Fascinating turntable cameos in popular media: Looking at the iconic bird beak turntable in Flintstones.

The Flintstones is a quintessentially American sit-com, a classic of the animated shows aimed at adults, and in addition to quite literally pioneering the genre and thus setting the standards for all the shows that would follow it. The series takes place in a romanticized Stone Age setting and follows the activities of the titular family, the Flintstones, and their next-door neighbours, the Rubbles. The continuing popularity of The Flintstones rests heavily on its juxtaposition of modern everyday concerns in the Stone Age setting.

The show was the longest-running and most successful animated show made for TVs before Simpsons broke that record. The Flintstones was also the first animated show in American history to get a prime-time slot, which, traditionally, was reserved for the more conventional dramas. 

The basic story follows, Fred and his family, Fred is a corporate employee, or at least is an equivalent of the modern corporate employee in the fantastical prehistoric era he lives in. The show is set in a comical version of the Stone Age but, has added features and technologies that resemble mid-20th-century suburban America. The plots deliberately resemble the sitcoms of the era, with the caveman Flintstone and Rubble families getting into minor conflicts characteristic of modern life. The show is set in the Stone Age town of Bedrock. Dinosaurs and other prehistoric creatures are portrayed as co-existing with cavemen, sabre-toothed cats, and woolly mammoths.

Animation historian Christopher P. Lehman considers that the series draws its humour in part from creative uses of anachronisms. And he is bang on the point, This society has modern home appliances, but they work by employing animals.

This also nicely segues to our discussion about popular turntable cameos, (pretty neat right!) and even though due to the nature of the medium, we can’t point towards any specific real-world turntable they resemble, but one still can’t stop from marvelling, and maybe chuckling a tad at the innovative bird’s beak needles and the classy stone deck, (hitting the two proverbial birds of reviving a dying art form and introducing a new generation too) which, curiously rabid fans have replicated with their decks. 

Read about: Tintin Creator’s Vinyl Collection and Turntable Set-up at in Brussels