For-broadcast duping was a little bit less slipshod than mass-market duping but problems like you describe were still common. Acquire a few copies of a King Biscuit Flower Hour program from different places around the country and see how different the same program can sound. All the variables of multiple duper slaves, multiple record heads, multiple production cycles, etc. Plus again, duped radio stuff could be 4 or 5 generations removed from the master. Radio guys I knew in the early 90's were thrilled with CD-based syndication because the quality was so much better and more consistent vs. the duped tapes. Now I think everything is distributed by satellite or internet and it sounds like most of it is distributed in lossy-compressed formats to boot.
And radio stations were classic abusers of tape technology. Usually, especially by the 70's, the "tech" was a substance-addled hack and the tape machines were over-used and ill-maintained (the magnetic equivilent of a rented mule). Over the years, I've collected dozens of produced-on-site radio programs and the quality varies all over the map. The best stuff is amazing because it was produced under typically pretty primative conditions and worst stuff is awful.
-- Tom Fine
----- Original Message ----- From: "David Lennick" <dlennick@xxxxxxxxxxxx> To: <ARSCLIST@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> Sent: Saturday, February 23, 2008 12:49 PM Subject: [ARSCLIST] Tape problems, was Re: [ARSCLIST] Collection for sale
But London allowed itself to get into 4-track tape because they were impressed by the operations at United Stereo Tapes (Ampex's duping division). It says so right on the back ad in a 1959 High Fidelity issue (I've been going through a ton of these lately). It's in print, it must be true..heh heh.
Duped tape disasters weren't limited to 4-track consumer product. I remember the Cleveland Orchestra coming in on ten-inch reels with horrible sound and on more than one occasion, an entire channel missing. This was in the early 90s.
dl