BMS2600 : The last Philips tape-based Background Music System

[@grahampaulkendrick7845]

No true Techmoan fan would ever settle for an abridged version. Matt makes the most intricate details fascinating.

[@mialemon6186]

I would consider the abridged videos for days when I'm severely pressed for time or energy but want to still enjoy some video content. I much prefer the longer videos though, even if it usually means I'm a week or two late (or more) seeing them. I'd consider it more a "preview" of the real video, something I could fill a few minutes with to get me thinking about the topic and excited to sit down for the full episode.

[@juanbrits3002]

I thinked it's for people that's pressed for time or either just getting new subscribers by a shorter form video to lure them in. Which is a good thing for Matt.

[@stephenproulx175]

you should check it out. its hilarious

[@LockeTheCole]

@@stephenproulx175 This! It's worth checking out after you've watched the full thing.

[@hugoromeyn4582]

@@stephenproulx175 HAHAHAHA!!! Yes it is!! LOL!

[@rafael-horacio]

Track 1: Samba Caliente - Horst Jankowski Track 2: No idea Track 3: Another Day in Paradise - Phil Collins Track 4: Sounds familiar, but nope Track 5: You Are - Lionel Richie Track 6: In the Navy - Village People Track 7: Ma Baker - Boney M Track 8: Love Machine - The Miracles Track 9: Don't Get Me Wrong - The Pretenders Track 10: Sacrifice - Elton John

[@juliawolf156]

Track 7 sounds more like Ma Baker but from K.K. Slider in Animal Crossing.

[@saaaaaaaar]

Track 4: Shazam says "Good Looking" (Parry Music)

[@Linkale_]

@@juliawolf156 I WAS GOING TO SAY THAT!

[@gabrielv.4358]

wow!

[@TerryClarkAccordioncrazy]

One thing you can be sure is that no Motorhead song will be butchered into background music.

[@JacGoudsmit]

As I've mentioned before, I'm also interested in Background Music, and I was involved in producing many BGM CD-i's between 1994 and 1995 while I worked at a company called Codim. I wouldn't be surprised if I heard some of the tracks of your tapes before while mastering the BGM CD's: We made about 10 productions every month, and a lot of those cover version tracks were re-used from time to time and used on many BGM discs, and probably tapes before that. I never visited Philips BMS but I know in "my time" they made each production by just recording the tracks onto a reel-to-reel tape recorder in real time. I'm not surprised to see that these cartridges are completely standard and the player uses a standard 4 track quarter-inch head. Very likely before they switched to CD's, they did all the mastering with standard reel-to-reel recorders with 4 track recording. They might have copied the tapes at 4x speed to save time. It must have been a pretty boring job to gather up all the music and sit around for probably a whole week or maybe even longer, listening to all that boring music that's pretty much meant to make you feel happy while you're shopping. It would drive me nuts to listen to all that music that almost sounds okay but not quite, because it was all intended to avoid paying royalties to the original artists by using cover versions. *Except for the "Soft Pop" production* -- that one had all original tracks and original artists! They were probably all artists under contract with Philips / Polygram of course, but anyway. I hope you'll fill us in on what music is on that Soft Pop tape once you get it; unfortunately you probably won't be able to play those tracks on KZbin and get away with it. For those who haven't heard the story before: This is how CD-i production of Background Music would work: The Philips BMS department combined 4 hours of mono music on a DAT tape, with 2 hours on the left channel and 2 hours on the right channel of a tape. We (at Codim) would a box of 10 DAT tapes each month, and it would take pretty much an entire week to process them. Most productions were two DAT tapes combined together, because CD-i was capable of fitting 8 hours of "FM Quality" audio per disc, encoded in ADPCM. We used a super fast (for those days) Compaq DeskPro PC with an 80386 at 40 MHz (if I remember correctly) to do the processing. The PC had a SCSI adapter and a huge hard disk of probably one or two Gigabytes, and it had a Sony DSP card that could record the analog outputs of the DAT recorders and convert the audio to ADPCM in real-time. My predecessor had written some software running under MS-DOS to do all this. I would start one program that would take care of recording the audio, and I would start the DAT tape to play the music. I would then go to my desk elsewhere in the building and work on other productions (my main job). Then 2 hours later I would have to remember to return to the BGM PC to turn the recording off. If I didn't, the hard disk would fill up and and I'd have to start over. The next step was to record another 2 hour tape to hard disk with the same program, and return in time, unless I was working on a short disc like Soft Pop which was only 4 hours and only showed up every 3 months or so. The next step was to run a program that would read all the data from the two stereo ADPCM files, and split it up into four mono ADPCM files. This didn't take long but of course took a lot of disk space. Once that was done, I had to delete the original files to leave enough space to do the rest of the processing. Then I would have to do a bunch of manual processing. I used a program that would play the mono ADPCM files and would detect silence, to verify the length of each track (compare it with a file on a floppy disk), and generate time codes. Sometimes especially on a quiet disc, the program got it wrong and I had to do a lot of manual editing. The next step was to combine the audio data into "Real Time Files" i.e. files that would be played in real time, using interleaved data. So the file would contain the data for one audio "track" in one sector, followed by the audio data for the second "track" in one sector, etc. Because the audio was compressed 8 to 1, each sector had enough audio data to play for the duration of exactly 8 sectors, while the disc was spinning at the normal speed of a CD player (75 sectors per second, and (in this case) 2324 bytes per sector). The Real Time File (RTF) and the specially formatted text file with track names and time codes would be combined with a CD-i player program and formatted into a disc image like an ISO file (only different). This could be written to a CD-R but we usually didn't bother: we just transferred it to a CD-i emulator to do some quick testing, and then made a master tape of it (Exabyte 8mm) to send to the factory. CD-R was very expensive at that time and usually, what we put on a BGM production wasn't really worth keeping and showing off. The only BGM CD's we made our own CD-R's of were Soft Pop, so we could play them in the office whenever there wasn't anything on the radio. It took all day to process one image file, and the whole box of DATs took a week. At the end of the week, we had about 5 or 6 disc images on tape that were sent to a mastering facility in Hannover Germany, and about a week later we would get a box of (I think) a few hundred pressed CD's back, with no labels or boxes, only sleeves. The box with CD's would go back to Philips BMS, who would distribute them to their subscribers. I don't know how often subscribers would get new discs but I know not all subscribers would get the same discs. They were probably usually subscribed to only one type of production like "Allegro" or "Mezzo" (those names were retained over many years) and while some of them might have gotten a new CD or two every month, some of them may only have gotten a new disc 4 times a year or so. Yikes! I would have hated to work in a store that would play the same 8 hours of "somebody else's problem" music every single day for 3 months. I would have loved to make my own background music CD's with my own music, to play in my house. Unfortunately I never got around to it and I never owned a CD-i player (or a BMS3000 CD-i Background Music player -- I hope you'll get one one day). But there were better ways to do that anyway: I could record CD's onto video tape, for example. But who wants to take the time to put 8 hours of music on a video tape? Not me so it never happened either.

[@billmyke746]

Thanks for sharing this, a superb comment.

[@ptonpc]

Thanks for this. A glimpse at how things were done.

[@skillaxxx]

So it used 8-bit mono ADPCM at 22KHz I guess ?

[@dethwiz]

I once spend several days filling up a VHS tape with 8-hours of music, and played the tape back once, so that was time well spend. My then brand new Hi-fi VHS machine (we are talking 1989) did not have a record-level controller, so some pieces of music was rather loud, while others were too low. Off course these days you can just make an 8-hour playlist on Spotify in a matter of minutes!

[@markjames8664]

That process is a lot more elaborate than I would have imagined.

[@j0hnf_uk]

I love anything like this. Not only the tech but the instrumental music aspect. It's rather a quirky thing, but there's something appealing about listening to these, 'easy listening', type tunes, especially as background music. The fact that most, if not all, are of well-known commercially available songs by well-known artists just adds to it. The great mystery being who are responsible for these renditions? You might be surprised.

[@bertroost1675]

The older I get the more I love this easy listening beautiful music. Look on youtube and you'll find reel to reel recordings people made off easy listening radio stations from the late 60's and 70's. Some even have the commercials. Great stuff!

[@AfferbeckBeats]

I'm guessing they either had an in-house team cranking them out, especially for the cheap 80s synth covers like Sting we heard on there. Or they just licensed them from the major library music companies.

[@nickwallette6201]

Somebody obviously took great care in performing, engineering, and mixing them. They’re balanced, punchy, and with way more detail and bass than a background music system deserves. It is obviously a labor of love or pride, knowing that nobody will ever hear it with the level of fidelity it was created to.

[@brandbryce]

Agree!

[@JeremySeitz]

My parents both worked on commercial music in Dallas, TX throughout the 70s and 80s. Often they were requested by companies to make familiar copies of popular tunes, scored for orchestra, and just clever enough not to get a copyright notice. They also built libraries of original instrumental music that could be licensed, these would sometimes show up in elevators, shops and hold music. It was fun to be somewhere and have my dad say "hey, that's one of mine.." and name all the musicians that he worked with and funny things that happened. I fear most of these things are lost, rotting on analog reel to reel, never to be recovered. When my dad passed my brother managed to save a bunch, but we don't know who owns the rights to them any more, they were made by a production house that no longer exists.

Despite it's lacking highs - which is expected - it's surprising how good it sounds listening to the direct feed recording on headphones. Very nice bass and mids.

@@arthurvasey .. or since this is a background music player it plays the tape at a very slow speed? My astonishment was going for this, that despite the artificial limitations it sounds surprisingly good.

[@keithkneeland6849]

Lack of highs in this case (lots of use) are either: Worn heads (increased head gap) Worn tapes Or both.

[@_-_Michael_-_]

Yes but that can be sayed about early taperecorders from 50s also. Just listen to some Les Paul late 40s early 50s sound on sound recordings. Yes there is some hiss, but mid and bass sounds as good as today. Considering using same type of acoustic intruments ofcourse.

[@LeftyPem]

Weak high-end response may be intentional. As someone who has worked in several large retail spaces, standard audio played through distant speakers tends to come across rather thin and tinny. By pre-equalizing the recordings to emphasize lower frequencies, you could improve the live playback experience.

[@video99couk]

@@keithkneeland6849 Other factors can include inaccurate head azimuth and poor magnetic retentivity.

[@VochoTalacha]

Track 3 = Another Day in Paradise - Phil Collins Track 6 = In The Navy - Village People Track 8 = Love Machine - The Miracles Track 9 = Don't Get Me Wrong - The Pretenders

[@MrDanJF]

Track 10 is Sacrifice by Elton John, Track 7 is probably Boney M but not sure which song?

[@felipesancho]

@@MrDanJF ma baker

[@BretMix]

The only one I recognized that hasn't been named: Track 5 is 'You Are' by Lionel Richie.

[@lcalvom]

@@MrDanJF Yup, it's Boney M's "Ma Baker"

[@JCWise-sf9ww]

Good music that's scarcely heard here in USA.

[@adampoll4977]

It's amazing how hard it is to identify a well-known track when all the joy and energy has been sucked out of it!

[@florianm3170]

... And imagine the poor musicians that had to put them together..... The producer: Ah no, it has to be softer, more nice, more unobtrusive, you know?

[@johnjacobs4280]

I love techmoan videos especially for the comments of people telling their stories about experiences they had or remember years ago about a lot of potentially obscure music recordings and whatnot. It’s cool cause otherwise I would never know this stuff without watching these videos and viewers combining their past experiences in these industries to explain the real origins of this stuff. I really love reading through the comments on this Chanel.

[@jayducharme]

Once you connected the line output, I was really impressed with the sound quality, especially given the age of the system and its tapes. And I'm glad you were able to get a hold of all those other cartridges. What a great find!

[@gordontaylor2815]

I'm thinking Mat should really make an effort to record the tapes (for preservation purposes if nothing else) and then try to find a LEGAL way to get the music released on a service like Pandora or Spotify - it's not like people WOULDN'T be interested in listening to that music...

[@caseyholford]

That end reveal is a perfect illustration of the saying “doesn’t hurt to ask!” Congratulations on finding the motherlode of background tunes.

[@drewdane40]

It makes perfect sense for the man who owns a collection of background music machines to proclaim the Austin Allegro "Britan's best car." You're a wild man. Don't ever change.

[@Spookieham]

I have a very strong suspicion I was a process engineer in a National Semiconductor factory in Greenock that made LM1894 chips on a 4 inch Fabrication line in the mid eighties. The date code is 8730 for week 30 of 1987. The wafer was then flown to Malaysia where it was sawn into individual dies and packaged into the black body with pins.

[@jtc1983tx]

I thought the same. Some of that music lines up with the 40th week of 1989.

[@Spookieham]

I've tried the reference for SM8730. M is packaged in Malaysia and S says a foundry in China but pretty certain they didn't have fabs in Asia then : Greenock was the only non-US fab.

[@davidrasthammar1057]

Tracks 3, 6, 7, 8, 9 and 10 were easy to recognize. They are: 3. Phil Collins - Another day in paradise. 6. Villige People - In the navy. 7. Boney M - Ma Baker. 8. The Miracles - Love Machine. 9. The Pretenders - Don't Get Me Wrong. 10. Elton John - Sacrifice.

[@carlhartwell7978]

Yep, got most of those you mentioned. Tracks 1 and 5 are really irritating me! Especially 5 27:44 I've a feeling it was a theme tune for something (Likely US, probably early mid 80's) though it's entirely possible it was also an actual song, but I only recognise it as a theme tune.

[@matthewlibanio8227]

And while I recognized most of them, what made me laugh is how some of them, if you didn't, sounded like something you would hear in some film that was adult themed... 🤣🤣🤣. Honestly such a great episode and enjoyed it!

[@ok4todd]

5. You Are - Lionel Richie.

[@RisingRevengeance]

@@samuelfellows6923 Your dad has good taste. Everyone loves Phil Collins.

[@alancrane4693]

Thanks 👍 that was driving me nuts 🎶🕺🤪

[@FranssensM]

I struggled to identify most of the tunes. I pictured the emporium in 1988 that wanted a version of Ma Baker by Boney M. No lyrics, but played enthusiastically on a bontempi organ. For each one I imagined the store, what it sold and its customers. Aimlessly flicking through books of carpet samples. While In the Navy by the Village people seeps into your soul. Great stuff.

[@MegaByronR]

Always fascinated by the background music players, not just the technology side of things, but the actual recordings. It always amazes me that someone has sat down, arranged the tune and then gone through the process of recording it - likely someone’s full time occupation! Understandably the tracks on these cartridges have probably been created using a MIDI sequencer and MIDI sounds modules / sequencers (1990’s early 2000’s I used to sell the gear enabling people to do this), but the older recordings fascinate me; a group of musicians ( or just a few and a capable 8 / 16 track analogue recorder) sitting down running through the arrangement and then recording it in the knowledge that they’ll not get any recognition for it aside from a fixed fee. I have friends that make a fairly good living from recoding library music that gets used on TV etc, so it’s not something to be looked down upon, but the fact the people are playing on these recordings shows that they must enjoy playing and use it to make a living.

[@DmitriiGlandarius]

With these cartridges it seems that there are midis mixed with older recordings. Some of them sound really old and re-re-re-re-recorded from one tape to another.

[@davidclough8671]

Was thinking the same. Having some idea of what it takes to produce one piece of music of any type of quality and recording it, its interesting that someone or some group of people churned these out with such regularity to fill up these tapes, and most of the musicianship is actually very good.

[@millsyinnz]

I think you will find that the vast majority of professional musicians do or did this sort of work.

[@Drummer2k]

Completely agree with them being reproduced using MIDI/sequencers :)

[@organfairy]

It's basically the same as arranging pop music for hammond organ which was big in the 1960's and 70's. There were also touring big bands who did this - James Last Orchestra comes to mind.

[@JMcMillen]

Given that these were meant to be used in a non-consumer setting for long and extended periods of time, I wonder if the actual tape in the cartridge was more robust than what you'd see in consumer grade products. I could see businesses paying extra for tapes that would last many times longer than something you'd pick up at the local music store. That could be why the music still sounds pretty good on these cartridges.

[@markjames8664]

Yes, it is probably top grade tape, similar to what audiophiles would buy to make home reel-to-reel recordings. The cost of the tape would be small compared to distribution-and the hassle of dealing with a broken tape stick in the machine. Pre-recorded cassettes usually had pretty low-grade tape.

[@radry100]

He said you had to send back the old ones when you get new ones, this suggests the tapes weren't purchased but rented. So I imagine you could just get a free replacement once the tape wears out.

[@JMcMillen]

@@radry100 But the company renting them out probably wants to make sure they last and don't wear out or break prematurely. So paying a bit more for a higher quality tape would be in their best interest, especially as the cost would be passed on to the places that rented them.

[@richardcastro-parker3704]

@@JMcMillen Probably highly likely. They would want the tapes to last and last so they wouldn't have to buy new cassettes and eat into their profit. Just like how say blockbuster would like to have to replace the tape too soon.

[@compzac]

@@richardcastro-parker3704 Well you say that but blockbuster didnt order specialty tapes for their rentals they would get the exact same tape as any joe buying the tape in store, my thinking with these things is along the same idea, these things arent audiophile quality, they are after all going to be played over a long line of utilitarian speakers with probably not the greatest dynamic range, so the quality of the ferric coating on the tape didnt really matter outside of tape noise... Which is what DNR was meant for what these chaps would be focusing on would be the thickness and sturdiness of the plastic backing, which would be the same for a given length of tape material, these kinda tape are most likely just the standard tapes sold for NAB carts or fideli pacs and they just get used till they either break or get returned, at which point they are often destroyed by the distributor... I mean keep in mind these things have an incredibly short use span over other tape systems because they get played so often.

[@tcpnetworks]

Philips seemed to have dipped their fingers into the VCR department's parts bins to build this machine. The top and front panel covers are a dead ringer for the 80's VHS VCRs we had over here in Australia

[@HenryLoenwind]

This would explain why the cartridge slot is unnecessarily wide...

[@electrosoundaust]

There were many "Philips" VCR's especially the HiFi models the were made by Sharp of Japan. Simply different face plates and controls rearranged. I had a couple of VERY unreliable (mechanically) ones of both brands.

[@WildkatPhoto]

I worked at a department store (Dillards) in the 90s and we had a background music system. If we had tapes we only had a few and they were 4 hours long. As a shopper you would never notice but it meant in an 8 hour shift you heard the same songs over and over and over, day after day. Kill me!

[@ptonpc]

At a job I did many moons ago, there was an introductory VHS tape with a short presentation for visitors. It had one tune on it for intro and outro. The tape was played continuously.. every.. single... day...

[@lo1bo2]

I feel sorry for employees at Universal Studios Hollywood hearing that stirring background music all day long. It was also a bit too loud.

[@mialemon6186]

I gave seasonal retail work a try last year after my job shuttered and I wanted to keep going somewhere! I made it all of 65 days before quitting, and I am willing to say it had a lot to do with the fact they only had a 2hr loop of Christmas music going. Hearing the same 120 minutes of not very good pop Christmas tunes on top of realizing my body can't suffer standing still for 8hr anymore was just too much. 😂😂😂😂

[@MissMTurner]

I worked at a department store in the 90s too but we just had a single cd on repeat. So every 74 minutes, it started over.

[@WildkatPhoto]

@@MissMTurner that is a crime.

[@Gruntos]

The speaker system is a 100v line for a Multi speaker system. Very popular with department stores. Use to install these systems. The two std speaker outputs (blade pin) would not be used for large speaker systems

[@Huggy1959]

100 volts? In the USA 🇺🇸 the defacto standard is 70.7 volts (usually simply called 70 volts. We also used to use a 25 volt system but that is pretty much obsolete now.

[@JacGoudsmit]

@@Huggy1959 I think the standard in Europe is/was 100V. But yes it has multiple taps for different voltages just like all the other BGM players I know

[@HenryLoenwind]

@@Huggy1959 Isn't it funny that the country that has the by far larger stores uses the voltage that has a lower maximum wire length? Just a random observation and tbf at those voltages you won't run into wire length issues for a good while.

[@Jelfs]

100v line is still quite common for some use cases, not just BGM but also at things like fairs where you need to cover long distances between speakers

[@sev8993]

​@@HenryLoenwind it's because everything above 100V is considered high voltage in the US, requires an electrical license etc. It is stupid to base it on the voltage rather than current but that is why it's 70V and not 100V in the US.

[@ukfmcbradioservicingTango21]

I've always loved background music systems. I came from Rotherham in South Yorkshire & a local garden centre near Workshop has speakers in all their greenhouses/outside/shop. I would have been about 6 years old when I first came across that (born in 1962). There was a supermarket up the road from where I lived with Reditune speakers no doubt connected to a Redifune player, and a small cafe near the long gone Royal Hospital where my late Mother worked (the hospital not the cafe!). In my teens I had reason to visit my Mother at her work once per week & we had lunch in the cafe with the unknown type of background music system. It made all the difference to my enjoyment whenever these systems were installed. Wind forward to today & background music in shops etc play 'ordinary' original artist music, which to me doesn't work for me on a BGM system. Like Techmoan I really enjoy the instrumental versions of everything that the 60's to 90's systems offered. Here at home, where I also do most of my self employed work in various workshops & buildings , I have a TOA system on 100V line feeding 22 loudspeakers through four zones. The system is set to play SD card tracks in a random order. I have recorded my 200+ boxed sets of Reader's Digest records onto the SD cards. Many of those sets of records were produced as 'Mood music' or 'background music'. I therefore don't know what random track will be next. I love it. Richard, G0OJF, Lincolnshire UK

[@mckelepic]

Amazing

[@highpath4776]

I have some mood music etc publishers LPs (and 78s) discs somewhere, might play them one day.

[@Spookex166]

I would love to hear full recordings of those tapes, the ones that we got here really captured a rather unique vibe that I liked

[@blenderbachcgi]

Same

[@JG-nx3jg]

Just ring a corporate and get asked to be put on hold

[@trankzen148]

I think that's a job for the KZbin Pedant ! (Mat bring the muppets back please)

[@NicholasAndre1]

The late 80s keyboard synthesizer vibe

[@mattgreen5351]

Oh definitely 👍

[@Richardincancale]

My colleagues and I stayed in a hotel in Paris during a project back around 1996 (which is how I ended up living here…) - same hotel for 18 months! We got to know the BGM program pretty well as it never changed! As we got to know the staff pretty well they let us see the technical room where it came from - just a standard hifi multi CD player taking I think 5 disks in a rotating platter. They let us bring our own disks to replace the standard ones - but it wasn’t the same! For three weeks we had to stay in a different hotel - a bit more chic - but they only played a single CD track all the time - Blue Gardinia - to give the place ‘atmosphere’. God were we glad to get back to our usual BGM!!

[@jdraven0890]

We were on vacation and San Antonio on the Riverwalk. We stopped into an Irish themed hotel bar. The bartender and staff and other patrons were so much fun we stuck around for about 5 hours. They said they had been listening to the same background music tape with Irish music for literally years on repeat.

[@eddiepetrick6222]

I worked in a grocery store in the early 80s. Those recordings and monitor speaker combine for a very nostalgic experience to me. Thank you for the video.

[@IanSlothieRolfe]

I remenber back in the 90's being in a mexican resturant (one of those large chains - I don't recall the name) and they were playing music in the background in the typrical Mariachi band style. After we'd been sitting for a few minutes I realised they were actually Beatles hits, arranged quite elaborately presumably to conceal this fact somewhat. When "Yellow Submarine" came on several of us on the table started singlng along, and as the pre-stater drinks flowed we must have got a bit loud because the music abruptly changed to what I can only presume were more traditional tunes!

[@spugintrntl]

There's a Mexican restaurant around where I live that still does this kind of thing. My wife and I were there a couple months ago and after about half an hour we realized they were still playing Christmas music, just Mariachi-ized. It was kinda weird.

[@BrianRRenfro]

Like almost every big Chinese buffet I have been to, and all of them in the town I live, do this but it's pop hits from the last 20-30 years in a traditional Chinese version. Like new new songs too so obviously a subscription thing going on.

[@avarisclari]

Fazoli's used to do this as well, but in Italian. I remember going in once and hearing "Can you feel the love" from Lion King in Italian playing on their speakers

[@brandbryce]

Yup, lol, I can picture one of the waitstaff hitting 'next track' to shut you up lolz

[@Astinsan]

It was when I heard “smells like teen spirit” musical format over the overhead audio at k mart that reminded me age is becoming a real world problem for myself.. lol

[@SmitsHappens]

With this video, you have answered questions I've had since 1997/1998. Thank you, my brain is relieved. This will be a long comment, I'm sorry. I worked in a store in the local mall that had this system, but never could remember the name--I recognized that player, though! It always struck me as strange since at the time, I was only used to regular cassette tapes and reel to reels; I didn't know about Fidelipacs, so these chonky tapes were a mystery. A couple of times during my stint as assistant manager, I found out how to connect the speaker wires from my CD boombox to the speaker connections in the back (not the plugs, the actual speaker wires under those clips just underneath). This of course didn't set well with upper management. I think we only ever returned one Muzak tape while I was there and the store took a vote to send back the one we hated most. If we got fined, I never heard about it. Our music selections were mostly swing and big band, plus some Top 40 from about 1995-1997, then the Christmas assortment. I feel like we missed out on these pseudo Hollyridge Strings arrangements! Anyway, thank you again. I always hoped you'd uncover this system and I can't get over how excited I am to see this!

[@dharma_dude]

Relating to you connecting your boombox to the store sound system, I've done that too! Although it was my phone rather than a boombox, and a 3.5mm jack rather than the speaker wires themselves. I was a shift manager at a craft store chain for awhile and I would do this when I was the manager on duty in the evening shifts, the normal music they'd play was mostly God awful. I always enjoyed doing that. It's cool to see that I'm not the only one who has done that and not much has changed since back then!

[@toresbe]

Oh my. Track 3 20:50 is "Caterina", by Tony Dallara. Didn't expect to hear that one, it's a 45rpm I got from my parents who bought it while interrailing in Italy in the late 70s.

[@federicoae7671]

I thought it was Mack the knife

[@Crftbt]

Amapola came out in 1920. Caterina sounds a like an Italian copy of that. :)

[@PSUQDPICHQIEIWC]

I like the idea of a "name that muffled 80's department store elevator music" game with chat. Unfortunately, I doubt any such thing would be streamable without getting axed. That's also assuming that there are enough people that are sufficiently interested in such a ridiculous game to participate.

[@Ozzy_2014]

Heard Phil Collins Another day in paradise. 1 song I know as an 80s hit from someone who blends with others. 1 I don't recall the song name or artist just the lead singer ( male) singing 'It's no, sacrifice." Which after looking up is of course Elton John. So common hearing his stuff I forget about the man. But the music burned in my brain.

[@yoymate6316]

@@PSUQDPICHQIEIWC i’d join this discord server, bc if this was made on twitch it’d get dmca’d off the face of the earth in three seconds

[@Mitulaa]

Man, you somehow always to manage to talk about things so enthusiastically, that it kinda makes me want to get a system like this as well 🤣👏

[@Sugiura_Tsuruki]

18:38 Only one heart - Johnny peters orchestra 19:10 This Ole House - Ray Hamilton Orchestra 19:22 Black Bottom - The Strings of Paris Track 1 : Samba Caliente Horst Jankowski Track 2 : Track 3 : Another Day in Paradice - The twilight Orchestra Track 4 : Good Looking - Parry Music Track 5 : You Are - The gary tesca Orchestra Track 6 : In The Navy Track 7 : Ma Baker - Silver Disco Explosion Track 8 : Love Machine Track 9 : Track 10 : Sacrifice - Ray Hamilton Orchestra

[@365networker2]

20:04 is Step by Step by Eugen Cicero & Rias Orchestra.

[@vinto34]

Track 9 Don't get me wrong originally by the pretenders.

[@mhoppy6639]

Who wants abridged when you’ve got 34mins of Mat playing about with retro tech? Can we have a “non-abridged “ version(!) please?

[@svens.2876]

That is exactly what I thought :D

[@daanwilmer]

You mean an extended cut?

[@klafbang]

I take it you either didn't check it out or didn't get the joke?

[@SockyNoob]

@@Spearca exactly

[@mhoppy6639]

@@Spearca yup. Wot Erik said.

[@brucegoatly]

19:24-20:00 was the Black Bottom (1926), which replaced the Charleston as the most popular dance.

[@ericclaptonsrobotpilot7276]

Could you upload those audio tracks to the Internet Archive? Shouldn’t be too much difficult. If you haven’t yet, check out the K-Mart tapes that were uploaded there a few years back.

[@rubenmejia942]

And who is going to pay for Techmoan's time and effort to do such thing?

[@grex9101]

@@rubenmejia942 us. Via patreon and money from youtube

[@Intelwinsbigly]

@@grex9101 lol

[@nevet1212]

@@rubenmejia942 also he doesn't own the rights

[@ssjaken]

@@nevet1212 then the copyright holder can petition the internet archive to take it down. The logic is, these things are so old, preserving them is meaningful. And the copyright holders are long gone.

[@argusfleibeit1165]

We had one of these at home, in the '60s, from when we ran a restaurant for a while. We used to call it "Boompty-boompty music", it was all like snoozy instrumental foxtrot tunes.

[@NightlyHigh]

I absolutely love these type of videos from you! More of this talking, points of view and little stories. I find this very relaxing, since nowdays we have these hyper-active videos left and right edited with jumpcuts every 0.5 seconds and unnecessary shouting, fake excitement and just chaos everywhere. This is real entertainment and truly interesting! Keep up the great work!

[@RCAvhstape]

This makes me want to put clothing racks in my living room and turn it into a department store floor, and get one of these machines to play continuously in my house. Like a twilight zone episode where you are trapped in a 1970s K-Mart.

[@tarmaque]

In the late 1970's we lived in a community with a large migrant farm worker population. The K-Mart there played a lot of that weird Mexican polka kind of music. The horror. _The horror!_

[@AltimaNEO]

And then hide in the round racks

[@coffeekatk4067]

And hide in the "stockroom" to gossip about customers!! Lol!

[@RCAvhstape]

@@AltimaNEO Who didn't do that as kids?

[@chriswalford4161]

Seek help.

[@Siktah]

I really love those musical versions of songs. Would listen to them all day :)

[@angaudlinn]

"Britain's best car" - that made me crack up! :D Even though I'm in Sweden and Austins wasn't that common here 40+ years ago I remember my mothers orange-brownish Allegro.

[@DavidWaltermyer]

As a kid I used to wake up in the 80's excited for Saturday morning cartoons. As an adult I wake up on Saturdays excited for new Techmoan 🤓

[@Gadgetonomy]

I love how you used a Nixie valve clock to time your tracks... it's what I love about this channel!

[@DeadReckon]

Man, I know I'd hate to be stuck listening to something like this all day in a work environment, but these machines are so cool! They're so well built, it's just stupid. Also, anyone who needs an abridged version of Mat is not a very interesting person and should probably stay on TikTok or wherever those people with 30 second attention spans dwell.

[@AMERICANxSPLENDOR]

Thanks for all of the videos!

[@Techmoan]

No, thank you for your generosity - it’s much appreciated.

[@AdamG1]

At 3:21 you mention liking songs in a completely different style. Everyone I know hates it when I play those kind of songs but my absolute favorite. I love this bluegrass version of Comfortably Numb that used to annoy the hell out of someone that is also a Pink Floyd fan. I got the Pickin' On Floyd CD stuck in their car CD player and they couldn't play anything else.

[@A_Casual_NPC]

a video about old philips equipment will always bring joy to my Dutch heart. I love that stuff, recently bought an old Michelangelo-L TV from somewhere in the early sixties that I'm converting into a terrarium. Having the opportunity to take a machine like that apart is amazing. It's beautiful on the inside (after some serious dusting off)

[@robsawalker]

The very first track playing on the first tape Mat films trying is ‘The Last Farewell’ by Roger Whittaker. Love these videos, love Muzak!

[@shieladixon]

I _loved_ the eee-ooo-eee-oooo sound as you cleaned the head. Please make that a regular feature. Your enthusiasm for these things is infectious.

[@djsarahjones]

Just a thought. If you you need to match a play back speed in percentage. You might be best quickly looking how virtual DJ works. It's free and just pressing sync will tell you the exact percentage difference between the 2 tracks. As DJs one of the main reasons we take the Micky out of virtual DJ is it's so simple to use. 🤣 Keep up the good work Techmoan. As a kid of the 80's that grew up with hand me down AutoPlay record music centers, top-loading VHSs. Etc I love this stuff. And I'm from Widnes so the analogue TV stuff you do is the same Winter Hill tuning frequencies 🤣👍

[@SeafoamSmiles]

I'd love to have a listen to the Christmas tapes when you get ahold of them. There's always something magical about old Christmas shopping music.

[@michaelgergen4318]

I really love these BGM system videos! I've always wanted to buy one and have these quirky tunes play somewhere! If I ever own a store, that's what I'll do! EDIT: Hope we can hear some of those new tapes coming in a future video!

[@davida1hiwaaynet]

Fascinating! We all know background music is ubiquitous. It's so cool to see the equipment responsible for it.

[@Gappasaurus]

Thanks for another brilliant video Mat, i think the rendition of “Love Machine” was my favorite 😆 Looking forward to the arrival of the 30 new tapes, hopefully we’ll get an Extra-Special Extended Edition Director’s Cut to balance out the abridged version 😋

[@g.m.2427]

"The directors flood" (flooding of music obviously)

[@DylanPackard]

As soon as it clicked for me I was so incredibly excited, honestly that's probably one of the best tunes I've heard off the tapes so far haha! That tenor sax was just absolutely going HAM on that solo in the credits holy shit

[@antonrozhkov2663]

The fact that you can get content matched for a cover version is pretty outrageous

[@kosmas173]

I lost it when he found a dead spider in it 🤣🤣🤣 that's how you know you have a vintage player

[@ZebronZee]

I don't even care about the system, but the way this man speaks is mesmerising to watch.

[@jamesm90]

I really enjoy a back ground music machine video. I was a child in the 70s and noticed that there were weird systems playing this music in dark cupboards and back offices in shops and restaurants leisure centres etc. I was fascinated by them but could never get near one or find out any information on them. It being the 70s there was no sources of information. Sometimes there was a microphone hanging on a wall somewhere, if you pressed the button the music would pause and the mic became live. I guess that plugged into the remote/mic socket. Would like too have heard the 100v line output. Most instances of installation of these devices would have used that connection.

[@alexanderthomas2660]

It's quite the special experience to listen to music now that would only be heard in restaurants, bars, and various shops back around the year 1988! If it weren't for this chap who held on to these tapes and you playing them here, this would probably all have been lost in time.

[@josuelservin]

Wonderful video, it's fascinating to learn about the equipment that was used behind the scenes! And I'm certainly not in a hurry, I love to sit and enjoy your videos, because your production is always top notch, and your commentary and perspective quite interesting. So thanks for another great video.

[@ItsDeJaPa]

I am amazed by the audio quality of the recordings! Really loved the covers on the Allegro cartridge. Wish they still kind of used machines like this. This took me right back to the days that I went with my parents to the local department store. It really kind of adds to an ambiance rather then hearing the originals nowadays. Totally agree with you that it triggers the brain. Enjoyed your video as always.

[@Milnoc]

I recognised a few of the tunes. I didn't expect to hear "In The Navy," though! 😂

[@Techmoan]

Its definitely an eclectic mix.

[@vwlssnvwls3262]

I love devices like this, from a long gone era of actually going to the stores and hanging out for hours with family and friends.

[@mwiz100]

Having worked in retail in the late '00's I would have gladly listened to the Allegro cart over the usual pop loops we'd had. Hell, I'd honestly love a rip of that cartridge hah! I'm also really surprised just HOW good those sounded on the direct line output recordings! A really smartly designed system.

[@RobertAsh999]

I commented on the bass lines sounding tight.

[@kct1975]

This whole video 📹 reminded me of shopping 🛒 at Kmart and Jewel with my Mom in the late '70's and the' 80's

[@lexfacitregem]

Track 1: Samba Caliente, Horst Jankowski and his Orchestra Track 2: Dunno Track 3: another day in paradise, Orquesta Musica Maravillosa Track 4: good looking, Parry Music Track 5: you are, The Gary Tesca Orchestra Track 6: In the Navy, village people Track 7: Maan Vaiva, Leni Track 8: love machine, bad girls. The last two, no clue!! But thank you so much for actually giving me a reason to use Shazam for the first time!!!!

[@dethwiz]

No, track 7 was Boney M's Ma Baker

[@tomcrofton7744]

9 is don’t get me wrong

[@OctavianVlad]

Track 9: Don't Get Me Wrong

[@OctavianVlad]

Track 10: Sacifice

[@chinabluewho]

#9 ? kzbin.info/www/bejne/p5OkkpVnnbmrhJY

[@wardsdotnet]

You have a devilish way of getting double the plays from me... I'll watch your video as I'm going to sleep and it's just mellow enough to help me doze off but just interesting enough that I have to watch it again the next day to catch the parts I missed!

[@mrb.5610]

I had - actually still do somewhere - a Philips cassette deck with 'Dynamic Noise Reduction' - and it was very effective !

[@n6vcw]

You and your music systems. Me and my camera systems. Birds of a feather.

[@Ancientreapers]

27:21 Track 3 The only one I could name right off the bat. Phil Collins Another day in Paradise 28:03 Track 6 took a bit but after the song got going Village People In the Navy

[@FatherAxeKeeper]

I love this sort of thing. I have fond memories of going to retail stores with my mom when i was a kid, and remembering sounds of the music being played is a big part of those memories. Learning about things like this is like adding new information to old memories, and i find it very nostalgic and interesting. Keep up the cool videos Techmoan!

[@logicaldojo1901]

These BGM videos always tend to remind me of the movie theater I worked at in high school. The lobby music was via a standard CD player in the managers office, loaded with a CD we received monthly (though it felt like quarterly at best) loaded with snippets of music from movies and ads for the theater. By a certain point nearly everyone working could lipsync to nearly the whole play time. The best though, was hearing the intro to "Don't Stop Believin'" on a new disc, drawing nearer to a speaker... Only to realize it was the Alvin the Chipmunks version!

[@felipesancho]

I highly recommend the abridged version. This chap just goes on and on...

[@xaenon]

Overall, it seems to be very similar to the Rowe/Customusic tape system. Customusic used the large cartridges, with the foil splices, but still very much based on the Fidelipac mechanism. Their machines had slots for four or six cartridges with a common capstan. From what I could determine, the machine could switch between tracks as well as between cartridges, and engage the pinch rollers as needed. Customusic also made third-party records for the Seeburg 1000 BGM system.

[@LerockJohn]

You Sir you are the best audio curator ever! You should have a whole wing in some museum dedicated to preserving and promoting these! With a lot of $$$. Respect!

[@K-o-R]

25:00 I honestly would have believed either of the slower speeds was the correct one.

[@DreadVos]

Abridged version? Bah, I could (and do) happily sit here and listen to an interesting story! Thank you for doing these, worked retail for years and was wondering how this was done before they started using a proprietary streaming service.

[@ethylhexyphthalate]

It fascinates me how someone can just say, "You know what this world needs? An easy listening arrangement of The Miracles' smash funk hit, 'Love Machine.' " I confess I'm guilty of the same thing., though:For many years, though my musical training runs to sacred music/opera/classical, my brain has insisted on turning those tunes into big band hits. I reckon that this may have stemmed from several years working for Sears Department Stores here in the U.S. back in the early 90s. I had no choice but to listen to hour after hour after hour of this kind of thing.

[@jmvsic]

It's that genuine enthusiasm you get (like the last minute or so of this video when you excitedly recognize a tune) when discussing the things that interest you which makes me a returning viewer. Thanks for always having something to share

[@BobBell808]

Great Video - Couple thoughts: Although you established the manufacturing date as being 1988, I wonder how long Phillips made the content cartridges? Those could've gone through the 90s, maybe beyond. Most of the selections sounded like they were not made in a recording studio, but rather by an individual, someone like an early Anders Enger Jensen. And if anyone questions the benefits of our protagonist searching forgotten music formats for hidden gems, I've got two words: Cuba Baion!

[@AaronSmart.online]

Well we heard Heal the World, which is from 1991

[@telemedic5142]

That’s impressive sounding for slow tape and a rudimentary noise reduction system. It did need that clean though! Excellent video, as always. Thanks

[@outsdr]

Geez, I remember using one of those SpotMaster cart machines. I didn't like it, because of the lever - I couldn't just yank out the cart. Built like tanks though - one slid off the back of the board while it was playing a cart, landing about four feet down on its top. The cart never stopped playing.

[@photobyTaps]

Nice video, thank you. During my DJ days of 91-94, I used to record music on VHS tapes for extra long background music

[@charlesjmouse]

FWLIW: I'm a good enough singer and musician to front a local band. Something one of my local pubs used to do (sadly no more) was play covers of famous pop songs from any period but now as background music rather than the originals - the thing I particularly enjoyed was that it wasn't cheap knock-off muzak but new arrangements done by mostly unknown artists with genuine talent. Really, really, enjoyable and occasionally inspiration. I sympathise with your enjoyment of new twists on the otherwise familiar. PS I strongly suspect the pub stopped as a result of 'feedback' from the usual suspects who possess no soul and consider a 'good time' to only ever be more of the same, while possessing an overly high regard for their own opinions coupled with loud mouths... ...I'd often overhear unhappy mutterings along the lines of "That's not the version I know" or "Why do they never play ?"

[@AffidavidDonda]

19:12 - "Cztery razy po dwa razy" by Polish Eagles from Chicago :))))))))

[@cmonkey63]

At the beginning I thought, let's play Name That Tune. And sure enough, we did in the end. So, Track 3 is Phil Collins (I have that album), Track 6 is The Village People (I don't have that album). The other 8 tracks make me think I'd fail a Turing test.

[@MrAsBBB]

This took me back to my childhood. I had a relative who had this kind of music on all of the time in the car and in the house. 3 hours in a Daimler driven at 100 miles an hour listening to this after a drink at a meal (well it was the 80s). We never knew how much we were in danger, it was a different world then. In a shop these tracks must have sent the staff into a coma after many hours, days , weeks? Or they became totally oblivious to it.. 😃 I really enjoy your in depth treatment of the equipment . Keep up the good work!

[@NaoPb]

I'm surprised by how many songs I managed to recognize. Also surprised by the sound quality. It's not that bad, certainly for a background system. I wish someone would be able to record all these tapes and make them available somewhere. I just love those alternative instrumental renditions. Even the more classical and/or romantic ones sound lovely. Maybe it's just me but I love listening to things like these. I listen to those K-Mart tapes from the Internet Archive for fun as well.

[@David-ik8wj]

i think a lot of this music can be found on TIDAL. I run into a lot of it when looking for cross-referenced covers of pop music.

[@MusicByWinston]

I love your attitude about "elevator music" as they call it around here. It is fun to decipher the titles. I really appreciate these videos with the odd / old formats. Keep up the excellent work!

[@andyelliott3198]

The only tracks I could recognise on the Allegro tape was T3: Phil Collins - Another day in paradise, T6: Village People - In the navy, T7: Boney M - Ma Baker, T8: The Miracles: Love Machine and T10: Elton John - Sacrifice. Couldn't figure out the rest but track 9 might be ABBA not sure.

[@highpath4776]

T9 Chrisse Hynde/Pretenders Dont Get Me Wrong (but not a very good approx to the actual intro so not surprised you didnt get it)

[@aner_bda]

The sound quality out of the line out is pretty impressive.

[@neunoak3545]

I am looking at it with interest. There is a made in Japan notation on the sticker, this device is very similar to Toshiba's BGM-4100 in panel design and details. I remember hearing this playlist somehow.(Tapes such as Rediffusion or Philips were also distributed...) I think BGM machines are a kind of culmination of tape music. This sound quality is very good.

[@AaronSmart.online]

I also noticed the main PCB was made by Elna, who are a Japanese company (mostly known for making capacitors)

[@Firefoxfifty]

Real nostalgia hit from this. Those tracks instantly brings me back to that 70's or 80's Hotel lobbies on Family holidays i had as a kid we used to have!

[@g2macs]

Those poor shop assistants, it must of been hell on earth having to listen to James Last/Bert Kaempfert type muzak for hour after hour.

[@johnlewan1114]

Wow, that was an instant flashback to shopping at the mall many years ago. The sound quality seems quite good considering I'm hearing it after YT has butchered it. Thanks for all you do to bring us this tech from the past.

[@wkdarchaeology5653]

Talking about 'background music' version's of popular songs I've just picked up a Woolworths 'Hits of the 80's - The Essential Collection' CD from a local charity shop. It's one of the weirdest listening experiences I've ever had! Its basically a modern re-recording of 80's hits but sung by the original artists in more recent times. It's clear some of the artists can't reach the high notes they use to and sounds like the original singer doing a cover version of their own songs ......It's bizarre!!!.

[@fcubeboy4959]

I LOVE TECHMOAN ❤️❤️❤️ I LOVE TINKERING AROUND WITH OBSOLETE ELECTRONICS

[@robertoeagle7764]

Matt please could you consider archiving some of these on the internet for download. Perhaps on the ‘Pedant’ channel. I really like them & would be great to listen to whilst doing housework. Great video 👍🏻

[@LordmonkeyTRM]

Yes would love to hear some of new ones featured at the end

[@ShadowWizard123]

I would also enjoy listening to the whole songs.

[@christopheralthouse6378]

HOLY CRAP! I did the math...THAT IS A 33 YEAR OLD CARTRIDGE TAPE PLAYER!!!! 🤯😯😬 And all it needed was a quick head and capstan cleaning...and GOOD AS NEW! 😍😍😍😍🥰🥰🥰🥰♥️♥️♥️♥️ That gentleman obviously knew how to maintain old audio equipment...☺️😍🥰♥️

[@tedse21]

Loved the content. I worked in retail in the late seventies and early 80's. I hated those tapes so much after a while. Also Allegro Britains best car? Surely you jest. My '78 Jag was streets ahead. As was my Austin 1800.

[@TheKnobCalledTone.]

r/woooosh

[@compzac]

@@TheKnobCalledTone. thank you... i dont even live in britain and i knew what mat was doing

[@compzac]

I do believe sir that mat was being sarcastic talking about the allergro as britains greatest car, its almost like walking up to an american and telling them in 1978 that the best car for america wasnt the corvette or any of the muscle cars from dodge, but the chevrolet chevette, or ford pinto.

[@kosmosyche]

I like BGM tunes, in general, especially those on the jazzy side.

[@xzerr]

It's interesting how the "large orchestras" mentioned on the boxes sound more like the average synthetizers of the time. I bet it's quite expensive to record the full orchestra (4 hours per cartridge - lots of work) when you have, saying, a music academy graduate... You just lock him or her up with a synth and plenty of food, come in a week and get the cartridge of music 🐣

[@kleinerELM]

I thought the same thing. But I bet it is just recorded midi-tracks :-D

[@hjalfi]

I heard once from someone --- no ref, sorry --- who claimed to be a session musician for Muzak. They said it was a really good gig if you could get it, as they paid well; but you had to be good, because there wasn't any time for rehearsals. You just got given the sheet music and had to sight-read it in one take.

[@KeithJewell]

For these it certainly sounds like an early digital synth. Of course earlier recordings were made with an entire orchestra, and in the 70s it was a big source of income for orchestras to do television and background music.

[@erwintimmerman6466]

My thoughts exactly... There hasn’t been any more than a single person orchestra near that tape 😆

[@CemetryGator]

I'm guessing that's just the description they did back when they still used orchestras, and by that time, there was just one mad man who had the job of turning all those songs into muzak ready masterpieces.

[@deepsleep7822]

I enjoy vids like this regarding this type of music (and equipment). I grew up during the era when department stores and a few other places played this back ground music. It’s nostalgia for me and I really enjoy it.

[@cageycretins]

Great video! Looking forward to a "Family Safe" version on Hammond organ of Frank Zappas "Bobby Brown"..... ;)

[@paulblichmann2791]

What, is the word "heiney" too extreme for you?

[@ZIGZAG12345]

That tune that was playing around 19:40 was also the same tune that was featured in the Castella Classic cigars TV advert (and those few words alone show how old it is!) that had Russ Abbot in them!

[@MrSonofsonof]

The Varsity Rag/Black Bottom

[@themac6356]

@@MrSonofsonof I believe it’s “Black Bottom”. Surprised a tune from the 1920s appeared on this tape haha!