The most “futuristic” piece of vinyl in my record collection, by far, would have to be the Fabulous Las Vegas Roulette multi-track LP. To fully appreciate the specialness of this disc, I must first bring up that classic Trivial Pursuit question:
Q: How many grooves are on one side of a standard LP?
A: Wait for it ………………………………… exactly one.
However, unlike every other record in my LP collection, Fabulous Las Vegas Roulette has 38 grooves: one for each of the numbered pockets on the roulette wheel. Each groove leads the listener to a 30-second “live” recording of a roulette wheel spin (for example, 13 in the black) that a tonearm stylus — when placed at the edge of the record — could theoretically select at random and play. Thus, you are the croupier, and your home becomes “the house” when you use this multi-track LP version to play the French casino game with family and friends (though possibly in defiance of state and/or federal law).
In actual practice, however, I found that certain grooves on my copy played much more frequently than others. Consequently, just for a challenge, I attempted to make individual recordings for each of the 38 grooves and then copy the 38 “clean” recordings onto a single CD for playback on a compact disc player with built-in capability for random song selection. Unfortunately, three of the grooves never came into contact with my turntable style despite many dozens of attempts. Thus, in order to complete my disc, I had to fabricate three of the recordings with the help of a microphone and my Yamaha REX 50 effects unit – here are two of them:
Album produced in 1974 by Multi-Track Sound Enterprises of Glendale, California – includes fold-out paper roulette board.