokeefe at 8:22 PM on June 3, 2005


"I thought it was important to interrupt all of these Awesome! Nice! Thank you! comments and point out that some of this music is horribly racist and demeaning." You thought wrong.
posted by arse_hat at 8:26 PM on June 3, 2005


squalor, those are awesome links!

jokeefe & arse_hat: you rock.
posted by Dr. Wu at 11:20 PM on June 3, 2005


Dude, that site ain't nothing. Hie thee to the alt.binaries.sounds.78-era and alt.binaries.sounds.78rpm-era newsgroups.
posted by Mo Nickels at 6:34 AM on June 4, 2005


crapulent, with all due respect, you need to develop a sense of perspective.

Dr. Wu, I have a sense of perspective, thanks. If you do not acknowledge the cultural background of art, I think it is you who is lacking perspective. Art doesn't exist in a vacuum. I do not advocate banning or burning art that is racist, offensive, questionable, etc. However, it is our responsibility to analyze the meaning and context of such art.

jokeefe and arse_hat: If you want to control the direction of conversations on a public forum, perhaps you should start your own. And thanks for letting us know that whites are no longer appropriating black culture! I almost forgot that the deadline had passed.
posted by crapulent at 9:48 AM on June 4, 2005


However, it is our responsibility to analyze the meaning and context of such art.

My point exactly. And exactly what your earlier comments indicate you were not doing.
posted by Dr. Wu at 10:21 AM on June 4, 2005


And thanks for letting us know that whites are no longer appropriating black culture! I almost forgot that the deadline had passed.

WTF? I said the exact opposite. Please read my comment again.

And I was responding to the unhelpful, even hostile, post from svidrigailov23, in which the word "butthole" was used, if you'll recall.

Also, I'm certainly up for talking about cultural history, but your initial post was so sarcastic and content-free ("Yay! Yay! Minstrelry!! Auntie Skinner's Chicken Dinner--A great piece of Americana?! Blech. Are you people serious?") that you can't really expect it to have inspired measured debate. But as I said-- I'm happy to talk about power and culture and who made the music and who profited. I just wasn't happy about the hit and run, sniping attacks-- that's not the way to open a discussion.
posted by jokeefe at 10:56 AM on June 4, 2005


"arse_hat: If you want to control the direction of conversations on a public forum, perhaps you should start your own." Again you are wrong. I made no attempt to control or change the conversation. I just pointed out that you were wrong. "And thanks for letting us know that whites are no longer appropriating black culture! I almost forgot that the deadline had passed." WTF? Huffing glue perhaps?
Dude your idea is valid but take a hint from jokeefe "If you want to talk about ... white ...culture feeding off the cultural productions of African Americans (something which is far from over, as I am sure you know), put together an FPP..."
posted by arse_hat at 11:18 AM on June 4, 2005


I also count myself of the jokeefe frame of mind. Stop derailing, crapulent.
posted by soyjoy at 9:40 PM on June 4, 2005


Okay. Next time I will just ignore all racist and offensive content.
posted by crapulent at 7:15 AM on June 6, 2005


crapulent, are you thick or a prick? Don't ignore it. Do something constructive. I really would like to see you do an fpp on the subject.
posted by arse_hat at 8:41 AM on June 6, 2005


Crapulent's attitude is what gets books like Huckleberry Finn or Catcher In the Rye banned -- an attitude of people too intellectually bereft to see any value beyond lthe most obvious aspects.
posted by crunchland at 9:53 AM on June 6, 2005


« Older Won't someone please think of the Sherpas?   |   Amazing Atlas Newer »


This thread has been archived and is closed to new comments