George Brock-Nannestad wrote:

> At EMI, lacquer was used for colonial recording from the late 1930s; I 
> suppose this logistic choice was sensible and outweighed the increased noise 
> that would be masked by the shellac mixture. And the end users were probably 
> not esteemed as being quality-conscious.

That, and the colonial buyers were likely as not listening on cheap 
suitcase portables, which would not have the frequency range of a more 
expensive floor model....although I would think that any surface noise 
would actually be MORE noticeable on suitcases, since they didn't 
reproduce the bass range all that well.

Michael Shoshani
Chicago