There is something fascinating about a phonograph cartridge. The dipping and swaying movements are almost mesmerising as it makes its graceful journey to the centre of the record. It has a tangible quality that we can appreciate more than a CD. We can see the needle touching the record, literally reading the music.

The record needle is also symbolic, and not just of music. The dexterity shown by a person who can manually lift or place the stylus on a record testifies to countless hours spent listening to music and thus their passions and tastes. It also symbolises history and heritage. We may remember our parents using record players and it connects us to them.

The M44-7 is an icon because its journey embodies this nostalgia, because it links our past and present. It poignantly recalls an era inhabited by phonographs when analogue was king, before it traced a path through three technical and cultural revolutions - jukeboxes and rock ‘n’ roll, digital and CDs and hip-hop and turntablism.

Even in the midst of a fourth revolution - digital controller DJing - the cartridge excels. When used in Digital Vinyl Systems (DVS) the 44-7 is just as good at reading digital timecode from a record since the principles are the same. Add to this the recent resurgence in vinyl use and it seems, for now at least, further resuscitation of the M44-7 will not be required.

When I ask Bill how they will celebrate the 50th anniversary of the 44-7 I am expecting a big marketing campaign. “We’ll definitely do one of our vinyl sessions - we’ll hang out and play 45s and drink small batch beer” was the answer. This says a lot about Shure as a company - they prefer to let the quality of the products speak for themselves. In our saturated collective consciousness full of advertising white noise, this is refreshing.

“We don’t try to fluff it, that’s just not what we do”, he says. “Others are welcome to do that, there’s nothing wrong with that. But we, as an audio company, stand by old-school audio engineering principles and if it does what we intend it to do, then that’s the success and it’s all the success we need. If it doesn’t do what we intended it to do then we shouldn’t be making it and we’ll fix it.

“Audio is just a beautiful thing and I think this cartridge sums up classical engineering.”

Macho Zapp would like to wholeheartedly thank:

Shure, Bill Needlz, Paul Crognale

Brett Palmer

Adam Butler

DJ Yogafrog

DJ Qbert

Tony Prince

Rob Thomas

Ross Blomgren

Gert J. Almind

John Papa

Extra special thanks to:

Mark Johnson of www.slowmo.co.uk

For more information on Shure's fabulous cartridge see here.