The cat is back! She was here before as a cassette player, yelping a script that resembled a 1970’s British dominatrix. But here she’s obviously more comfortable with popular music than dreary light classics.
The case folds up into a neat little case, with cat at front and five 10cm double sided discs in a back slot: Techno, Hip Hop, Pop, Jazz and Country. The power switch is at the back where small fingers won’t fiddle.
Open the case and snap any disc onto the turntable. Stretch the yellow play arm out onto the record and it spins. (The cat hangs on but thankfully is not given to scratching). Each disc side has multiple tracks selected by the orange paw print at the right and then played by the yellow button at the bottom. These songs are full digital samples – not actually on the discs but selected from the unit by scanning the white bar codes printed on the label. The blue button has the cat announce the genre and the guest animal on the label.
As always the audience is not the child but the parents who buy it for the child. They may prefer Techno over Country or vice versa – the child won’t give a hoot, In reality the tunes are all pretty much the same ‘lets have a party with lots of cake’ sound. But it does illustrate an interface I find refreshing in some way – something that is only now appearing on professional gear.
The Evolution of an Idea
VTech have the luxury of decades of development in children’s record players. Apparently the first dedicated turntable was the original Fisher Price wind up toy from 1971.
{I own one of these but this image from the Internet looks better than my photo.} Notice that the discs have little pegs on them – these twang the metal teeth under the front of the stylus. It’s just a music box, with swappable discs.
Mine is very weary and the teeth have had much twanging over the years. It needs a service. Sigh.
This updated version was released some time later (the exact year is hard to pin down). STOP Look closely to see what has changed…
The little teeth are gone. Instead the discs have ridges which push up on sensors identifying the record. The music box sound is played from inside the machine.
(Another clue to the age – the paper stickers are not on the sides.)
I’m not sure who jumped on the bandwagon next. Was it VTech with their cat – don’t think so – it’s only been around the traps a short while. More likely Fisher Price with the Rockin’ Record Player.
If so the label code idea comes from their labs. But it seems to be a long code around the full spin of the disc.
I like the cat here. I think you get just as much ‘authenticity’ as you do from putting real records on turntables (i.e. it’s still very silly). Again, I think the music instrument makers have some ideas waiting for them.
:::zips over to a frantic eBay search:::