Earth Day: The Victrola Re-Spin and Sustainability in Music

3 Min Read

April 22 marks Earth Day, meant to serve as a day of support for our environment. First celebrated in 1970, Earth Day began as a demonstration to draw attention to the growing cause of environmentalism. Today, Earth Day is celebrated worldwide, as more and more people have embraced the environmental cause and made efforts to promote sustainability. Environmental advocacy has been present in music for most of the last century, and as an organization that believes music matters, we at Victrola decided to make sustainability a prominent feature of one of our newer products, the Re-Spin Bluetooth Suitcase Record Player.

The Victrola Re-Spin

Victrola designed the Re-Spin with a focus on sound and sustainability. It is a reimagining of the standard suitcase record player, featuring the best sound in its class, and made from 25% recycled plastic. The Re-Spin is unlike any suitcase record player on the market today, with a built-in, custom tuned speaker enclosure, allowing you to play your vinyl records at any volume without the risk of skipping and scratching. Our favorite records can be some of our most prized possessions, and a scratch can be a devastating thing to deal with. The Re-Spin allows us to keep our vinyl intact, so it can help us make music memories for as long as we want.

The Re-Spin also comes equipped with a downward facing, passive bass radiator delivering tremendous bass and depth of sound, a feature that is virtually unprecedented in the suitcase category. If you want to play your records through an external Bluetooth speaker, Vinyl Stream technology allows you to do just that, without the use of any wires. The Re-Spin also allows for wireless Bluetooth connectivity, so you can stream music directly from your smart device.

The Re-Spin's sustainable construction makes it far lighter than your average suitcase record player, allowing us to ship more units per pallet, and its box is fully recyclable as well. Of course, the Re-Spin is just the latest in a long line of environmentalism in music, and we believe it is vitally important to honor those who paved the way.

Environmentalism and Music

Though environmentalism has been present in popular music for most of the 20th century, interest in the topic spiked in the 1960s, with the publication of Rachel Carson's Silent Spring and the burgeoning counterculture movement. Pete Seeger (pictured above), a prominent folk musician and political activist, released what is widely considered to be the first environmentalist record, with 1966's God Bless the Grass. On it, Seeger makes plenty of reference to pollution and the general message of treating the planet we live on and its resources with respect.

The environmental movement grew in popularity throughout the ensuing decades, culminating in the 1980s with the release of Greenpeace — The Album. Musical superstars such as George Harrison, Queen, and The Pretenders contributed songs to the compilation record meant to raise funds for Greenpeace. In 2007, a concert series called Live Earth was held, with concerts held on all seven continents to raise awareness and funds to combat the effects of climate change. The environment and our impact on it remains a popular topic in music today, as the threat of climate change has only increased.

Vinyl and Sustainability

It shouldn't come as much of a surprise that vinyl records are difficult to produce. Some in the industry have tried to combat this in new and interesting ways. Musician Nick Mulvey, for example, cut his 2019 single, In the Anthropecene, on a record made from recycled ocean plastic. Others, such as Ninja Tune's Peter Quicke, have suggested making lighter-weight pressings from sustainably created PVC. Vinyl, however, is unlike most other physical media, as records are seen as heirlooms rather than a disposable product. Most vinyl enthusiasts would never dream of throwing out their records. Many of us have inherited records from family, and frequently go thrifting for older, rare finds. Vinyl is meant to stay with us, something to carry as we get older and pass along to younger generations, making lifelong music memories.