Forty Fives

Posted on February 15, 2003 in Milestones

Forty five. The number suggests many things: my age as of today, a caliber of handgun, the speed limit trucks and trailers had to follow on freeways when I was young.

But the forty five I remember the best were the records. Forty fives — standing for forty five rpms. Rounds per minute. They were smaller than the licorice pizza 33 1/3 rpms. Most record players had settings for 78s, 45s, 33s, and, sometimes, 16s. When you set the lever to 16, the turntable rumbled and shuddered. I never in my life saw a 16 rpm record. I presume they were made in limited quantities, perhaps for scientific, military, or industrial purposes.

You could tell a forty five at a glance from the similarly sized, amphetamine charged 78s: they had a hole through which you could slip an eyeball in the center. To play one on a turntable, you needed an adapter. On the simple blue player my mother got for my fifth birthday I could play my Walt Disney records, there was a little circle that you could raise up and lock. The stereo my parents bought about a year late used a tall changer that you pressed down over the stiletto used for thirty threes. I thought it looked like the center of a toilet paper hanger. Today, I’d liken it to an instrument which some women use to take pleasure.

Record companies showed panache when they pressed forty fives. They just didn’t come in black: I have seen many made of transparent red vinyl, green, and, once, yellow. Artists used to spin out their work on both albums and singles: before the rise of cartridges, forty fives were the preferred media for radio broadcasts. You usually got to hear one side over and over again: the contents of the flip side seldom made the airwaves. The names of those songs entered into the memory of trivia buffs and seldom onto the lips and tongues of the fans who parroted the tunes they heard over the radio.

Forty fives defined an era — the fifties through the early eighties. “My time” my younger readers might call it. As if my life ended when CDs took over the music scene.

I’m forty five today and still spinning. Just like the RCA Red Labels still whirl in my imagination.

P.S., thanks everyone for the birthday wishes.