Bsnpubs.com Both Sides Now Publications, newsletter
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A few years ago, when the compact disc celebrated its tenth anniversary, we all had a chance to stop and think about how far we've come in such a short period of time. Never before have we had such outstanding music reproduction quality, and this is particularly true of the CDs of the 1990s. With the search for session master tapes, and the modern noise suppression techniques, even the muddiest of records can sound passable, and many of the oldies are now available in a sound clarity and fidelity only dreamed of by record or tape purchasers of the 1970s. Never before have we had the ease of use provided by the CD, with both its small size and long playing time (almost 80 minutes per disc; with multi-disc players, we can easily get an uninterrupted 5 or more hours of individually programmed music without lifting a finger to change tapes or records). Small wonder the compact disc has revolutionized the music industry.
Looking back to the early 1980s, it's interesting to note that most of the music industry professionals seemed to take the imminent debut of the compact disc very lightly, as if the new little silver platters would be confined to popularity among the high-tech equipment junkies and electronic chipheads. A "niche market," to be sure, and not a very big one at that. Even those who were very optimistic about the CD's success probably didn't hope to dream of the total dominance we see today from this medium. But the success of the CD, it turns out, was probably as much of a marketing success as a technological one. Thanks to the miracle of 20/20 hindsight, we can now look back on the early days of the compact disc with a bit more objectivity. As part of the introduction to this edition of Oldies on CD, let's pause a moment... "and return to those thrilling days of yesteryear...."
