When I started writing songs decades ago, I used a “miniature” cassette recorder (about the size of a small brick) that I bought at a garage sale. It was the kind used by secretaries and executives for voice recording. So the sound quality wasn’t very good, but it was perfectly adequate for recording my voice or guitar during brainstorming sessions.
It was also simple enough that I could grab it when I thought of a melody or lyric (possibly in my sleep) and needed to record it quickly, and with a minimum of startup actions. I could feel for the record button in the dark, blurt out my idea, and get back to sleep.
I’ve tried various digital recording devices, and haven’t found one that suits my needs.
Some of them look simple enough in the ad. But when I try them out in the store, there’s a bootup procedure that requires better vision than I have (espcially in the dark) and takes longer than I have when I need to jot something down quickly in the middle of the night.
IT designers always seem to assume we users have nothing better to do than wait for their glorious products to spin up to full commercial sentience. “Why write music? You can buy much better music from us!”
But I digress.
There are lots of voice-activated digital recorders out there. Those could be right for my brainstorming sessions (assuming I could pause the voice-activated recording while I’m working details out - is that a common feature?)
But can those recorders be activated from “brick” mode as quickly and easily as I need, in the middle of the night?
I’d love to find one of those cassette recorders. But they’re probably valuable collectors items, costing more than my house.
Progress, my eye.
