ABSTRACT
While music and sound are to records what language and narrative are to books, there is special importance to thing itself too. As early as 1998, the German cultural theorist Wolfgang Welsch presciently reflected on meaning of the material in the age of electronic 'immaterialization': Precisely those concrete experiences which are not accessible via electronic media have once again become important to us. Analogue records record in multiple senses of the term. They are things before they can be valuable artefacts or collective representations. In a digitally altered world, the seemingly old-fashioned thingness and unique pragmatic qualities of analogue record could and did become somewhat conspicuous and unique. Unlike compact disc, vinyl record is a disc playable on both sides. The most popular diameters have become synonymous with vinyl single as such: 12-inch and 7-inch. A series of carefully calibrated mechanical and chemical procedures must be undertaken for the thing called vinyl record to be created and to satisfy our senses.
