[Scott Dorsey]

In article , Mike Rivers wrote:
is relatively quiet, with a lower maximum level before distortion, you
have less dynamic range available. You may think that's not a big deal
since most pop music is cut with less than 6 dB of dynamic range, but
they do that so they can take advantage of the maximum level and make
everything loud. But try to do that close to the center of the disk, and
you end up with distortion.

Back in the Disco era, people went to clubs where they listened to systems
with huge horn-loaded speakers that had a lot of thumpy bass and coupled
into the room and made everything vibrate. This was necessary since they
were out of their mind on cocaine and their perception of low frequencies
was impaired.

The DJ or Disquere in a big club like Studio 54 would have the turntables
isolated in a sand table, but in cheaper places there would often be feedback
problems from the room vibration being coupled into the turntables.

Because of this, DJs wanted discs with greater and greater bass excursion.
These were LPs, so limiting didn't really get you any loudness the way it
did with a CD which is amplitude-limited. The LP was rate-limited
mechanically, so all you could do was try and cut hotter and faster.

This made it VERY difficult to cut with low linear velocity. You couldn't
cut close to the center at all. So guys would be cutting 12" singles were
half the record surface was empty because they wanted to get those outer
grooves and they wanted to hit them as loud as possible.

You'll still see a lot of dance and DJ records cut this way. You'll see
12" singles cut at 45 rpm for more linear velocity and the ability to get
even louder.

I don't cut discs like that anymore.
--scott
--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."