Popeye? Why the Audacity!

Here is a yellow, five inch, 78 rpm record that is a touchstone of my childhood. Jack Mercer singing "I'm Popeye the Sailor Man!"

My original copy is long gone, but I've had this one for some years, now. I have not, however, owned 78 rpm turntable sice maybe 1978.

AUDACITY TO THE RESCUE!

I recorded a wav file with my turntable set to 45 rpm and then used the speed change option in the to convert the file from 45 rpm to 78 rpm.

It worked like a charm, but...

The original recording on the record was sped up so that it sounded like one of his nephews, rather than Popeye, himself, was singing.

AUDACITY TO THE RESCUE, ONCE AGAIN!

I found that by bringing the pitch down one whole note (from "C" to "B-flat") the sailor's voce was more natural. Well, as "natural" as Popeye's voice can sound.

It worked like a charm, but...

This record also had some pretty bad pops and click on it.

AUDACITY TO, well, you know.

I zoomed in on each click and used the "repair" tool to neutralize them. This works better than the click filter, I find, but it is infinitely more tedious.

One last tweak...

The last few seconds of the record had some fatal skips, so I edited in a repeat chorus and forced a fade out.

Click on the link, below, to download the resulting mp3.

POPEYE GOLDEN RECORD



Well, blow me down!