The Vengeful Turntable

Flashback to fall 2017:
There rests a large cardboard box in the middle of the living room in the House of VV.  Inside, a fancy new turntable ordered from Needle Doctor in Minnesota.  With the VVers having a busy week, and needing to rearrange their current electronics arrangement before setting up the new player, the box sat untouched for a few days.

Vengeful spookiness ensued.

Artist rendition of actual real imagined events

On the first night, the VVer's still-functioning basic model Audio-Technica turntable decided to make its voice heard.  It is important to preface this with the fact that since 2010 this AT has been the main platter spinner in the House of VV.  During that time it has gotten a ton of action, 100% reliable, aside from needing the occasional adjustment when the speed control got a little out of whack.  So what happened with the AT on this night you ask?  The tone arm refused to lower to the play the record.  You read that right.  The player refused to play.  Usually the process is simply to push the start button and the AT does all of the work, but not on this night.  The arm would raise, move to hover over the vinyl, and sit there thinking about lowering for a few seconds... then return to the cradle.  No joke.  It did this four times before the VVers applied some coaxing, lowering it freehand.  The VVers took note that it was behaving strangely and moved on.

While playing Soundgarden EP, Fopp, on the second night that the new box sat in the living room, there was a moment the VVers turned to each other with eyebrows raised.  "Oh! It's must be set to 45, the wrong speed!" (typical activity in the House of VV).  Upon pushing the button on the AT to change back to 33, it sped up even more, then equalized.  Apparently it was already at 33, then decided to push itself to 45.  It was definitely wrong and after toggling the buttons an extra time it played correctly at 33.  VVer1 could tell the song was initially wrong because "I was dancing--funk dancing--and Soundgarden is not that kinda band."  The speeds were strange, but it did add some extra fun juice to the synths on the f'ed-up "Fopp (Fucked Up Heavy dub remix)."  A happy off-speed accident?  More likely a message of warning that the house machine was not amused.

On the third night, the turntable chose to be extra well-behaved.  While the VVers were listening to an LP from Mr. Chuck Berry, the record had a skipping groove.  As VVer2 got up from playing Settlers of Catan with the neighbors, and before she made it to the turntable, the needle decided to fix itself declaring: "Look at me, I'm a great turntable!"  "Keep me!"  Thinking that everything was ok, the House of VV went back to the seemingly normal game of Catan, but as it turns out VVer1 was clearly possessed by the indomitable spirit of the turntable.  He spent the rest of the night cheating with total disregard for the rules of the board game while the old AT player spun merrily along.  Curse!

This was the last straw.  The VVers committed to setting up the new player that weekend, and with the viewing of several goofy YouTube videos, were able to get it into action.  "The tables have turned!"
"You've had your turn Mr. Bond!"

It's also possible that VVer1's Dead Cross album was the original source of the curse.  Obviously, right?  It arrived at the same time as the new turntable and with an evil glow in the dark cover and blood splattered vinyl too.  Listen to even one foreboding track and you may very well be convinced that this LP is in fact the origin of the trouble.  Impossibly fast, fierce, and eerie with the ear splitting vocals of Mike Patton (Faith No More), annihilating percussion from Dave Lombardo (Slayer), mangled mayhem guitars from Mike Crain (Retox), and pounding  bass from Justin Pearson (Retox, The Locust, and Head Wound City); these Dead Cross guys are just plain mean.

Flash forward to present(ish) day:
End of story, right?  Wrong.  The new table had all sorts of wingdings and gewgaws that needed adjusting to exact precision.  This took months to get right.  YouTube was helpful.  The instructions and home page of the new Pro-Ject player had some helpful tidbits a well.  But "months" is not an exaggeration.  While everything is going well these days, it had been a mental leap to have to manage something that used to so easily and effectively manage itself.  Beware!

Double flash forward to the year 2076:
From their record-shaped flying saucer, the VVers activate their teleportation device and empty out their storage unit finding the AT!  It has grown horns and acquired a trident, but still sounds great when played.  The VVers of the future applaud the VVers of the past for deciding to keep the vengeful turntable around for the next generation of those possessed with the vinyl hobby.