Episode 338: Got Me A Walkman and they Walked Right On and Solved Them

November 15, 2021

Show Notes Episode 338: Got Me A Walkman and They Walked Right In and Solved Them

This week Host Dave Bledsoe slips on his Members Only Jacket, squeezes into his Parachute Pants and slaps his Walkman on his belt to cruise the Mall for some Bettys. Only to be thrown out of the Shady Oaks Retirement Community Mall Walk-A-Thon. (Again) On the show this week, we rolled back the technological clock to a simpler time when nothing could come between you and the music except for five hundred dollars, inflation adjusted. We are talking about the original Sony Walkman!

Along the way we learn about why Dave had a large coffin shaped box in his boyhood bedroom that had nothing to do with him being a cool Goth kid and everything to do with his parents handing down large pieces of furniture they had no further use for. Then we jump right into the history of the most remarkable consumer electronic device in history, one which would not only change how we listened to music but change society itself. The Eight Track Cassette. (We kid, it’s the Walkman) We go from it’s humble origins as a sad attempt by Salaryman to impress his boss to how it swept the world in just a few short years. (You wouldn’t be listening to this on a smartphone without the Walkman).

Our Sponsor this week is the Sue-Me Want-Man, because there was no way in hell your parents were paying that kind of money for a cassette player. We open the show with a CBS News clip about the new machine and close with Scott Weste singing about how the Walkman solved his problems.

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Citations Needed:

Humming Off Key For Two Decades

https://archive.nytimes.com/www.nytimes.com/library/tech/99/07/circuits/articles/29walk.html

Recorded History: The Sony Walkman Turns 40