Discussions about eggcorns and related topics
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Thanks for your understanding.
Chris -- 2018-04-11
I heard an NPR segment on the lost recordings of Hank Williams, and his daughter was talking about the format of the newly located recordings. I couldn’t tell whether she was referring to them as “acetates” or “acid tapes.” So, I ran a Google search on the two terms, and both show up…
Deal Paves Way For Hank Williams Treasure Trove
Sep 26, 2008 … “I had possession of the acetates but they had already been duplicated way before I had … 3, 1951, version of Hank Williams singing it. ...
www.billboard.com/bbcom/news/article_display.jsp… – 45k – Similar pages
http://www.billboard.com/bbcom/news/art … 1003855599
Web ResultsInterview with Glen Glenn – Elvis Articles, By: Elvis Austra…
Apr 5, 2007 … He had—I call ‘em dubs, but they call ‘em acid tapes, .... Him and Hank Williams was my favorite country singer, but Elvis was just. ...
www.elvis.com.au/presley/interview_glen_glenn.sh… – 64k – Similar pages
http://www.elvis.com.au/presley/intervi … lenn.shtml
“Acid tapes” makes sense because a tape is a familiar format, and one might assume that “acid” refers to the process by which they are made, cf. acid paper or acid-free paper.
Note: “Acetates” is also a term for transparencies (used in giving presentations); I think it derives from the transparent polymer used in their manufacture… short for polyethyl acetate or polyethylene acetate (I’m not exactly sure). I’m thinking that the same term (Acetate) is used to refer to the recording medium of the recordings.
Last edited by jorkel (2008-10-25 09:06:51)
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In the production of vinyl records, an “acetate” was a sort of “test pressing” you made before pressing up the master disk—it gave the sound engineer a chance to hear how the music would sound after transfer from the recording tape. With old recordings, the master tapes are often lost, and sometimes the final form of the record was never actually pressed—so occasionally acetates are the only trace left. Unfortunately, they weren’t intended to be permanent, and they generally deteriorate more quickly than actual vinyl; recordings made from them tend to be pretty noisy.
“Acid tapes” is interesting. I don’t know whether acids are involved in making the lacquer for acetates, and the users of this probably don’t know, either. “Tapes” might seem to disqualify this as an eggcorn, but I know from long music retail experience that there are plenty of people out there who use “tapes” as a blanket term for cassette tapes, vinyl records, and even CDs.
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So if the acetate gains the sound engineer’s approval it has passed the acid test, so to speak?
*If the human mind were simple enough for us to understand,
we would be too simple-minded to understand it* .
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I think it’s conceivable that on some level, probably unconscious, people hearing the term “acetate” may be making connections between that and musical genres such as “acid rock”, “acid folk”, “acid house” and “acid jazz”. Such connections, however unconscious, could nudge someone into hearing “acetate” as “acid tape”.
Oh wowwwwwwwww;
Dixon
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Wowwww and flllutter.
*If the human mind were simple enough for us to understand,
we would be too simple-minded to understand it* .
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By the way, I had this eerie feeling that my eggcorn suggestion had a familiar ring to it, so I ran a search of the word “acid” within this database and found this similar item:
Acid Tone for Acetone by KRS Contribute! 0 2007-07-31 11:14:52 by KRS
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