Videocassette recorders finally rendered obsolete

The long anticipated day has finally arrived. After some 45 years, the hardware behind the one-time omnipresent VHS (Video Home System), the Video Cassette Recorders (VCR) — for those that still remember — has finally ended its useful life. The last surviving company behind the VCR, Funai Electric Corporation, the Japanese headquartered company that also has a subsidiary in the US — selling products under both its own brand name and in the names of Emerson, Magnavox, and Sanyo, among others —announced end-July that production of the once-revolutionary “time-shifting video recording and playback machine” had ended.

Apparently there are still millions of VHS VCRs being operated globally (with an estimated 46% of U.S. households still having at least one such device) but, with sales of VCRs that provided an ability to record video images onto VHS tapes dropping to only 750,000 units globally in 2015, manufacturer Funai justifiably called it quits.

For historical reference, the VHS VCR was developed in 1971 by the Japanese Victor Company — more popularly known as JVC — with the goal of providing an affordable way to both record and play back TV programmes, often of a channel that was not being viewed. VCRs could be programmed to record telecasts — across channels — in advance. VHS reached the consumer market in 1976, about a year after Sony’s rival BETAMAX videocassette format. Although, Funai’s own format — VC — never took off in the bargain, Funai launched its first VHS VCR in 1984.

By then, VHS was the dominant home entertainment video format, relegating BETAMAX to niche-status. However, my first exposure to this new and unique video viewing concept occurred on a Sony BETAMAX player itself when, in 1980, I was offered an opportunity of viewing a British docu-drama called Death Of A Princess. It was based on a true story that occurred in the Middle East of a young princess and her paramour being publicly executed for adultery. Simultaneously, the other fascination for me was listening to the film’s soundtrack (notably, the songs named Alpha and Pulsar), which I subsequently gathered was composed by Greek keyboardist Vangelis, who went onto to achieve further global fame the following year with the soundtrack of Chariots Of Fire.

With the popularity of the videocassette, VHS gave rise to both the chain and “mom-and-pop” video rental industry where book libraries were “converted”, virtually overnight, into video rental outlets (I distinctly recall Shemaroo at Mumbai’s Nepean Sea Road being one of them) and cinema halls giving way to shopping malls (the Oscar/Amber/Mini cinema complex at Mumbai’s Andheri (west) being converted into Shoppers Stop is another primary example).

For music listeners like me, the videocassette was certainly a true boon. While most followers of music videos credit the likes of Michael Jackson (Thriller, and other tracks from his 1982 album) or Queen, whose Bohemian Rhapsody in 1975 is generally considered as the first video to support a song, as being the progenitors of today’s music video, in actuality, it is the movies based on musicals that deserve that credit. They were almost like one extended music video or, alternatively, could be considered as several music videos stitched together with intervals of dialogue which deserve that credit. Take many familiar musical theatre works that have been the basis for popular musical films as examples: Oklahoma!, Carousel, The King And I, The Sound Of Music, West Side Story and My Fair Lady. Consider South Pacific as an ideal example where colour filters were utilised to fit the mood of the depicted scene containing songs.

Nevertheless, with the introduction of the Grammy Awards into India, both the pre-Grammies, and a recording of the actual event (first in 1984, if I remember correctly) — sponsored by the company behind the ‘Only Vimal’ brand — it truly changed viewing habits for music forever. Effectively, among the most treasured “gifts” that people brought from abroad, for me, were VHS recordings of US cable channel Music Television, more popularly known as MTV!

Although videocassettes were a very popular and practical option for recording and watching TV shows, movies and, of course, music, as the ’90s arrived, newer options became available, which began the slow decline in the popularity of the VHS. Now, of course, downloads/streaming has put paid to all physical formats but, for those who were either born during or underwent the video era of the past, nothing changes the fact that it remained a revolutionary education in entertainment that has now moved, in this generation, into the era of the Internet.

The writer has been part of the media and entertainment business for over 23 years. He still continues to pursue his hobby, and earns an income out of it.