Adorno tries to convince his readers that that the turntable (and the record) is a net positive for critical engagement with music (he foreshadows turntablism, as I’ve argued here: https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/07494469608629694): interestingly it features as a ghostly device in The Magic Mountain by his correspondent Thomas Mann.
https://www.jstor.org/stable/778935
https://www.jstor.org/stable/778935
That’s why it’s use as a signifier of nostalgia (pipe and slippers) and indeed aging (and memory loss) is so interesting in TV - whether it’s Inspector Morse, or (CJ’s father in the West Wing, thanks @bazzargh ) it tends to be as a reactionary force at odds with the potential seen by Adorno, and realised in DJ/turntablist culture where the turntable affords techniques for critique of musical material via reconfiguration.
It is also at odds with association of vinyl paraphernalia with the presentation of a pretentious high cultural attitude. The opening of the movie of Highrise where the central character manages to get his audiophile turntable (there’s a nod to Kubrick here also) working despite the collapse of civilisation is a nice example of this trope.
Records are both regressive/reactionary and have the potential for critique: so very negative dialectic ;-)
So there ;-)
#vinyl #adorno #turntablism