STRANGE BUT TRUE: The Bib Video Alarm! Our Fellow Videovore Al “Sauce” Moschetti Take Us Back to His Trip Into the Wild Where He Found One Groovy and Weird Analog Era Gadget!
In the world of contemporary VHS collecting, the profusion of online auctions, explosion of internet-based collecting forums and extension of the “pick, post and flip” trend with video tapes has seemingly provided an endless ocean of analog delights awaiting every Videovore courtesy of their world weird web portal. It’s now easier than ever to clickity-click your way to a virtual treasure chest of black plastic gold, fire up the PAYPAL and then eagerly await your new slab o’ analog to arrive, hopefully devoid of any bubble mailer disasters.
But over here in Lunchmeat Land, lest the magnetic-crazed masses forget about the undeniable excitement and potential glory of rooting through thrift stores, dirt malls and various other incarnations of the wild, we’ve cooked up a little mix of our classic “Strange But True!” with a short yet so sweet anecdote of an exciting analog excavation from my fellow Videovore and all around groovy dude Al “Sauce” Moschetti.
So, without any further ado, I’ll let The Sauceman give you a little insight on how he ventured into the wild and uncovered one of the most outrageously radical video era gadgets to ever be unearthed: the BIB Video Alarm! Take it away, my man…
! I went nuts when I picked it up. Made in England and the oddest gadget I've ever seen. I've never seen another and don't think I ever will, so it was a must to sit alongside my collection… the icing on the cake! I'm scared to hear it work… I might pop an eardrum! He also had brand new head cleaners from the same BIB label, but I let those sit. My friend found a car tape rewinder and I know you collect those but he kept it… ”
PROTECT YO'SELF AND YOUR VCR. This thing RULES.
“I got it at an estate sale with my friend the other day. The guy that owned this house must've worked for a movie distribution company or something. I raided his filing cabinet and he had catalogs for BFV Video and RCA all types of weird shit that hinted he had something to do with movie distro. He had thousands of movies. I mean he stored them EVERYWHERE: In his kitchen cabinets, office, living room, and scattered throughout the house. We had an incredible hit there. All sorts of rare tapes. We even found some really, really rare porno tapes from VHL, Cal Vista, etc... He had these incredible hard plastic cases in which he protected every tape… all different types of storage. You could tell this guy loved film. He had high end DVD and Blu-ray equipment as well as cassette players, 8-tracks, etc. I mean this guy was INTO IT. The decor of the house was so 70's it ain't even funny. Rock walls in the living room, chartreuse painted walls and everything. Among all these tapes I saw this
A look at the Bib Video Alarm in the case. Menacing, man. This is all business.
Aww, hey, that’s a-okay, Sauce! Finders Keepers, mang! Plus, I gots plenty of rewinders, so more power to him! A-Rewind Racing he (we) will go! DIG IT!
Impossible, eh? What happens when I accidentally set it off and the keys slipped into The Twilight Zone? Looks like HAMMER TIME to stop the pure analog agony, brotherrrr.
But back to the Video Alarm itself, this bad boy is advertised to max out at a “deafening” 98db (apparently from INSIDE the VCR), so we can see why The Sauceman would be hesitant to test it out. However, after a hasty internet search it seems 98db is about as loud as a hand drill or some large farm equipment. While not exactly ear-shattering, this analog-oriented alarm is certainly loud enough to scare off any video bandits trying to gank your playback machine… or defy any unwanted watchers! And, to be fair, it is noted that prolonged exposure to anything at 98db is liable to cause hearing damage and / or loss, so the “deafening” gimmick sticks on this one, but only in that conditional sort of way. Isn’t marketing grand?!
Awww, man, it's a scream?! Like, one of those cheapo Halloween toy screams? A man can dream.
So, my fellow Videovores, there you have it: Just one more fast and fun story from the wild, bolstering the fact that there’s just no telling what kind of groovy video era goodies you might find outside of that computer screen. Sure, you can point, click and obtain, but the thrill, the experience and the memories that are created from haulin’ your caboose out into cluttered, crowded, crusty and ultimately unpredictable second-hand spaces, well, that’s just something the internet can never offer. And that’s pretty groovy.