AFTER THE WAR

The war years and their aftermath spurred on some technical developments in the recording industry. Some ideas never really took off, such as an early precursor to MP3s where jukeboxes were wired to a phone line through which customers requested songs that a DJ would then play over the line (and through the jukebox speaker.) There were also video-jukeboxes called Soundies, which were quite popular for a few years, but disappeared by the 50s. (Their staged vignettes interspersed with footage of singers and bands lip-synching their hits followed the same formula used by most music videos today.) But the most important changes were in technology: the more advanced plastics and engineering developed in the war were quickly applied to most manufactured consumer goods.
Hi-Fi audio, for example, owes its origins to the British Navy’s invention of wider-frequency recording machines used in ships during wartime to analyze the sound of submarine propellers to detect which ones were the enemy’s. The Decca label was the first to use this technology after the war, and they marketed it with the letters “ffrr” printed on record labels, meaning “full frequency range recording.”
Another important invention were V-Discs, which were like radio transcription discs (16 inches, 33 RPM) but made of sturdier plastic, recorded and pressed by the state-created Victory Disc Record Company in the US. Sets of 20 such discs, totaling four hours of material, would be sent to overseas bases to entertain the troops. Though V-Discs were still not sturdy enough for many repeated listens, and therefore unfit to be a new consumer format, their advances were useful for the eventual development of LPs.
The return home of millions of soldiers fueled a huge economic boom that boosted the fortunes of the record industry along with most others. Sales finally surpassed 1920s levels, surging to 350 million units in the US alone in 1946 and 375 million in 1947. Labels small and large began rushing out their own versions of whatever hit songs were released on other labels, a practice that remained common until the mid-60s (presumably stopping after LP sales overtook those of 45s, since it was less feasible to make a cover version of a whole album.)
Capitol, MGM and Mercury emerged as new major labels after the war. Even though these weren’t immediately as big as RCA Victor, Columbia or Decca, they all had their own studios, A&R departments, pressing plants, and distribution networks. The formerly British-owned Decca became an American company as a result of the huge postwar debt Britain owed the US. “Albums” of new music began appearing at this time, usually presenting selections from a musical or opera or compiling past hits from current stars. They were basically cardboard binders holding two or more 78s, with artwork on the front and sometimes liner notes on the inside front cover.
As in the early 1920s, the growing number of labels allowed for the exposure of an expanding number of new styles. Among them was an outgrowth from swing and jazz called “jump,” “jump blues” or “rhythm and blues,” a fast, high-energy music made for dancing that had a more prominent drumbeat than swing had. This music, along with the electric blues style pioneered by Mississippi bluesmen moving to Chicago after the war, led directly to rock and roll.
In pop music, by the late 40s the swing era begat the “sing era,” when the vocalists who were once token members of the big bands stepped forward to become the real stars (Frank Sinatra, Lena Horne etc.) Their sugary pop songs had a wide appeal, though white male jazz nerds remained fixated on the bands and star soloists who were just then pioneering bebop (smaller bands playing more complex music with more solos.) There was also a rediscovery of the “hot jazz” of the 1920s, forming perhaps the first real “retro” movement since recording began, accompanied by perhaps the earliest rare record collecting and specialized used-record stores.
But the most important post-war development was to help the be-boppers lay down their long jams for posterity, and help the nostalgics reissue their favourite hot jazz tunes on a single platter. That development, of course, was the LP.

THE INVENTION OF THE LP

The story of the long-playing 33 RPM record begins with chief researcher at CBS-Columbia, Peter Goldmark, a pretty smart guy who also invented colour television. His boss, Ed Wallerstein, had been at RCA Victor in the 30s when they invented the 33 RPM radio transcription disks. Wallerstein claims Columbia had planned to develop the LP in the 30s but was interrupted by the war.
Goldmark claims the LP was his personal initiative, and in any case attacked the problem of a longer-playing record with vigour. He used a “total engineering” approach that analyzed every component of the sound reproduction system, considering all possibilities and materials for everything from the needle and tonearm to the speakers and amplifiers to the record itself. Goldmark decided to focus on the main challenge—the spot where the needle sat in tiny grooves on the record—and worked outwards from there, arranging every other part of the overall machine so that it would function smoothly without causing the needle to wear out after repeated listens and skate across the groove like they did on transcription discs.
During the process, new materials for the needle and the record were tried and decided on, and in the end, new tonearms, motors, drives and wiring were designed. (Goldmark even ended up inventing the condenser microphone just so the full range of the new record could be exploited, although it turns out the Germans had also developed one. Goldmark also invented the modern speaker while he was at it, using elastically suspended cones and vented cabinets for the first time.) During the process, the speed of 33 RPM was retained, partly because it was fairly irrelevant (the eventual length of about 45 minutes per 12-inch record was set by fixing the width of the grooves), and partly because Columbia had for awhile been recording duplicates of their 78 RPM recording sessions at 33 RPM as well, so as to have material ready in case a consumer long-playing format ended up working out.
Victor and its Red Seal brand had long dominated the high-margin classical music field, although CBS-Columbia started hitting back in 1940 with their new Masterworks imprint. The LP was seen as a chance at cornering the whole classical market, and Wallerstein determined their length after listening to hundreds of operas and symphonies and concluding that 95% were no longer than 45 minutes.
However, Wallerstein later claimed to have been concerned that the LP wouldn’t have much use in the pop market, which was made up of two- or three-minute songs, and thought Columbia should unveil an improved version of the 78 as well. Either way, once the LP was ready, it was important to get it out there before Columbia’s competitors found out about it.
Launching the LP would take more effort than just inventing it, though. People would need a record player to play them on. Colombia wisely gave the major manufacturers all the plans they needed to start making record players for the new speed. At the same time, they designed an adapter, sold at cost, which would allow people to play LPs on their existing record players. Finally, while all these things were happening, Columbia had to completely redesign their pressing plants so as to mass-produce the new records.
Considering all this, it’s surprising that when the president of Columbia summoned the president of RCA Victor and his research team to his office for a chat, the RCA president had no clue that a new format was in the works. Remembering how earlier, heavily-patented long-player ideas by Edison never took off, Columbia decided not to patent the LP format, and hoped RCA Victor would help make it the new industry standard by using it, too. But the head of RCA, David Sarnoff, the former Titanic telegraph operator and radio pioneer, was outraged that “little Columbia” would have the gall to suggest that RCA Victor, the very inventors of radio and 78 RPM records, become a cheerleader for its competitor’s inventions. He is said to have chewed out his staff right in front of Wallerstein, hollering at them for not having thought of the LP first, and later ordering them to come up with something even better. The “Battle of the Speeds” had begun.

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