Ongoing History Daily: Weird album alert
I have a fondness for weird albums—and this one fits the bill perfectly. EasyJet, the British discount no-frills airline, had a weird marketing product back in 2017: An album filled with nothing but
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Ongoing History Daily: The MiniDisc is back?
In the late 90s, consumer electronics manufacturers were looking for a digital format to replace the cassette. One attempt was Sony’s MiniDisc, which debuted in 1992. Instead of using tape, the MiniDisc had
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Ongoing History Daily: Beck was initially embarrassed by “Loser”
“Loser” was the song that first brought our attention to Beck. When it arrived in 1993 as an indie single in the middle of the golden era of grunge, it immediately stood out
Read MoreOngoing History Daily: The story behind the Better Call Saul theme
When Breaking Bad ended, Better Call Saul stepped into the gap. When the show was greenlit, showrunner Vince Gilligan started looking for someone to write a theme song. He found his guy in
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Ongoing History Daily: When the star can’t make it, someone has to fill in
The show must go on, so when a member of the band (outside the singer, anyway) can’t perform for whatever reason, it might fall on the shoulders of a roadie to fill in.
Read MoreOngoing History Daily: Collecting cassettes? Stay away from these.
Pre-recorded cassettes first appeared in the mid-60s and reached their commercial peak in the mid-80s before slowly fading away over the next couple of decades. This brings me to the problem of the
Read MoreOngoing History Daily: More on the iTunes end-user license agreement
We’ve all been faced with end-user license agreements or “EULAs.” They come in the form of dialogue boxes that pop up when we’re installing new software or hoping to use a certain product
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Ongoing History Daily: A history of smashing instruments (part 1)
The smashing and destruction of instruments onstage has a long and storied history. If we have to trace it back to one person, it’s probably Pete Townshend of The Who, who, in a
Read MoreOngoing History: The birth of the teenager and its effect on rock
Up until the mid-20th century, there was no such thing as a “teenager.” You were a child, and then one day, you were declared an adult. There was no official in-between period. In
Read MoreOngoing History Daily: More interesting facts about vinyl, part 2
Here’s a fact about playing vinyl records. Do they sound consistently good all the way through? In other words, does the music sound as good nearer to the outside of the record as
Read MoreOngoing History Daily: More interesting facts about vinyl, part 1
The vinyl revival shows absolutely no sign of going away as LPs continue to outsell CDs and show double-digit growth year after year. Here are a couple of facts you may not know
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