bristol@hou2h.UUCP (N.BRISTOL) (06/13/84)
While we're on this discussion on AM and AOR format radio stations, I have another question. Do some radio stations speed up their turntables or cart machines? When I hear a tune that I'm familiar with on some stations, its key sounds slightly higher (most noticeable in the voice) and the tempo sounds rushed. WPLJ and WAPP are metropolitan Bayonne area stations that sound as if they have sped up their playback equipment. Gil Bristol hou2h!bristol
rlr@pyuxn.UUCP (Rich Rosen) (06/13/84)
> While we're on this discussion on AM and AOR format radio stations, I have > another question. Do some radio stations speed up their turntables or cart > machines? When I hear a tune that I'm familiar with on some stations, its key > sounds slightly higher (most noticeable in the voice) and the tempo sounds > rushed. WPLJ and WAPP are metropolitan Bayonne area stations that sound as if > they have sped up their playback equipment. > Gil Bristol hou2h!bristol Yup, it's a familiar tactic amongst the more money-hungry stations. The reason is pretty obvious: they can claim more music per unit time, while still opening up more time for commercial advertising bucks. "Yes, WIMP-FM, we play 40 songs an hour and still have room for 30 minutes of commercials!" Another really annoying tactic is the "commercial-free bloc", in which they claim "1 full hour of commercial free music", during which they insert as many station promos as possible (leaving the extended spans of commercials for the extremities of the bloc). Apparently station promos don't count as commercials to them. Have we just about killed the topic of radio programming in net.music? I mean, it really has very little to do with music (and I don't mean because it deals with Top 40 and AOR and Adult Contemporary schlock---because it has more to do with the broadcasting industry than with music). It seems like we're beating a dead horse. -- "Submitted for your approval..." Rich Rosen pyuxn!rlr
stuart@ssc-vax.UUCP (Stuart Lewis) (06/13/84)
As far as speeding up (or slowing down) pre-recording items over the air, it is usually a matter of mal-adjustment of the machine. Maintenance is very frequentat stations (tonearm cartridges are usually replaced every other week), and manymachines will slow down after getting very warm from constant use. I've never seen any broadcast turntables that had strobe lights (not to say there aren't any), so the jock has no idea if the output is not exactly right - unless it is subtly detectible. At one station I worked at I did a fill-in show from 6a.m. to noon on a Sunday morning. Well, the jock I relieved had to run some typical Sunday a.m. reli- geous program from a reel to reel machine. In between sips of coffee he would casually reach over and either grab the back-up reel and stop the tape for shortspurts and blurbs, or spin the take-up reel to provide a few 'chipmunk' sounds! He made it quite clear that he hated running that stuff! hhhmmm? I wonder how many people experienced true enlightenment from this program!? Stuart Lewis ssc-vax!stuart
ab3@stat-l (Rsk the Wombat) (06/14/84)
We would (occasionally) speed up/slow down a record to get it to finish *exactly* at the correct time needed "to meet" the network...since our Technics turntables had digital indicators for +/- 9.9% pitch changes, a little work using the cut's printed timing and a calculator usually did the trick. > In between sips of coffee he would casually reach over and either grab the > back-up reel and stop the tape for short spurts and blurbs, or spin the > take-up reel to provide a few 'chipmunk' sounds! Yup, I've pulled that trick too...sitting through 6 hours of taped programming is a bore. I've also used it in the recording studio to make a timing problem go away, similar to the turntable trick above. And, oh yes, the hand-on-the-reel trick is the origin of the "phlanging" sound. -- Rsk the Wombat UUCP: { allegra, decvax, ihnp4, harpo, teklabs, ucbvax } !pur-ee!rsk { allegra, cornell, decvax, hplabs, ihnp4, ucbvax} !purdue!rsk
merchant@dartvax.UUCP (Peter Merchant) (06/14/84)
{}
Yes, in fact. Some radio stations speed things up by about 2%, just to
keep things booking along. It's also rather strange because some singles
when they are created, are just the album version with a few cuts and 2%
faster. Which means if a station speeds it up again, isn't that 4% faster?
Sometimes it's not that obvious that it's speeded up. The best way to tell
is to listen to both versions back-to-back. I noticed a few days ago that
as well as the garbage that they threw into Duran Duran's latest single
"The Reflex", they also speeded up the vocals about 2%.
--
Peter Merchantabh@ccivax.UUCP (Goofy) (06/14/84)
I've listened to many stations but I've never heard sped up music.
I really can't agree that it happens on purpose, I mean after you
hear a song only a few times it becomes very obvious when even a
small deviation is introduced. I've seen commercial turntables
with the +/- throttle, they are fun to play with on late night
shows (WRCT, Pittsburgh!) but you can't get more than 2-3% deviation.
This is hardly enough to make a sizeable increase in corporation
profits, especially when you consider the artistic integrity you have
sacrificed!
The engineer must have been a nickle short.
--
Andrew
...{rlgvax | decvax | ucbvax!allegra}!rochester!ritcv!ccivax!abh
"From the ever cycling epicenter of Rochester...."kds@intelca.UUCP (Ken Shoemaker) (06/16/84)
sorry to dissapoint you, but speeding up tunes is standard practice
on a few stations. I don't think the point is to pack more songs
into a certain time period, but by speeding them up, people tend
to feel that they are a little more "up beat." In addition,
many stations play around with equalization out the wazoo,
people running the boards don't pay attention to meter levels (they
only make sure they wiggle with they're supposed to),
they have compressors on each audio band, etc., to try to
pack more sound into the carrier. All this is done to try to make
the station sound "better" and it probably works in attracting
larger audiences if only a few stations do it...human engineering
and all that.
--
Ken Shoemaker, Intel, Santa Clara, Ca.
{pur-ee,hplabs,amd,scgvaxd,dual,idi,omsvax}!intelca!kdsemjej@uokvax.UUCP (06/18/84)
#R:hou2h:-49100:uokvax:4000042:000:407
uokvax!emjej Jun 18 10:38:00 1984
I've heard songs sped up by ~6% (100* (2**(1/12) - 1): I know because
the pitch was raised by a semitone). The station that did it, though,
played the full version of the song ("Nights On Broadway" by the Bee
Gees), where the others were cutting it, so I called the DJ and thanked
him for doing what he was doing. His reply--"I don't know what the hell
you're talking about, but thanks!"
James Jonesron@brl-vgr.ARPA (Ron Natalie <ron>) (06/19/84)
Yes...WLPL in Baltimore actually was considering speeding up their new quartz turntables by changing the crystal to make them compatible to the hacks they did to their old turntable. The speed up was about 5% which also places the notes off of any of the perfect tunings. 70 minutes of music every hour! -Ron
rpk@mit-vax.UUCP (Robert Krajewski) (06/19/84)
I've noticed this too, mostly on top-40 format stations. I guess they can squeeze in more material that way. -- ``Bob'' (Robert P. Krajewski) ARPA: RpK@MC MIT Local: RpK@OZ UUCP: genradbo!miteddie!rpk or genradbo!miteddie!mitvax!rpk
blickstein@orphan.DEC (Dave Blickstein) (06/21/84)
This discussion of speeding up the music has solved a long-time mystery for
me. I often play guitar along with the radio, and quite often I've noticed
that songs are slightly out of tune. Now I realize that bands often don't
record at exactly A-440, but most bands do (with the advent of quartz tuners
this even more so). Many is the time I've tuned to the radio, and then
replayed the song on the record and it's not in tune.
There are companies that make equipment that digitally records an audio signal
and compresses it (leaves out some samples). This doesn't cause the key
to shift or timbres to change. I would thing that most sophisticated
radio stations would use such equipment but I guess most radio stations
are that sophisticated.
Dave Blickstein
(UUCP) {decvax, ucbvax, allegra}!decwrl!rhea!orphan!blickstein
(ARPA) decwrl!rhea!orphan!blickstein@Berkeley
decwrl!rhea!orphan!blickstein@SU-Shasta