Amy Grantham; © Bosie Vincent/Sky VisionRock ‘n’ Roll Inventions, the new six-part Smithsonian Channel series focusing on the history of the technology used to play, record and listen to music, premieres tonight at 8 p.m. ET/PT. Graham Nash and The Kinks‘ Dave Davies are among the music stars who appear in the debut episode, titled “This Damn Music,” which takes a look at the ways listening to recorded music has changed over the years.
Among the devices and topics profiled in the show are wind-up gramophones, 78-rpm discs, vinyl records, transistor radios, jukeboxes, cassettes, CDs, MTV, digital downloads and streaming music. Nash and Davies both share their recollections about listening to 78-rpm discs when they were young, while Graham also recalls listening to U.K.’s famous pirate radio stations and talks about the development of the CD.
Other music artists interviewed in the show include Booker T. Jones, Big Audio Dynamite DJ Don Letts, Mike Oldfield, Gary Numan, Moby and The Human League‘s Martyn Ware. Later episodes will feature ex-Yes keyboardist Rick Wakeman and Police guitarist Andy Summers.
For more details about the series, visit SmithsonianChannel.com.
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