Tuesday, July 13, 2010

Hi-Tone (60's? 70's?)

"In this modern era of television, radio and phonographs, little is heard of the old music box that thrilled the young and old of the '80's. The brilliant tones and colorful rendition of old familiar tunes skilfully punched on metal discs and played on the old music box, still preserve a rare entertainment quality unfamiliar to many of the present day generation"

This 10" is such a perfectly designed, simple object, right down to the large spaces between the identically sized bands. I love recordings of old mechanical instruments. Every other record I have presents a survey of different machines from a specific collection. This one is all recordings from the same kind of machine. This kind of music box uses metal discs that look like records, which are placed under a metal rod that holds several sets of "combs". I've only ever seen one at the Museé Mécanique in San Francisco.

1 comment:

  1. Man, I love the Musee Mechanique! It's great to get your fortune told by that one mechanized typewriter that blasts out some tips on your future and lets you take it home on a full sheet of paper.

    ReplyDelete