Here is some fun exotica music for your next jungle cruise. A 1951 Capitol records 78 album set:  Voice of the Xtabay by Yma Sumac with composition and orchestration by Leslie Baxter and Moises Vivanco.

I think Yma might have Mariah Carey beat for vocal range. She hits some amazingly high notes here.

Here’s a playlist of some Ray Kinney 78s I just got that were pressed on a sort of transluscent red “vinylite”on the Pilotone record label.

Here’s a few British records by Felix Mendelssohn. It was hard to find good discographical info online about these but I believe they were made between 1940 and 1943. I’m sure if you were living in Britain at that time a bit of Hawaiian escapism would have been a welcome distraction.

Decca Presents “Songs of Hawaii” Played by Ray Kinney and His Hawaiians. (1938)

I bought this album in Honolulu. These were the only 78s I found there on a trip in December. The cover and records were dusty and water dammaged, but the records actually cleaned up nice and sound pretty good. It was missing one record of the 5 and I recently found a replacement. So here is the complete album set!

As you can see I have rather sloppily stop the cover from decomposing completely with some packing tape… I know.. not the most archival way to save something, but at least the dust and mold wont be getting all over the records anymore..

There’s been some debate on facebook forums I follow about what the best playback methods are for 78s. Some people love acoustic machines. Some swear by vintage tube amps and electric turntables. Some want the most modern hi-fi equipment and computer processing. I think all of these ways have some benefits, but I suppose it’s subjective. It depends on what you think sounds good. But in the interest in science, I have recorded the same record with several methods for you to compare. This is not fully comprehensive. I am sure if you are really into this you may have some other players with better tone.. (Victor Credenzas are probably top of the line for acoustic playback for instance. I don’t have one of those) But in any case this may give you a general idea of the difference in sound of different playback methods.

First is a good old acoustic phonograph. This was made probably in the 30s. It’s my RCA Victor suitcase phonograph. I have recorded it with a decent stage microphone (you can see it on the left in the video) pointed directly into the “speaker” (technically there is a sort of horn under there)

Here’s an mp3 of that same acoustic playback:

Next let’s hear a 1950’s Wilcox Gay Recordio tube based analog electric phonograph playing it. This particular record player can actually make records too. But here it is outfitted with a medium tone steel needle for playback:

Now this is a modern turntable (a Numark TT200):

First with a regular 33rpm stylus:

Then with a Shure M78S stylus:

Then with a special order 3.5 mil stylus (wider than the m78s to pick up less of the surface noise at the bottom of the groove):

Now let’s hear that last version again but with soundsoap cleanup (soundsoap lets you adjust the levels of noise and click removal.. it’s something that you have to fiddle with to get the best results..):

Lastly, just one little thing. Some people worry about the wear on a 78 when played with a steel needle. I won’t deny that technically there IS wear. But I think one or two playbacks won’t hurt. (The important point is that you use a NEW steel needle with EVERY play. A worn needle WILL damage a record.) Here is a short clip with 2 samples. First is the 3.5 stylus before I played it with teh steel needle on the wilcox-gay machine. and the second is after. I don’t think you can hear a difference:

here is a playlist of all those so it’s easier to compare: