NYT: A Turntable Reborn Turns Its Back on Its Hip-Hop Legacy

[Frank Forman]

When the late Allen Mackler had gotten over-exposure from hearing music
too much at WETA-FM (iirc), he sold off his collection in pieces. I paid
$200 for this great turntable. At least one transfer engineer uses it, a
high recommendation indeed. I gave mine to VanderCook College of Music
(Chicago), after selling many recordings to those on these lists, along
with the bulk of my collection.

A Turntable Reborn Turns Its Back on Its Hip-Hop Legacy
http://www.nytimes.com/2017/01/01/business/panasonic-technics-hiphop-turntable.html

By JONATHAN SOBLE

UTSUNOMIYA, Japan--In the sofa-appointed listening room of a
factory north of Tokyo, hi-fi fans can listen to vintage vinyl
records on a sound system costing $45,000, including a sleek silver
turntable. Musical choices include rock--the Eagles' "Hotel
California," sounding warm and vivid through four-foot-tall speakers
--jazz and classical.

Not on the menu: hip-hop.

Or disco. Or the thumping, floor-convulsing sounds of modern techno
or house music, which helped make the record player at the center of
this audiophile's paradise famous.

The turntable, the Technics SL-1200, may not enjoy the name
recognition of, say, Fender electric guitars or Steinway pianos. But
if you have watched a D.J. scratching furiously behind a rapper in
the last few decades, you have almost certainly seen one, or, more
likely, a deftly manipulated pair.

"It's the go-to," said Darby Wheeler, a documentary filmmaker whose
recent series for Netflix, "Hip-Hop Evolution," keeps avid SL-1200
spotters busy. The turntables pop up everywhere--on concert stages
and album covers and in the studios of genre legends like
Grandmaster Flash.

"At the after-party for 'Hip-Hop Evolution,' the club had another
brand," Mr. Wheeler recalled during a phone interview, in a tone
that suggested both mystification and embarrassment. "The D.J.
looked at me and said, 'What the hell, Darby, no 1200s?'"

That legacy seems like an easy sales hook for the Panasonic
Corporation of Japan, which has reintroduced the turntable to great
fanfare.

Panasonic has chosen mostly to ignore it.

"Our concept is analog records for hi-fi listening," said Hiro
Morishita, a creative director at Technics. "D.J.s are fine, too,
but as a marketing target it's problematic. We don't want to sell
the 1200 as the best tool for D.J.ing. The 1200 is the 1200."

It is a dilemma most marketers would long for: a product with a
built-in fan base and perhaps too much cultural cachet. For all
their passion, Panasonic calculated, the SL-1200's core customers
were not numerous enough, or rich enough, to make reviving the
Technics brand financially worthwhile. It needed to reach wealthy,
older audiophiles who would spend extravagantly on gear--not only
the turntable, but also the amplifier, speakers and other equipment
that the company markets alongside it.

And too few such people, it figured, appreciate the finer points of
hip-hop.

Hence the absence of Dr. Dre and the Beastie Boys in the factory's
listening room. And hence a new, more rarefied price: 330,000 yen,
or about $2,800, which is roughly four times its earlier cost.
Bedroom D.J.s without trust funds will struggle to buy one, let
alone the customary two.

Panasonic admits it struggled with how to acknowledge the SL-1200's
history and fans.

"There was a lot of debate," Mr. Morishita said. "Would we keep the
name? Would we change the design?" In the end, he said, the company
decided the turntable was too iconic to change drastically. The
latest version, the SL-1200G, has an upgraded motor and a few other
touches, but is otherwise the same as the players that Technics made
in decades past.

The main difference is in the marketing. Instead of sponsoring D.J.
contests, Technics has hired a German classical pianist, Alice Sara
Ott, to be its "global brand ambassador" and provided an SL-1200G to
Abbey Road Studios, of Beatles fame. Serene connoisseurship, not
sweaty nightclubs, is the theme.

"Listening to records is like tea ceremony, or flower arranging,"
said Michiko Ogawa, director of the Technics division. She added
that music recorded by live musicians showed off Technics's hi-fi
qualities best.

Panasonic is hardly the first company to try to change a product's
image, though most marketing makeovers are aimed in the other
direction--turning old and fusty into young and hip. Think "not
your father's Oldsmobile" or the rebranding of Old Spice cologne for
younger men. In a world where hip-hop and dance music have become
worldwide phenomena, sought after by marketers of everything from
energy drinks to running shoes, it is in some ways remarkable that
an authentic part of the culture has turned its back.

"It's unusual in that you've had relatively positive associations
and decided to disown that," said Ravi Dhar, a professor of
marketing at Yale.

"When the brand already has an image that is associated with certain
groups, if you try to move away from it, it's risky," he said. "But
for them, the associations weren't positive for the market they're
targeting."

Some famous users have been harsher. "They never really gave support
to the D.J. community," Jeffrey Allen Townes, better known as DJ
Jazzy Jeff, said in a Facebook post after the revival announcement,
criticizing Panasonic for high prices and for ignoring the consumers
who stuck by the SL-1200 during vinyl's lean years.

The SL-1200 was first made in the 1970s, and while plenty of other
record players have come and gone, none are as central to the global
culture of hip-hop and dance music.

"If you wanted to be taken seriously, you saved up and you bought a
pair," said Barrington Oakley, a veteran British D.J. who performs
under the name Cutmaster Swift and won a world D.J.ing championship
in 1989. Part of the prize: a gold-plated SL-1200. "The life of this
turntable has beaten all the odds."

In 2008, Panasonic said it was closing its Technics audio division
and would discontinue most of the division's products. Turntables
seemed like a particular extravagance, since hardly anyone listened
to records anymore. Panasonic dismantled the SL-1200 assembly line
and converted the factory to other uses, including an experimental
vegetable farm.

For die-hard fans, the decision was a blow. Prices of used SL-1200s
jumped. Devotees urged Panasonic to bring the machine back, starting
an online petition that eventually collected more than 27,000 names.

"The D.J.s of the world almost unanimously recognized that here was
the perfect record player," said Tony Prince, director of DMC World,
which organizes the long-running D.J. competition that Mr. Oakley
won. The turntable's stability, ruggedness and responsiveness to
coaxing fingers are hard to replicate on newer gear like CD players
or iPads--as is the look of spinning on authentic old-school
decks. Many pros kept using older SL-1200 models, often with
specially designed adapters so they could play digital music files
alongside their records.

"There's just something about the look and feel of 1200s," said
Richard Quitevis, a.k.a. D.J. Qbert, an American former world champ
who estimates he owns 20 older models, mostly received through
sponsorships. "I don't know anyone who's bought the new one," he
said. "It seems like it's mostly for collectors."

Two years ago, Panasonic swerved again, saying it was reviving the
Technics brand to target the premium end of the audio market. Vinyl
records were making a comeback, too. In a modest backlash against
digitization, record sales in the last couple of years have crept up
to their highest levels since the format's heyday. By early 2016,
the SL-1200 was back in production.

Panasonic emphasizes the effort that goes into making the
turntables, which are now produced at a different factory about two
hours from Tokyo. Only 20 are assembled a day, with most of the work
done by hand. Each unit's record platter is checked by lasers and
human workers to ensure perfect balance. A specially developed
machine drills tiny holes at strategic points in the undersides
until they spin just right. These days, such deliberately crafted
products are simply too costly to compete for a mass market.

"We brought the 1200 back just in time," Mr. Morishita said. "We're
very familiar with digital products now, but the know-how for this
kind of precision mechanical work is disappearing."

The company does not disclose sales numbers, but said an initial set
of 300 special-edition SL-1200Gs, made available online when sales
restarted this year, sold out in 30 minutes. Even at nearly $3,000,
the turntable may not make any money for Panasonic, instead serving
as a loss leader for other Technics products.

"I understand why they've done it, even if it's disappointing," Mr.
Oakley said of Technics's marketing strategy. "At least I've learned
how to repair my old ones."