You sitting at a
stoplight, waiting patiently for the
light to
turn when you feel it: your car begins to
tremble. It begins as
almost a
subliminal sensation, but it begins to
grow. Suddenly,
you feel your
auto buffetted by
wave upon wave of
vibration.
You look around and realize that what you are feeling is the
result of the
car behind you whose
driver has the windows rolled
down and the
stereo cranked to its highest
volume, putting its
woofers and sub-woofers to a
stress test far beyond the
factory
specifications. Unpleasant as this little
episode is,
imagine if someone asked you to
pay four dollars to experience
this off and on for two hours. That is what people did in the
summer of 1974.
It was called Sensurround and was the latest of the sensory experience
to come out of Hollywood. This new technology was tied to the
latest in summer disaster movies in the early to mid-70's, Earthquake.
The movie starred Charlton Heston, Ava Gardner, Genevieve Bujold
Walter Matthau, and the obligatory appearance by George Kennedy and
featured a sound system that would make the theater shake from the
sound being sent through the woofers and sub-woofers.
This new technology won Ronald Pierce and Melvin Metcalfe, Sr.
the Academy Award for sound that year.