0:00

Hey, it's Allan, and I just wanted to

0:02

let you know that you can now listen to the ongoing

0:04

history of new music early and add free

0:06

on Amazon music, included with

0:08

Prime. Back in the late nineteen seventies,

0:11

the BBC debuted a science education

0:13

show called Connections. The

0:15

host was James Burke, an affable

0:17

professor ish guy, usually dressed

0:20

in a beige polyester leisure suit,

0:22

who gave the term interdisciplinary a

0:24

whole new meeting. His

0:27

thing was to take disparate developments in

0:29

science and technology and show

0:31

how they were actually interconnected in ways

0:33

that led to our modern world. Nothing

0:35

he demonstrated existed in isolation

0:37

over the long term. One show

0:39

connected the invention of the canon to the first

0:42

movie project in the late eighteen hundreds There

0:44

were obviously a lot of steps in between, but

0:46

Burke was able to draw a very clear

0:48

line. Another demonstrated the

0:51

few degrees of separation between drinking

0:53

gin and tonics to astronomers discovering

0:56

the true sides of the universe. Kind

0:58

of a stretch, but he did it. Connections

1:01

remains one of my all time favorite

1:03

TV shows. And to be honest, more

1:06

than a little of this program is inspired

1:08

by the way James Burke was able to

1:10

tie things together. I've always

1:12

wanted to create a proper connections type

1:14

show, but it's been hard

1:16

because it requires so much

1:19

knowledge and research and analysis and

1:21

synthesis. And if

1:23

I'm honest, what you're about

1:25

to hear has taken years

1:27

to pull together. I hope

1:29

they can do Jamesburg justice. Here

1:32

is my attempt to create some connections

1:34

between rock music and some

1:37

seemingly unconnected inventions

1:39

events, and discoveries

1:42

from the past. This

1:44

is the ongoing history of new music

1:46

podcast with Alteryx. Okay.

2:03

We had to start with that. Stereo MCs and

2:05

connected from nineteen ninety two. Hello,

2:08

again, I'm Ellen Cross, and we're gonna

2:10

attempt to make some wild connections

2:13

leading from our music Back

2:15

to some decidedly non musical

2:17

things in the past. The goal is to give

2:19

you a completely different spin on

2:22

the origin stories of what

2:24

we listen to today. Let's start with

2:26

this. We have been using various

2:28

metals since ancient times.

2:30

As time passed, we learned how to fashion metal

2:33

into different shapes. If you could

2:35

afford it, you could acquire sheets of metal,

2:37

iron, brass, copper lead, or some kind

2:39

of old ally. These

2:41

sheets had been hammered flat and

2:44

these metal sheets were great for things like roofing

2:46

and shields and armor But

2:48

creating these things, these flat pieces

2:50

took a lot of time and a lot of muscle power.

2:53

There were attempts at mechanizing the process

2:55

as far back as Greece in the first century

2:57

AD. But it wasn't until the

2:59

late seventeenth century that milled

3:02

using the power of water were used

3:04

to flatten hunks of metal using

3:06

big rotating cylinders made of iron.

3:09

One of the best metals for flattening

3:11

turned out to be steel. A manufacturer

3:13

of which had started in England by about

3:15

sixteen fourteen. The best

3:17

source of raw materials came from iron

3:19

bars imported from Sweden. An

3:22

industry that was kickstarted by a slave trader

3:24

from France named Louis DeGear. By

3:26

the latter part of the eighteenth century,

3:28

a product called ten plate sheet

3:31

metal was being used for everything

3:33

from roofing to carriages. It was

3:35

cheap, lightweight, fire proof, and very

3:37

tough. And it could be pressed very

3:39

very thin so the edges had a

3:41

near razor like finish. Birmingham,

3:44

England became one of the centers of the British

3:46

industrial revolution. Largely because

3:48

of the textile industry in the city.

3:51

And as it became more mechanized, supporting

3:53

industries were needed. And that included a

3:55

newfangled thing called the steam engine, which

3:58

was also put to work in the mining industry

4:00

nearby. And where you have

4:02

mining, you have steel production. The

4:05

population of Birmingham increased as a

4:07

constant supply of labor was needed to work

4:09

in the factories, including the new

4:11

sheet metal plants and other fabrication

4:13

factories. Young men with little

4:15

prospects of higher education got jobs in

4:18

these factories, and that included Tony

4:20

Iomi, a seventeen year old who dabbled

4:22

in the guitar. He tried

4:24

being a plumber, but the factory that

4:26

manufactured metal rings seemed to be a better

4:28

idea. At least at first. It

4:31

wasn't, and Tony wanted out, so

4:33

he gave his notice. On his

4:35

last day of work, A day he wanted to

4:37

skip, but his mother convinced him that it was

4:39

only proper that he worked out his commitment.

4:42

Tony was working on the line when

4:44

the accident happened. His

4:46

job was to take a piece of sheet metal,

4:48

make some welds, and then pass it on to someone

4:51

else. But on that last day, The

4:53

person who normally sent him the parts

4:55

to weld called in sick. So

4:58

Tony was reassigned to a huge press

5:00

that operated something like a guillotine.

5:03

Tony was very inexperienced on

5:05

the thing. And as he was trying to

5:07

work it, the press came down as

5:09

Tony's right hand was in the way.

5:11

I quote. Bang, it came

5:13

down. It just took the

5:15

ends off my fingers. I actually

5:17

pulled them off. As I

5:19

pulled my hand back, it sort of pulled them

5:21

off. I was left with two

5:23

stocks, the bones sticking out on the top

5:25

of the finger. Went to the hospital

5:27

and they cut the bones off and said, well, you

5:29

might as well forget about playing the guitar.

5:32

But his foreman felt bad that the

5:34

accident might have ended Tony's ability

5:36

to play the guitar. So

5:38

this foreman played Tony a recording

5:40

by guitarist, Django Reinhart.

5:43

Reinhardt had suffered terrible burns

5:45

to his hand, leaving him with just two

5:47

workable fingers, yet he became

5:49

a master of the guitar. That

5:52

inspired Tony to keep going,

5:53

but it was painful. To

5:56

get around that problem, he fashioned a couple of

5:58

plastic thimble from a bottle

6:00

of dishwashing soap and wrap

6:02

them in leather from an old leather jacket.

6:05

That helped but didn't solve the problem. First,

6:07

he couldn't feel the strings through the thimble, which

6:09

meant he had to press down very very

6:11

hard. Second, soloing

6:13

became tough. So he concentrated on

6:15

playing heavy power chords. And

6:18

third, he couldn't bend standard

6:20

guitar strings very well. So he

6:22

strung his guitar with Banjo

6:24

strings. And to make things even easier,

6:26

he tuned his guitar so that the

6:28

strings were quite loose. Technically, his

6:31

guitar was tuned down low to c

6:33

sharp. Put this all

6:35

together and you have the distinctive

6:37

guitar sound that made his band Black

6:39

Sabbath, Famous. It was

6:41

heavy, it was sinister, it was powerful.

6:44

And the Sabbath sound went

6:46

a long way to creating the sound of heavy

6:48

metal as we know it today. A

6:51

little more than ten years after Sabbath really

6:53

took hold, A new generation

6:55

of Sabbath inspired and metal adjacent

6:57

bands started to emerge out of the

6:59

Pacific Northwest. Many

7:01

of them had guitarist that

7:03

copied Tony's no

7:05

finger's tuning, that drop

7:07

d or in Tony's case drop c sharp,

7:10

became the foundation of brunch.

7:12

Here's an example. Hey.

7:30

Nirvana's heart shaped box recorded

7:32

using a drop d tuning inspired

7:34

by the sound of Tony Iomie's black

7:36

Sabbath guitar, which was

7:39

directly caused by an industrial accident

7:41

involving sheet metal. See

7:43

all the connections that were involved? Okay.

7:46

Let's try another. This one involves

7:48

oil. Oil was

7:50

first discovered in Pennsylvania in

7:52

eighteen fifty nine. At the time, nobody

7:54

really knew what petroleum could be used for,

7:56

but it did burn and oil

7:58

was slippery. There might be

8:00

other uses too. The result was

8:02

the Pennsylvania oil rush, which was

8:04

centered around the town of Titusville, in

8:06

the far northwest part of the state.

8:09

This was the start of the modern

8:11

oil industry. Company started

8:13

drilling wells everywhere. In

8:15

eighteen seventy, standard oil, run

8:17

by John d Rockefeller, one of the richest

8:19

people in modern history, was

8:21

calling the shots and generating mountains

8:23

and mountains of cash. The entire

8:26

Rockefeller family benefited greatly

8:28

and there were a great many heirs and heiresses

8:30

who inherited fortunes. As

8:33

standard oil got bigger and bigger, a young

8:35

man in basal Switzerland was mourning the

8:37

death of his parents. With nothing

8:39

to keep him in Europe, Adolph Rickenbacher

8:41

moved to America, landing in New York

8:43

City, and then moving to a more permanent

8:45

home in Columbus, Ohio. And that's

8:47

where he met Charlotte. Charlotte

8:49

was tangled up somewhere in the

8:52

Rockefeller family tree and as such was one

8:54

of those many heiresses of the standard

8:56

oil fortune. In other words,

8:58

Adolf married into money, a lot of

9:00

it. The company lived in Illinois for a bit

9:02

before moving to California in nineteen

9:04

eighteen. Despite having no

9:06

problems with cash, Adolph

9:08

insisted on having a day job as a machinist

9:10

and an engineer. When he opened his own

9:12

machine shop, Charlotte worked as

9:14

the stenographer. At the

9:16

same time all this was going on, the

9:18

United States was sinking its hooks into the

9:20

Kingdom of Hawaii, which it

9:22

had enacts following the overthrow of Queen

9:24

Lily Ukuleani in eighteen ninety

9:26

three. Within a few years, there

9:28

was a craze on the mainland

9:30

for all things Hawaiian. Mean,

9:32

new American territory? Alright.

9:34

Let's let's see what they got. This

9:36

included the Yuculele and

9:38

something called the Spanish guitar. Which

9:40

had been introduced to Hawaii by Spanish

9:42

and Mexican sailors before the annexation.

9:45

The native Hawaiians repurposed

9:47

the Spanish guitar preferring to

9:49

play it vertically as we do

9:51

today rather than laying flat in your

9:53

lap. By nineteen fifteen, the

9:55

now renamed Hawaiian guitar

9:57

was all the rage in certain sectors of

9:59

America. One person who was

10:01

intrigued was adult rickenbocker.

10:03

With the money from the machine shop

10:05

and Charlotte's standard oil

10:07

inheritance, and his partner George Beauchamp

10:09

and a couple of other guys, they started

10:11

making Hawaiian guitars. The

10:14

problem though was that they were too quiet

10:16

if anyone who was gonna hear these newfangled things, they

10:18

had to be louder. So

10:20

together with a partner named George Beecham and

10:22

a violent repairman named John

10:24

DePiro, they worked to create

10:26

a louder Hawaiian guitar. Beacham

10:30

had a wild jay Gatsby type wearing

10:32

twenties cousin named Teddy Kleinmeier,

10:34

Teddy was just twenty one, and he had

10:36

just inherited a million dollars from

10:38

his rich rancher daddy who

10:40

also had interests in the oil market.

10:42

And Teddy was doing his absolute best

10:45

to blow all this money. When

10:47

he heard what Beacham was doing, he gave him a check

10:49

for twelve thousand five hundred dollars. And

10:51

that helped create the national string

10:54

instrument company, which got down to

10:56

business of making guitars. Okay.

10:59

Hang on. Back up. Before we can

11:01

move on to the inevitable invention of the

11:03

electric guitar, we have to go

11:05

someplace else. Somebody had to

11:07

invent electronics. First,

11:09

America needed access to electricity.

11:11

The electrification of America a story in

11:13

itself was a major deal

11:15

in the early twentieth century.

11:17

Then in nineteen eleven, lead the

11:20

forest unveiled the vacuum

11:22

tube, which could make electrical signals

11:24

stronger. This is the very

11:26

foundation of what would become known

11:28

as an amplifier. And

11:31

third, somebody needed a way to

11:33

turn an amplified electric

11:35

signal back into sound. And in

11:37

nineteen twenty one, generally

11:39

electric and AT and T created

11:41

the speaker. Electricity, the

11:43

vacuum tube, and the speaker all

11:45

first came together with the introduction

11:47

of the radio. Amplifiers

11:49

and speakers were then used for

11:51

PA systems and sound systems for theaters.

11:54

This technology attracted the attention

11:56

of Adolph Rickenbacher and George Beacham,

11:58

They came up with the idea of using

12:01

electricity to amplify the

12:03

vibration of the steel strings

12:05

of their Hawaiian guitar. The

12:07

major breakthrough was a pickup, which

12:09

was nothing more than a magnet with a

12:11

copper wire wrapped around it. When the

12:13

metal strings were strummed, they

12:15

vibrated through the electrical field of the pickup,

12:18

creating an electrical signal which

12:20

traveled down a wire to an amplifier

12:22

filled with vacuum tubes which in

12:24

turn made the signal louder and transmitted

12:26

everything to a speaker which turned those

12:28

signals back into sound. And

12:30

this was the birth of the electric

12:32

guitar. And that's how you can

12:34

link the discovery of oil in Pennsylvania.

12:37

It was on like this. Back

12:40

outside. One sound

12:53

garden with a song based on the electric

12:55

guitar, which was made possible by the

12:57

inheritances of a couple of people more than a

12:59

hundred years ago. More connections on

13:01

the way and wait until you'll hear how rock

13:03

was indirectly birthed out of

13:05

World War two. I call

13:07

this episode connections, And

13:09

yes, it is modeled after that BBC Science

13:11

and History Show of the same name hosted by James

13:13

Burke. I'm trying to draw together

13:15

some seemingly random historical

13:18

events to show how everything is

13:20

connected and how these connections

13:22

created our music. I'm

13:24

gonna spend some time on how World War

13:26

II led to the birth of Rock and Raw. Before

13:29

the war, jazz was the

13:31

thing, specifically the big band sound.

13:33

These were orchestras of ten or more

13:35

people led by a big name. Paul

13:37

Whiteman, Tommy Dorsey, Minnie Goodman, and so

13:39

on. The star of the big

13:41

band era was the band

13:43

leader. Everyone in the orchestra, including

13:45

any featured singer, was

13:47

merely an employee who did

13:49

exactly what the band leader ordered.

13:51

It was all very very rigid. When

13:53

the war started, big bands started to

13:56

suffer. Many players were drafted into the

13:58

military, making it harder to find

14:00

musicians to fill spots in the orchestra.

14:02

The dance halls where the bands used to play started

14:04

closing down. And even if there

14:06

was a hall that needed a band, gasoline

14:09

rationing made touring difficult and expensive.

14:12

Meanwhile, some of the more ambitious musicians had

14:14

grown tired of taking orders from the band

14:16

leader. After a gig, they'd all

14:18

congregate together some place to jam

14:20

These were long nights of improvisations where

14:22

you were challenged to show exactly how good

14:24

of a player you were. The

14:26

result was a splintering of the jazz

14:28

sound into something that became known as

14:30

Bebop, experimental, very

14:32

complex virtuosity made

14:34

by musicians, four musicians.

14:37

one thing was for sure, you could not

14:39

dance to this stuff because there was

14:41

often no discernible beat

14:43

or sing along to any melody because there

14:45

often wasn't one. This was just

14:47

fine by these jazz guys. Their

14:49

goal was to take jazz into a completely

14:52

different direction, which they did.

14:54

Charlie Parker, Sunny Rollins, Dexter Gordon,

14:57

Miles Davis, dizzy Gillespie

14:59

thelonious monk, their work

15:01

helped put the nail in the coffin

15:03

of the big bands. At

15:05

the same time, all this was happening, there

15:07

was a crippling strike ordered by the

15:09

American Federation of Musicians. It's

15:11

president, a guy by the name of

15:13

James Petrillo. Was outraged at

15:15

how American record companies were paying

15:17

out royalties. So as of

15:19

July thirty first nineteen forty

15:21

two, right in the middle of the war, no

15:24

union musician was allowed to make

15:26

any records for any record

15:28

company. This

15:30

obviously made an possible for anyone

15:32

associated with a big band to make a living. You

15:34

can still play live on the radio, but you couldn't sell

15:36

any records. And really how many slots were

15:38

there available for big band performances on a

15:40

radio station? Plus, you couldn't play any gigs because

15:42

the dance halls were closing down. And if you couldn't get

15:44

a gig, could you find enough people to fill over

15:46

positions in the orchestra? And how

15:48

many guys and they were almost always

15:50

guys? We're moving on to the

15:52

growing bebop scene. Meanwhile,

15:54

big band singers which

15:57

remember were employees of the big

15:59

band leaders were not

16:01

obligated by the union to strike.

16:03

And this is because they were

16:05

singers, not musicians. Interesting

16:08

loophole. This meant that they were

16:10

free to step out on their own, which they

16:12

did. And many of them became

16:14

stars as solo performers, a

16:16

very new thing for the time. And names

16:18

included Bing Crosby and Frank

16:20

Sinatra and Pericoma all

16:22

former big band singers. They were

16:24

no longer props for the orchestra leader.

16:26

They were stars and personalities unto

16:29

themselves. The strike

16:31

got more complicated without going too

16:33

much into the weeds They were a

16:35

bunch of loopholes. A singer could

16:37

record a song acapella. No

16:39

musicians. Right? Or they could

16:41

record a foreign song not

16:44

registered with ASCAP, the main

16:46

performing rights organization at the time.

16:48

Not covered by the agreement, not covered by

16:50

the strike. ASCAP

16:52

also did not consider country

16:54

musicians, western performers, and

16:56

RMBS to be real

16:58

musicians. As a

17:00

result, they were not covered by any

17:02

prohibitions, so they were free to do their

17:04

thing. And in the absence of

17:06

big bands, These sounds

17:08

began to spread very fast. I mean, what else were

17:10

you going to listen to? Radio

17:12

stations change too in a couple of important

17:15

ways. First, local American stations were

17:17

allowed to have local programming

17:19

after seven PM. Some

17:21

had live performances, but

17:23

it became much more cost effective to have the

17:25

announces play records instead

17:27

of introducing livebacks. This

17:30

is how some imported orchestral music made it on

17:32

the air, but it also made room for

17:35

country, western, hillbilly, and R and

17:37

B records. People

17:39

started to hear other genres on the radio

17:41

for the very first time, bogey bogey,

17:43

jump blues, swing, gospel,

17:46

spirituals, a whole new melting pot of

17:48

sounds, was created and disseminated through the radio

17:50

as a result of the big band problems

17:52

and the musician strike.

17:54

These sounds began to mix and mutate

17:57

and was this kind of thing America needed

17:59

to help put the trauma of the first half

18:01

of the nineteen forties behind them.

18:03

Long story short, This mingling of

18:05

new sounds indirectly caused by World

18:08

War two and the Musician Strike

18:10

created the conditions for the birth of

18:12

Rock and Roll. I want to reflect on this a little

18:14

bit more, but let's contemplate all the disparate

18:16

factors that went into eventually creating

18:18

music. It sounds like this. Here's

18:31

another connection that I find fascinating. In

18:34

nineteen twelve, a ten year old boy

18:36

named Jim fell off a wall and

18:38

hit his head. It

18:40

was okay except that his right

18:42

eardrum broke and his hearing on that

18:44

side was never the same. Fast

18:46

forward to nineteen forty one, German

18:48

Lufthansa tried to bomb Britain into submission

18:50

with a campaign known as the blitz.

18:52

And Jim, now thirty eight, had been

18:54

excused for military service because of

18:56

his bad ear. One night

18:59

during that year, the air raid warnings

19:01

went off. And Jim found himself

19:03

waiting things out at his mother's Visiting

19:05

that night was Jin Mohan, a

19:07

friend of mom, staying with her

19:09

was her sister Mary. Jin and

19:11

Mary had known each other casually for

19:13

some time, but that night, they really

19:15

got to know each other. Bombs falling, you

19:18

know, emotions running strong, whatever.

19:20

They fell in love, and after short

19:22

engagement, they were married on April fifteen, nineteen

19:24

forty one. Then on June eighteenth

19:27

nineteen forty two, they had a son. They

19:29

named him James Paul

19:31

McCartney. Had Jim not

19:33

fallen off that wall in nineteen twelve

19:35

and ruined his hearing, he would have been drafted

19:37

into the army and had the

19:40

LIFTWAF not bombed Liverpool that

19:42

night in nineteen forty one, he would have

19:44

never had a chance to get to know Mary so

19:46

well. And if that hadn't happened, there

19:48

would have never been a son. And without that

19:50

son, no beetles. Think

19:52

of a backwards. Here's

20:11

one more story about how World War two led

20:13

to the creation of her music. Between the start of

20:15

the war in nineteen thirty nine and nineteen

20:17

fifty seven, all men between the

20:19

ages of eighteen to forty one

20:21

were expected to report for national service

20:24

in Britain. Many were sent to fight in

20:26

the nineteen forties, and even after the war was

20:28

over, young men were required to do

20:30

their duty. However, that

20:32

obligation officially came to an end in

20:34

nineteen fifty seven. Anyone

20:36

born on or after October first

20:38

nineteen thirty nine was now

20:40

exempt. And that meant that the young man in

20:42

a new group called the quarryman wouldn't have

20:44

to worry about going into the army, so all they kept

20:46

at it. John Lennon was born in

20:48

October nineteen forty, so he scraped

20:50

and future beetle ringo star was

20:53

born on July seventh nineteen

20:55

forty. And in November nineteen

20:57

sixty, when compulsory service ended

20:59

altogether, all four members of the Beatles

21:01

managed to avoid going

21:03

into the army. But there's

21:05

more. Without having to worry about going into

21:07

the military and with time on their hands, untold

21:10

thousands of young British men

21:13

started picking up guitars and

21:15

forming bands. In just a

21:17

Liverpool area alone, there were more than four

21:19

hundred bands regularly playing around ten

21:21

by the summer of nineteen sixty one.

21:23

And in London, that number was much

21:26

much higher. After a couple of

21:28

years, the Beatles broke through. British

21:30

music took off and the British invasion

21:32

of North America started. All

21:34

in large part to the end of national

21:36

service, the United Kingdom. Back

21:54

in a moment with a couple of more seemingly

21:56

random connections that ended up making

21:58

our music possible. I have a couple

22:00

more connection stories before we're done, and

22:02

this one involves a line that runs through

22:04

from the discovery of aluminum

22:08

to sky. Aluminum is one of

22:10

the most important elements we know. It's

22:12

abundant, stable, light, strong,

22:14

impervious to rust, reflects light, and could be used

22:16

for a million different things. The

22:18

ancient Greeks knew about aluminum at

22:20

least twenty five hundred years ago, but

22:22

it wasn't until eighteen twenty four that

22:24

a Danish physicist named Hans

22:26

Christian Ørsted, figured out how

22:28

to produce aluminum metal. It was

22:30

an arduous process, and for a

22:32

while, a hunk of aluminum was actually worth more

22:35

than But by eighteen

22:37

eighty nine, an efficient way of creating

22:39

aluminum was discovered, and that

22:41

required the purification of a mineral

22:43

called bauxite. It

22:45

turns out that Jamaica contained some

22:47

of the largest known deposits of

22:49

bauxite anywhere on the planet. And in

22:51

the early nineteen fifties, bauxite

22:53

mining began in the country and

22:55

exported by the Reynolds Metal Company.

22:57

Other companies like Alcan and Kaiser also

22:59

moved in, and the first shipment out

23:01

was nineteen fifty two. But this

23:03

kind of wide scale mining had

23:05

some serious social effects.

23:07

Farmland was expropriated, and people were

23:09

kicked off their land. Thousands of

23:11

Jamaicans were displaced from the countryside and

23:14

moved into the cities, especially the

23:16

capital of Kingston. The Ghettos

23:18

expanded with many, many unemployed

23:20

and people. This

23:23

exacerbated the already wide class division

23:25

between the island's British colonial masters and

23:27

its native inhabitants. With

23:29

live bands at a region, nobody could afford

23:31

them. Jamaican's developed sound

23:33

system culture. These were portable

23:35

DJ setups, mobile discodes

23:37

if you That were set up in open spaces called wands

23:40

every weekend. These sound

23:42

system crews and there were many of them all competing

23:44

fiercely with one another for

23:46

attention. Would find new ways to get the party started

23:48

and to keep it going with Calypso, Soul

23:50

Music, and American Blues and R

23:52

and B. Starting in about late

23:54

nineteen fifty nine, This mix of music began coalesce into something

23:56

with a distinctive Jamaican sound.

23:59

Long story short, it was Nicknames

24:01

Scott. In nineteen sixty two, Jamaica

24:03

became an independent nation, and this new

24:05

sky music was exactly what the country needed.

24:07

It was good time music and

24:09

it was homegrown. Meanwhile,

24:13

Britain was suffering a labor shortage

24:15

and decided to make it easier for citizens

24:17

of the Commonwealth to immigrate to the home country.

24:20

A lot of people in Jamaica took the

24:22

British government up on their offer, and of

24:24

course, they brought their music with

24:26

them. By nineteen sixty four, the Jamaican

24:28

diaspora in Britain was being so service

24:30

by at least three record labels that brought

24:32

music from home. Eventually, it was

24:34

discovered by white kids, especially those

24:36

identifying as mods, and

24:38

spread the sounds even further. The

24:40

big breakthrough was a worldwide

24:42

hit by Milly Small called My

24:44

Boy Lollipop. Produced by Englishman,

24:46

Chris Blackwell, and distributed through his

24:48

brand new island records label.

24:50

After a brief burst of popularity,

24:53

Ska, also known as BlueBeat, receded

24:55

for a couple of decades until it was

24:57

discovered by some white kids from Coventry

24:59

who gave this working class music from

25:01

Jamaica a new twist by adding working

25:03

class punk from England. And

25:06

we've been skanking ever since.

25:21

The specials with

25:24

concrete jungle from nineteen seventy nine.

25:26

For two years, Skaw was one of the biggest

25:28

sounds of the UK, but it burned

25:30

out in the early nineteen eighties.

25:33

However, Scott never went away and

25:35

has popped up again and again and again

25:37

over the last forty years. And it

25:39

remains one of the most popular and

25:41

universal sounds in the world today.

25:43

And to think it all started with the

25:45

discovery that you could make aluminum from

25:47

bauxite, and the best box I

25:49

was in Jamaica. One

25:51

more connection story. It involved

25:53

a convoluted route to modern musical

25:55

recordings that involves fingers being burned

25:57

by cigarettes. I know.

26:00

It begins with a New Jersey inventor

26:02

named Oberland Smith who usually

26:04

made machine tools. After seeing his

26:06

first photograph in eighteen seventy eight, the

26:08

year after Thomas Edison unveiled the

26:11

thing, Overland became fascinated with

26:13

the idea of recorded sound. His

26:16

idea was to create permanent magnetic

26:18

impressions on a cotton or

26:20

silk thread that was

26:22

embedded with either steel dust or clippings

26:24

of wire. Those bits of metal could be

26:26

then magnetized to hold audio

26:28

information. It was totally theoretical.

26:30

No working unit was ever built, but

26:32

the concept was sound.

26:34

Other people saw

26:36

his treaties in a technical journal and took up

26:38

the cause. And for years, various

26:41

people applied his principles to either a

26:43

long roll of or spool of

26:45

steel tape. Neither worked very

26:47

well and they weren't very practical. Then

26:50

came FritzFlumer, Smokers

26:52

he discovered had a problem. If

26:54

they forgot they had a cigarette in their

26:56

hand, it would eventually burn all the way down

26:58

to the knuckles. Ouch. So,

27:01

Fluid came up with a solution.

27:03

He developed a process for putting

27:05

metal stripes on cigarettes

27:08

so that they would only burn down so far.

27:10

So no more scarred knuckles.

27:12

And as an engineer, Fritz

27:15

was also aware of the various experiments involving

27:18

magnetic recording using wires. His

27:20

idea was to take what he learned with

27:23

cigarette foil and apply it to the

27:25

problem. In nineteen twenty seven, he

27:27

created a very thin paper strip that

27:29

was coated with iron oxide and

27:31

held to the paper with locker. A

27:33

patent was granted the following year. And in

27:35

nineteen thirty two, he licensed the rights to

27:37

his invention, which he called the Magnetafone.

27:40

And in nineteen thirty five, the machine had its

27:43

debut at the Berlin Radio Show.

27:45

However, because of political tensions,

27:48

and here's where we get into War two again. The

27:50

Germans kept this technology secret.

27:52

The Nazis confused the

27:54

allies during the war by broadcasting

27:56

long performances by orchestras hours and

27:58

hours and hours without anybody taking a break.

28:00

How is this possible? The

28:03

Nazis also broadcast different speeches by Hitler

28:06

simultaneously from different

28:08

cities. Hours and hours and hours and

28:10

speeches, how is that possible?

28:13

And where was the Fuhrer? It was only

28:15

after the war when major Jack Mullen,

28:17

who was helping mop up after

28:20

the Nazis, discovered a couple of

28:22

these magnetic tape machines at a secret

28:24

broadcast post. He got

28:26

permission to take the gear back to the US,

28:28

which he could do because all the patents

28:30

the Germans had were made invalid by the

28:32

war. So Mullen disassembled

28:34

everything, shipped at home

28:36

and set up a company devoted to exploiting this new technology

28:38

based out of San Francisco.

28:40

One day during a failed demonstration to

28:42

somebody in the film industry,

28:44

An assistant to Bing Crosby happened to

28:47

see what was going on and

28:49

relayed details of the new machine to his

28:51

boss. Remember, Bein Crosby had

28:53

once been a big band employee, but

28:55

was set free as a result of the musician

28:57

strike in nineteen forty

28:59

two. Bing had become a big time solar

29:01

radio star. The problem

29:03

was that he'd have to broadcast his

29:05

show twice. Once on the East Coast,

29:08

and another three hours later for all those on the West

29:11

Coast. He realized that this magnetic

29:13

tape machine would solve all

29:15

these problems. He could just tape his East Coast show

29:17

and call it a day. So that means

29:19

he could be doing more of what he wanted to

29:21

do instead of having to hang around the studio

29:23

and do the show again. And

29:25

Bing really wanted to spend time

29:28

golfing. Bing was so

29:30

interested in the new machine that he dropped

29:32

fifty thousand dollars, more than six hundred

29:35

thousand dollars in today's money, so Mullen

29:37

could perfect his machine. And the

29:39

result was the AMPX two hundred

29:41

reel to reel tape recorder. For

29:43

the first time ever,

29:45

recorded performances could be

29:47

edited, and thanks to the work of guitarist

29:49

and tinkerer Les Paul it

29:51

was possible to overdub parts on previously made

29:54

recordings. This changed

29:56

music forever. Before magnetic

29:58

tape, the purpose of a recording session

30:00

was to capture a live performance as accurately

30:02

as possible. You wanted to preserve

30:05

reality. But with

30:07

magnetic tape, You could improve

30:09

on reality, creating recordings

30:11

that could never be performed live

30:13

in real life. And recording

30:15

technology has never been the

30:17

same since. Oh, and one more

30:19

connection. The extra time, the

30:21

reel to reel machine allowed Bing Crosby to

30:23

spend on the golf course, eventually

30:25

inspired him to create new things

30:27

for golf Thanks to the

30:29

reel to reel machine, he was able to

30:31

invent the pro celebrity golf

30:33

tournament, turning him into the

30:35

original fundraising pop

30:37

singer. Here's just something that probably had close to two hundred

30:39

different tracks, all mixed together, and it was all

30:41

made possible by a guy who wanted to keep people from

30:43

having their fingers burned

30:45

By their smokes? History

31:03

is such a funny thing. It zigs and

31:05

zags and gets all tangled up and interconnected

31:07

in ways that are hardly obvious.

31:09

It's only when we stumble across

31:12

weird between people and events and technologies and

31:14

accidents that you realize that

31:16

everything really is connected in strange and

31:18

wonderful ways. I

31:20

know there has to be more of these weird

31:22

connections that ended up creating various

31:24

aspects of our music world. So I'm gonna keep

31:26

looking for them. And when I've discovered

31:28

enough, we'll do a program like this

31:30

again. Meanwhile, you should work on catching up with

31:32

the ongoing history archives. There are hundreds of

31:34

podcasts available. All free and available from any

31:36

podcast platform you choose to

31:38

patronize. Please, enjoy. I'm always

31:40

looking around Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and

31:42

TikTok. You can look for me there. And there's my website at

31:44

journallood musicalthings dot com, which is updated

31:46

every single day. Get the free daily newsletter

31:48

too. Oh, and we can always have an offline

31:50

conversation through Allan and Allan

31:52

Cross. Ca. Textbook production is by

31:54

Rob Johnston. We'll talk to you next time. I'm

31:56

Ellen Cross. You've been listening to

31:58

the ongoing history of new music

32:00

podcasts about across.

32:03

Subscribe to the podcast through iTunes,

32:05

Google Play, Stitcher, Spotify,

32:07

and everywhere you find your favorite

32:10

podcasts.