It's vintage

[scott]

Just wondering what the word vintage conjures up for you guys. Because to me it always used to mean something that was from the 70's or older but to think about it, thats not what it means at all is it? Vintage comes the age or year of a crop of grapes. So the word vintage by itself doesn't mean anything. You could say vintage guitar and mean something built last year. Theres even a brand of guitars called vintage so now you can buy a '54 vintage telecaster reissue relic replica thats was built 6 months ago! Don't get me wrong this isn't a whinge or anything, and you would be a fool to think that just because it was built in the 60's it's gonna be a great piece of gear whatever it is, but I for one am a little tired of all this trading on the past. Anybody else a little sick of this kind of marketing in the audio game?

[Dominic]

I think (if this is not correct please let me know) the term 'vintage' as an age indicator applies to something 30years old and more, and something of 25years is a classic, perhaps we should start using 'circa' instead.

[Thirteen]

It is a winemaking term, but it is also a cheesemaking term. I think applies as well to cars that from 1919 to 1930, where veteran is applied to cars to 1918. It then fell into use to describe old clothing. When it comes to things like guitars, amps, synths, handheld games, trading cards and even computers, the term falls into the relative timeline of the existence of the item, so if for instance personal computers have been around since the mid 70's, then anything from the first 10-15 years would probably be called vintage, such as Microbee's, TRS80's, Apple II's Atari's and so on. Guitars have a much longer history so vintage guitars would be pre 50's I guess. It is an example of an industry specific term migrating to other uses through common useage because it works and gets the meaning across, the same as the word "printing" migrated to the recording studio to describe the process of recording to tape, the english language is full of them.

I agree with you in that when words are misused to give something undeserved cachet it becomes really tiresome. It is almost always done by someone trying to sell you something, and almost always to give something the image of being something that it is not, so you get Ebay sellers calling just about anything older than 5 years "vintage" or "retro" to try and take advantage of people's obsession with subculture. Corporations love calling things vintage, even though what they actually are selling is a piece of software or a board full of surface mount DSP's. See also : Warm, Fat, Analog, Retro and Classic.

[Ausrock]

I see another unfortunate aspect to the "marketing use" of the word.....................due to it's common and/or historical association with particularly wine and cheese, the term "vintage" usually refers to something which, because of it's age, is in some way, superior to newer product.....................it is this connotation of the word that so many manufacturers are trading on.

[scott]

That s weird. I just turned on the TV and the guy was talking about sub $20 supermarket wines. "...now these are all last years vintage..."

[Howard Jones]

the term "vintage" usually refers to something which, because of it's age, is in some way, superior to newer product.....................

A common mistake, and one to which I was referring in another thread with my rave about old mixers. Old does not automatically equal good, okay or anything else. If you hear the word "vintage", you should have your bullshit detectors on full alert.

[astrovic]

with wine - whether or not it was the original intention, vintage is used to describe the year the wine was bottled (e.g 2003 vintage, 1996 vintage, 1998 vintage Barossa...mmmm, 1998 vintage Barossa...) Actually, I suspect that this was the original usage of the word ("vin" etc) and it got mutated to mean "old". But I'm making it up now.

Re: music gear - it's a horses for courses thing. Guitars pre 1970, synths pre, say, the DX7, studio gear from the '70's or older - kinda depends on the nature of the products and their development, I guess.

[Ausrock]

Courtesy of a dictionary...............:

Vintage n 1 the wine obtained from a particular harvest of grapes. 2 the harvest from which such harvest is obtained. 3 a time of origin: an open-necked shirt of uncertain vintage. ~adj 4 (of wine) of an outstandingly good year. 5 representative of the best and most typical: a vintage Saint Laurent dress. [Latin:vindamia]

Howard,

#5 seems to cover my previous comment fairly well. ;-)

[Howard Jones]

representative of the best and most typical

Ha ha, this gives the BS purveyors some latitude, no? In terms of audio gear, the most typical is usually not the best. In fact, I might go so far as to say that the best is the best precisely because is not typical.

[norm]

The word vintage is a generic term. To my way of thinking it denotes those items which thru age are now no longer available in the It would be a major mistake to equate vintage with quality in most items regularly listed under this term new retail sense. I use the term for ebay searches as it is commonly associated with some of the gear I am looking to purchase. It would be a major mistake to assume vintage equates with quality in my view. Norm

[TimS]

So what would be a vintage mic pre?
If vintage means timeline, then alot of '70s mic pres are vintage..

[Howard Jones]

We didn't have mic pres in the 70s, not as standalone items, anyway.