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Video Home System

Top view of VHS cassette with ruler for scale
Media type	Video recording media
Encoding	FM on magnetic tape
Developed by	JVC (Victor Company of Japan)
Usage	Home video, Home movie

The Video Home System^[1] (better known by its abbreviation VHS^[2]) is a consumer-level analog recording videotape-based cassette standard developed by Victor Company of Japan (JVC).

The 1970s was a period when video recording became a major contributor to the television industry. Like many other technological innovations, each of several companies made an attempt to produce a television recording standard that the majority of the world would embrace. At the peak of it all, the home video industry was caught up in a series of videotape format wars. Two of the formats, VHS and Betamax, received the most media exposure. VHS would eventually win the war, and therefore succeed as the dominant home video format, lasting throughout the tape format period.^[3]

In later years, optical disc formats began to offer better quality than video tape. The earliest of these formats, Laserdisc, was not widely adopted, but the subsequent DVD format eventually did achieve mass acceptance and replaced VHS as the preferred method of distribution after 2000.^[4] By 2006, film studios in the United States had stopped releasing new movie titles in VHS format. On December 31, 2008, the last major United States supplier of pre-recorded VHS tapes, Distribution Video Audio Inc. of Palm Harbor, Florida, shipped its final truckload.^[2] As of 2010^[update], most of the VHS tapes being produced are 6 and 8 hour blank tapes.

History[link]

JVC HR-3300EG - a revision of the world's first VHS-based VCR. The original HG-3300 released in Japan lacked the LED display and button-based programming.

In 1971, JVC engineers Yuma Shiraishi and Shizuo Takano led the effort in developing the VHS tape format.^[5] JVC originally collaborated with Sony Corporation and Matsushita Electric (aka Panasonic, National in Japan) in building a home video standard for the Japanese consumer.^[6] Soon after, Sony and Matsushita broke away from the collaboration effort, in order to work on video recording formats of their own. Sony started working on Betamax, while Matsushita started working on VX.

By the end of 1971, JVC produced an internal document titled VHS Development Matrix. In the document, it listed twelve objectives in building a home video recording unit.^[7] Suddenly, the commercial video recording industry in Japan took a financial hit. As a result, JVC cut its budgets and restructured its video division - even going as far as shelving the VHS project. However, despite the lack of funding for the VHS project, Takano and Shiraishi continued to work on the project in secrecy. By 1973, the two engineers successfully produced a functional prototype.^[7]

In 1974, the Japanese government started a standards war of its own. The Ministry of International Trade and Industry (MITI) attempted to force the Japanese video industry to standardize on just one recording format, for the sake of saving the country from consumer confusion of having too many video formats on the market to choose from.^[8] Later, Sony had a functional prototype of the Betamax format, and was very close to releasing a finished product. With this prototype, Sony persuaded the MITI to adopt Betamax as the standard, and allow it to license the technology to other companies.^[7]

JVC believed that an open standard worked in the best interest of the consumer, as sharing the format among competitors without licensing the technology was better for the consumer. To prevent the MITI from adopting Betamax, JVC made an attempt to have other companies accept VHS, and thereby work against Sony and the MITI.^[9] It was a major key to have Matsushita on-board because Matsushita was Japan's largest electronics manufacturer at the time.^[9] JVC succeeded in persuading Matsushita to back the VHS format because Matsushita was afraid to allow Sony to become a leader, and Betamax could only record one hour of video.^[9] Matsushita's backing of JVC persuaded Mitsubishi and Sharp to back the VHS standard as well.^[7] Sony's release of its Betamax unit to the Japanese market in 1975 placed further pressure on the MITI to side with the company. However, the collaboration of JVC, Matsushita, Mitsubishi and Sharp was much stronger, and eventually lead the MITI to drop its push for an industry standard.

Initial releases of VHS-based devices[link]

The first VCR to use VHS was the Victor HR-3300, and was introduced by the president of JVC at the Okura Hotel on September 9, 1976.^[10][11] JVC started selling the HR-3300 in Akihabara, Tokyo, Japan on October 31, 1976.^[10] The United States received its first VHS-based VCR - the RCA VBT200 on August 23, 1977.^[12] The RCA unit was designed by Matsushita, and was the first VHS-based VCR manufactured by a company other than JVC. The United Kingdom later received its first VHS-based VCR - the Victor HR-3300EK in 1978.^[13]

Quasar and General Electric would follow-up with VHS-based VCRs - all designed by Matsushita.^[14] By 1978, Matsushita alone produced just over half of all Japanese VCRs.^[15]

Technical details[link]

Cassette and tape design[link]

Bottom view of VHS with magnetic tape exposed

Top view of VHS with front casing removed

The VHS cassette is a 187 mm wide, 103 mm deep, 25 mm thick plastic shell held together with five Phillips head screws. The flip-up cover that protects the tape has a built-in latch with a push-in toggle on the right side (see bottom view image). The VHS cassette also includes an anti-despooling mechanism (see the top view): several plastic parts near the front label end of the cassette between the two spools. The spool brakes are released by a push-in lever within a 6.35 mm hole accessed from the bottom of the cassette, about 19.05 mm in from the edge label.

There is a clear tape leader at both ends of the tape to provide an optical auto-stop for the VCR transport mechanism. A light source is inserted into the cassette through the circular hole in the center of the underside when loaded in the VCR, and two photodiodes are located to the left and right sides of where the tape exits the cassette. When the clear tape reaches one of these, enough light will pass through the tape to the photodiode to trigger the stop function; in more sophisticated machines it will start rewinding the cassette when the trailing end is detected. Early VCRs used an incandescent bulb as the light source, which regularly failed and caused the VCR to erroneously think that a cassette is loaded when empty, or would detect the blown bulb and stop functioning completely. Later designs use an infrared LED which had a much longer lifetime.

The recording media is a 12.7 mm wide magnetic tape wound between two spools, allowing it to be slowly passed over the various playback and recording heads of the video cassette recorder. The tape speed is 3.335 cm/s for NTSC, 2.339 cm/s for PAL.

VHS M-loading system.

As with almost all cassette-based videotape systems, VHS machines pull the tape from the cassette shell and wrap it around the head drum which rotates at 1800 rpm in NTSC machines^[16] and at 1500 rpm for PAL. VHS machines, in contrast to Betamax and Beta's predecessor U-matic, use an "M-loading" system, also known as M-lacing, where the tape is drawn out by two threading posts and wrapped around more than 180 degrees of the head drum (and also other tape transport components) in a shape roughly approximating the letter M.

Tracking adjustment and index marking[link]

Another linear control track, at the tape's lower edge, holds pulses that mark the beginning of every frame of video; these are used to fine-tune the tape speed during playback and to get the rotating heads exactly on their helical tracks rather than having them end up somewhere between two adjacent tracks (a feature called tracking). Since good tracking depends on the exact distance between the rotating drum and the fixed control/audio head reading the linear tracks, which usually varies by a couple of micrometers between machines due to manufacturing tolerances, most VCRs offer tracking adjustment, either manual or automatic, to correct such mismatches.

The control can additionally hold index marks. These are normally written at the beginning of each recording session, and can be found using the VCR's index search function: this will fast-wind forward or backward to the nth specified index mark, and resume playback from there. There was a time when higher-end VCRs provided functions for manually removing and adding these index marks — so that, for example, they coincide with the actual start of the television program — but this feature has become hard to find in recent models.

By the late 1990s, some high-end VCRs offered more sophisticated indexing. For example, Panasonic's Tape Library system assigned an ID number to each cassette, and logged recording information (channel, date, time and optional program title entered by the user) both on the cassette and in the VCR's memory for up to 900 recordings (600 with titles).^[17]

Recording capacity[link]

The interior of a modern VHS VCR showing the drum and tape.

A VHS cassette holds a maximum of about 430 m (1,410 ft.) of tape at the lowest acceptable tape thickness, giving a maximum playing time of about 4 hours in an DF480 for NTSC and five hours in an E-300 for PAL at "standard play" (SP) quality. Other speeds include "long play" (LP) (Not all VCRs include this record mode), and "extended play" (EP) or "super long play" (SLP); For NTSC, LP and EP/SLP doubles and triples the recording time accordingly, but these speed reductions cause a slight reduction in video quality - from the normal 250 lines in SP, to 230 analog lines horizontal. Also, video recorded onto tapes at the lower speed often exhibit poor playback performance on recorders other than the one they were produced on. As a result, commercial pre-recorded tapes were almost always recorded in SP mode. In some cases, budget labels such as Video Treasures (both LP and EP), Starmaker (EP), Burbank Video (LP), Avid Home Entertainment (EP), GoodTimes Entertainment (LP), and even Disney (LP) and Paramount (EP) commonly used a slower speed to reduce the amount of tape required as a cost-saving method.

Video recording[link]

VHS tapes have approximately 3 MHz of video bandwidth and 400 kHz of chroma bandwidth, which is achieved at a relatively low tape speed by the use of helical scan recording of a frequency modulated luminance (black and white) signal, with a down-converted "color under" chroma (color) signal recorded directly at the baseband. Each helical track contains a single field ('even' or 'odd' field, equivalent to half a frame) encoded as an analog raster scan, similar to analog TV broadcasts. The horizontal resolution is 170 lines per scanline, and the vertical resolution (the number of scanlines) is the same as the respective analog TV standard (576 for PAL or 486 for NTSC). In modern-day digital terminology, VHS is roughly equivalent to 333x480 pixels luma and 40x480 chroma resolutions (333x480 pixels=159,840 pixels or 0.16MP (1/6 of a MegaPixel)).^[18]

JVC would counter 1985's SuperBeta with VHS HQ, or High Quality. The frequency modulation of the VHS luminance signal is limited to 3 megahertz which makes higher resolutions impossible, but an HQ branded deck includes luminance noise reduction, chroma noise reduction, white clip extension, and improved sharpness circuitry. The effect was to increase the apparent horizontal resolution of a VHS recording from 240 to 250 analog (equivalent to 333 pixels from left-to-right, in digital terminology). The major VHS OEMs resisted HQ due to cost concerns, eventually resulting in JVC reducing the requirements for the HQ brand to white clip extension plus one other improvement.

In 1987 JVC introduced a new format called Super VHS which extended the bandwidth to over 5 megahertz, yielding 420 analog horizontal (560 pixels left-to-right).

Audio recording[link]

Original linear system[link]

In the original VHS format, audio was recorded as baseband in a single linear track, at the upper edge of the tape, similar to how an audio compact cassette operates. The recorded frequency range was dependent on the linear tape speed. For the VHS SP mode, this resulted in a mediocre frequency response of roughly 100 Hz to 10 kHz. The signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) was an acceptable 42 dB. Both parameters degraded significantly with VHS's longer play modes, with EP frequency response peaking at 4 kHz.

Audio cannot be recorded on a VHS tape without recording a video signal, even in the audio dubbing mode. If there is no video signal to the VCR input, the VCR will record black as well as generate a control track while the audio is being recorded.

More expensive decks offered stereo audio recording and playback. Linear stereo, as it was called, fit two independent channels in the same space as the original mono audiotrack. While this approach preserved acceptable backward compatibility with monoaural audio heads, the splitting of the audio track degraded the signal's SNR to the point that audible tape hiss was objectionable at normal listening volume. To counteract tape hiss, decks applied Dolby B noise reduction for recording and playback. Dolby B dynamically boosts the mid-frequency band of the audio program on the recorded medium, improving its signal strength relative to the tape's background noise floor, then attenuates the mid-band during playback. Dolby B is not a transparent process, and Dolby-encoded program material will exhibit an unnatural mid-range emphasis when played on non-Dolby capable VCRs.

High-end consumer recorders took advantage of the linear nature of the audio track, as the audio track could be erased and recorded without disturbing the video portion of the recorded signal. Hence, "audio dubbing" and "video dubbing", where either the audio or video are re-recorded on tape (without disturbing the other), were supported features on prosumer linear video editing-decks. Without dubbing capability, an audio or video edit could not be done in-place on master cassette, and requires the editing output be captured to another tape, incurring generational loss.

Studio film releases began to emerge with linear stereo audiotracks in 1982. From that point onward nearly every home video releases by Hollywood featured a Dolby-encoded linear stereo audiotrack. However, linear stereo was never popular with equipment makers or consumers.

Hi-Fi audio system[link]

Around 1984, JVC added Hi-Fi audio to VHS (in response to Betamax's introduction of Beta Hi-Fi.) Both VHS Hi-Fi and Betamax Hi-Fi delivered flat full-range frequency response (20 Hz to 20 kHz), excellent 70 dB signal-to-noise ratio (in consumer space, second only to the compact disc), dynamic range of 90 dB, and professional audio-grade channel separation (more than 70dB). VHS Hi-Fi audio is achieved by using audio frequency modulation (AFM), recording each of the 2 stereo channels (L, R) on a frequency-modulated carrier and embedding the modulated audio signal pair into the video signal. To avoid crosstalk and interference from the primary video carrier, VHS's implementation of AFM relied on a form of magnetic recording called depth multiplexing. The modulated audio carrier pair was placed under the luminance carrier (below 1.6 MHz), and recorded first. Subsequently, the video head erases and re-records the video signal over the same tape surface, but video signal's higher center frequency results in a shallower magnetization of the tape, allowing both the video and residual AFM audio signal to coexist on tape. (PAL versions of Beta Hi-Fi use this same technique). During playback, VHS Hi-Fi recovers the depth-recorded AFM signal by subtracting the audio head's signal (which contains the AFM signal contaminated by a weak image of the video signal) from the video head's signal (which contains only the video signal), then demodulates the left and right audio channels from their respective frequency carriers. The end result of the complex process was audio of outstanding fidelity, which was uniformly solid across all tape-speeds (EP or SP.) Since JVC had gone through the complexity of ensuring Hi-Fi's backward compatibility with non-Hi-Fi VCRs, virtually all studio home video releases contained Hi-Fi audio tracks, in addition to the linear audio track. Under normal circumstances, all Hi-Fi VHS VCRs will record Hi-Fi and linear audio simultaneously to ensure compatibility with VCRs without Hi-Fi playback, though only early high-end Hi-Fi machines provided linear stereo compatibility.

Due to the path followed by the video and Hi-Fi audio heads being striped and discontinuous—unlike that of the linear audio track—head-switching is required to provide a continuous audio signal. Misalignments may lead to imperfect joining of the signal, resulting in low-pitched buzzing.^[19] The problem is known as "head chatter," and tends to increase as the audio heads wear down.

The sound quality of Hi-Fi VHS stereo is comparable to the quality of CD audio, particularly when recordings were made on high-end or professional VHS machines that have a manual audio recording level control. This high quality compared to other consumer audio recording formats such as compact cassette attracted the attention of amateur and hobbyist recording artists. Home recording enthusiasts occasionally recorded high quality stereo mixdowns and master recordings from multitrack audio tape onto consumer-level Hi-Fi VCRs. However, because the VHS Hi-Fi recording process is intertwined with the VCR's video-recording function, advanced editing functions such as audio-only or video-only dubbing are impossible. Some VHS decks also had a "simulcast" switch, allowing users to record an external audio input along with off-air pictures. Some televised concerts offered a stereo simulcast soundtrack on FM radio and as such, events like Live Aid were recorded by thousands of people with a full stereo soundtrack despite the fact that stereo TV broadcasts were some years off (especially in regions that adopted NICAM). Other examples of this included network television shows such as Friday Night Videos and MTV for its first few years in existence.

The considerable complexity and additional hardware limited VHS Hi-Fi to high-end decks for many years. While linear stereo all but disappeared from home VHS decks, it was not until the 1990s that Hi-Fi became a more common feature on VHS decks. Even then, most customers were unaware of its significance and merely enjoyed the better audio performance of the newer decks.

Variations[link]

Victor S-VHS (left) and S-VHS-C (right).

VHS-C adapter

Super-VHS / ADAT / SVHS-ET[link]

Several improved versions of VHS exist, most notably Super-VHS (S-VHS), an analog video standard with improved video bandwidth. S-VHS improved the luminance resolution to 400 horizontal lines (versus 250 for VHS/Beta and 500 for DVD). The audio-system (both linear and AFM) is the same. S-VHS made little impact on the home market, but gained dominance in the camcorder market due to its superior picture quality.

The ADAT format provides the ability to record multitrack digital audio using S-VHS media. JVC also developed SVHS-ET technology for its Super-VHS camcorders and VCRs, which simply allows them to record Super VHS signals onto lower-priced VHS tapes, albeit with a slight blurring of the image. Nearly all Super-VHS camcorders and VCRs made today have SVHS-ET ability.

VHS-C / Super VHS-C[link]

Another variant is VHS-Compact (VHS-C), originally developed for portable VCRs in 1982, but ultimately finding success in palm-sized camcorders. The longest tape available holds 60 minutes in SP mode and 180 minutes in EP mode. Since VHS-C tapes are based on the same magnetic tape as full size tapes, they can be played back in standard VHS players using a mechanical adapter, without the need of any kind of signal conversion. The magnetic tape on VHS-C cassettes is wound on one main spool and uses a gear wheel to advance the tape.

The adapter does not require a battery to function and is solely a mechanical adapter. It has an internal hub to engage with the VCR mechanism in the location of a normal full-size tape hub, driving the gearing on VHS-C cassette. Also when a VHS-C cassette is inserted into the adapter, a small swing-arm pulls the tape out of the miniature cassette to span the standard tape path distance between the guide rollers of a full-size tape. This allows the miniature cassette to use the same tape loading mechanism of the full-size tape.

Super VHS-C or S-VHS Compact was developed by JVC in 1987. S-VHS provided an improved luminance and chrominance quality, yet S-VHS recorders were compatible with VHS tapes.^[20]

Sony Betamax was unable to shrink that form any further, so instead they developed Video8/Hi8 which was in direct competition with the VHS-C/S-VHS-C format throughout the 80s, 90s, and 2000s. Ultimately neither format "won" and both continue to be sold in the low-end market (examples: JVC SXM38 and Sony TRV138).

W-VHS / Digital-VHS (high-definition)[link]

W-VHS allowed recording of MUSE Hi-Vision analog high definition television, which was broadcast in Japan from 1989 until 2007. The other improved standard, called Digital-VHS (D-VHS), records digital high definition video onto a VHS form factor tape. D-VHS can record up to 4 hours of ATSC digital television in 720p or 1080i formats using the fastest record mode (equivalent to VHS-SP), and up to 40 hours of standard definition video at slower speeds.

D9[link]

There is also a JVC-designed component digital professional production format known as Digital-S, or officially under the name D9, that uses a VHS form factor tape and essentially the same mechanical tape handling techniques as an S-VHS recorder. This format is the least expensive format to support a Sel-Sync pre-read for video editing. This format is most notably used by Fox for some of its cable networks.

Accessories[link]

Shortly after the introduction of the VHS format, VHS tape rewinders were developed. These devices served the sole purpose of rewinding VHS tapes. Proponents of the rewinders argued that the use of the rewind function on the standard VHS player would lead to kinks in the tape that would affect playback quality. Many lower end VCR's would leave the tape wound around the video head whilst rewinding or fast forwarding, so the rewinders were of some benefit on these machines, to save additional tape and head wear. The rewinder would rewind the tapes smoothly and also normally do so at a faster rate than the standard rewind function on VHS players. However some rewinder brands did have some frequent abrupt stops, which occasionally led to tape damage.

Some devices were marketed which allowed a personal computer to use a VHS recorder as a data backup device. The most notable of these was ArVid, widely used in Russia and CIS states. In the United States similar systems were manufactured by Corvus and Alpha Microsystems.^[21] Also available was Backer from Danmere Ltd. of England.

Signal standards[link]

VHS can record and play back all varieties of analog television signals in existence at the time VHS was devised. However, a machine must be designed to record a given standard. Typically, a VHS machine can only handle signals of the country it was sold in. The following signal varieties exist in conventional VHS:

• SECAM/625/25 (SECAM, French variety)
• MESECAM/625/25 (most other SECAM countries, notably the former Soviet Union and Middle East)
• NTSC/525/30 (Most parts of Americas, Japan, South Korea)
• PAL/525/30 (i.e., PAL-M, Brazil)
• PAL/625/25 (most of Western Europe, Australia, New Zealand, many parts of Asia such as China and India, some parts of South America such as Argentina, Uruguay and the Falklands, and Africa)

Note that PAL/625/25 VCRs allow playback of SECAM (and MESECAM) tapes with a monochrome (black and white) picture (and vice-versa) as the line standard is the same. Since the 1990s, dual- and multi-standard VHS machines have become more and more common. These can handle VHS tapes of more than one standard. For example, regular VHS machines sold in Australia and Europe nowadays can typically handle PAL, MESECAM for record and playback, plus NTSC for playback only (provided the TV is able to display NTSC's 525/30 line standard - most^{[citation needed]} can). Dedicated multistandard machines can usually handle all standards listed, some high end models can even convert the content of a tape from one standard to another on-the-fly during playback by using a built-in standards converter.

S-VHS only exists in PAL/625/25 and NTSC/525/30. S-VHS machines sold in SECAM markets record internally in PAL, and convert to/from SECAM during record/playback, respectively. Likewise, S-VHS machines for the Brazilian market record in NTSC and convert to/from PAL-M.

A small number of VHS decks are able to decode closed captions on prerecorded video cassettes. A smaller number still are able, additionally, to record subtitles transmitted with world standard teletext signals (on pre-digital services), simultaneously with the associated program.

Tape lengths[link]

Both NTSC and PAL/SECAM VHS cassettes are physically identical (although the signals recorded on the tape are incompatible). However, as tape speeds differ between NTSC and PAL/SECAM, the playing time for any given cassette will vary accordingly between the systems. In order to avoid confusion, manufacturers indicate the playing time in minutes that can be expected for the market the tape is sold in. It is perfectly possible to record and play back a blank T-XXX tape in a PAL machine or a blank E-XXX tape in an NTSC machine, but the resulting playing time will be different from that indicated.

To calculate the playing time for a T-XXX tape in a PAL machine, use this formula: PAL/SECAM Recording Time = T-XXX in minutes * (6.6/4.69)

And to calculate the playing time for an E-XXX tape in an NTSC machine, use this formula: NTSC Recording Time = E-XXX in minutes * (4.69/6.6)

Some new Panasonic NTSC/ATSC recorders also include a Very long Play (VP) mode which is not part of the official specification. It enables recordings at 1/5 the SP speed, such that a T-180 holds 3*5 == 15 hours. ^[22]

• E-XXX indicates playing time in minutes for PAL or SECAM in SP and LP speeds.
• T-XXX indicates playing time in minutes for NTSC or PAL-M in SP, LP, and EP/SLP speeds.
• SP is Standard Play, LP is Long Play (1/2 speed), EP/SLP is extended/super long play (1/3 speed)

Uses in marketing[link]

Although VHS was a popular delivery format for long-play content, VHS was also used to deliver short-play content, such as music videos, in-store videos and tutorials.

VHS single[link]

VHS single, also known as videotape single or Video 45s (a play on the term "45" when used to describe vinyl records) is a music single, using a standard-sized VHS cartridge. The format has existed since the early 1980s. In 1983, British synthpop band The Human League released the UK's first commercial video single on both VHS and Betamax as "The Human League Video Single".^[23] It was not a huge commercial success due to the high retail price of £10.99, compared to £1.99 for a vinyl single.

The VHS single format gained higher levels of mainstream popularity when Madonna released "Justify My Love" as a video single in 1990 following the blacklisting of the video by MTV.^{[citation needed]} U2 also released "Numb", the lead single from their 1993 album Zooropa as a video single.^{[clarification needed]}

Despite the success of these releases, the video single struggled as its releases were relatively periodical, the technology slowly being superseded first by CD Video (which proved unsuccessful due to the cost of capable LaserDisc players to play the video portion), music CDs with computer-accessible video files, then, by the early 2000s, by both DVD singles and CD+DVD releases.

Other uses[link]

VHS was also commonly included in various products and services - including exercise equipment, kitchen appliances, and even computer software. Corporations used the VHS format to deliver addresses made by company executives to regional offices. Manufacturers would send out VHS tapes to their service centers, to demonstrate how to repair a new product. And retail stores would play VHS tapes demonstrating a product on a television set, requiring a VCR that supported encore function replay or auto rewind play.

VHS vs. Betamax[link]

Size comparison between Betamax (top) and VHS (bottom) videocassettes.

VHS was the winner of a protracted and somewhat bitter format war during the late 1970s and early 1980s against Sony's Betamax format, as well as other formats of the time.^[3]

Betamax was widely perceived at the time as the better format, as the cassette was smaller in size, and Betamax offered slightly better video quality than VHS—it had lower video noise, less luma-chroma crosstalk, and was marketed as providing pictures superior to those of VHS. However, the sticking point for both consumers and potential licensing partners of Betamax was the total recording time.^[9] To overcome the recording limitation, B-II speed (two-hour mode, NTSC regions only) was released in order to compete with VHS's two-hour SP mode, thereby reducing Betamax's horizontal resolution to 240 lines (vs 250 lines).^[24] In turn, the extension of VHS to VHS HQ produced 250 lines (vs 240 lines), so that overall a typical Betamax/VHS user could expect virtually identical resolution. (Very high-end Betamax machines still supported recording in the B-I mode and some in an even higher resolution B-Is (B-I Super HiBand) mode, but at a maximum single-cassette run time of 1:40 [with an L-830 cassette].)

Because Betamax was released more than a year before VHS, it held an early lead in the format war. However, by 1981, United States' Betamax sales had dipped down to only 25-percent of all sales.^[25] A debate continues between pundits over the cause of Betamax's loss. Some say - including Sony's founder Akio Morita - that it was due to Sony's licensing strategy with other manufacturers, which consistently kept the overall cost for a unit higher than a VHS unit, and that JVC allowed other manufacturers to produce VHS units license-free and keep cost lower.^[26] Others say that VHS had better marketing, since the much larger electronics companies at the time (Matsushita, for example) were on-board with VHS.^[9]

Decline[link]

The VHS VCR was a mainstay in the TV-equipped living room for more than a decade, but is being replaced by newer technologies. For time shifting (off the air or cable/satellite taping), hard-drive based digital video recorders have replaced the VCR as the time shifting device of choice, especially in households with subscriber-based TV services. The home camcorder market, one which VHS shared with alternative formats, has already transitioned to digital-video recording. But the largest impact on the VHS format was the introduction of the DVD format to American consumers in March of 1997.^[27] For home-video (that is, pre-recorded commercially-released movies, etc.) rental and sales, DVD has almost completely taken the place of VHS.

At most electronics retailers, choice among VHS equipment is increasingly shrinking. New sales are focused on DVD-recorders and subscriber-based DVRs (such as TiVo). Most electronics chains have stopped stocking VHS home-video releases, focusing only on DVD and Blu-ray Disc technology. Major Hollywood studios no longer issue releases on VHS. The final major Hollywood motion picture released on VHS in the United States was David Cronenberg's 2005 film A History of Violence.^[28]

On December 31, 2008, the final truckload in the USA of recorded programming on VHS tapes rolled out of a warehouse owned by Ryan Kugler, the last major supplier of VHS-recorded videos. Kugler is President and co-owner of Distribution Video Audio, a seller of distressed goods such as VHS tapes. According to Kugler, "It's dead, this is it, this is the last Christmas, without a doubt. I was the last one buying VHS and the last one selling it, and I'm done. Anything left in warehouse we'll just give away or throw away."^[2][29]

However in 2009, the Hayao Miyazaki film Ponyo received a VHS release in Japan alongside DVD and Blu-ray.^[30] Home-video VHS tapes can still be found in many second-hand shops, and are sometimes very cheap due to the lack of demand.^[31]

In 2010, The House of the Devil received promotional distribution on VHS^[32][33] and is available exclusively on Amazon.com with a DVD copy of the film.^[34] At the back-end of the same year, Harmony Korine's Trash Humpers (which was shot and edited entirely on VHS) was released onto DVD and in a limited run of 300 VHSs directly from the official website.^[35] Also in 2010, the movie Paranormal Activity was released on VHS in the Netherlands.^[36]

Although VHS has quickly faded from mainstream home-video, a VCR is still owned in many US households. The Washington Post noted that as of 2005, 94.5 million Americans still owned VHS format VCRs.^[27] Many people hold on to their VHS-VCR for nostalgy reasons, because many movies only exist in that format or because their wedding movies or videos of other personal events in their life are still in VHS. In May 2012 the New York Times reported that VHS format stays popular in immigrant communities since movies are still available for next to nothing.^[37]

The last standalone JVC VHS-only unit was produced on October 28, 2008.^[38] JVC, like many other manufacturers, still makes combination DVD+VHS units.

Several retail chains in the United States and in Europe planned to stop selling VHS equipment in 2004,^[39] 2005,^[40] and 2006.^[41] Despite these plans, VHS recorders and blank tapes are still being sold in major stores worldwide. As an acknowledgement of VHS popularity, in 2009 Panasonic has announced the world’s first dual deck VHS-Blu-ray player.^[42]

Successors[link]

VCD[link]

The Video CD (VCD) was created in 1993, becoming an alternative medium for video, in a CD-sized disc. Though occasionally showing compression artifacts and color banding that are common discrepancies in digital media, the durability and longevity of a VCD depends on the production quality of the disc, and its handling. The data stored digitally on a VCD theoretically does not degrade (in the analog sense like tape.) In the disc player, there is no physical contact made with either the data or label sides. And, when handled properly, a VCD will last a long time. However, in practice, the surfaces of the disc do get touched by the operator's hand, causing body oil and dirt to collect on the disc, and eventually transfer to the lens and motor inside of the player, if not cleaned before use. Also, when used in an industrial or commercial environment when a disc is handled hundreds or thousands of times during its life, wear on the plastic can occur if the disc is not handled properly. VCD is susceptible to disc rot.

Since a VCD can only hold 70 minutes of video, a movie exceeding that mark has to be divided into two or more discs. This format is currently popular in developing countries.

DVD[link]

The DVD-Video format was introduced first, in 1996, in Japan, to the United States in March 1997 (Test Marketed) and mid-late 1998 in Europe and Australia.

Despite DVD's better quality (480 typical versus 250 lines horizontal resolution), VHS is still (as of 2012) somewhat widely used in home recording of video content, due to the large installed base and the lower cost of VHS recorders and tape (compared to DVD). The commercial success of DVD recording and re-writing has been hindered by a number of factors including:

• A reputation for being temperamental and unreliable, as well as the risk of scratches and hairline cracks.^[43]
• Incompatibilities in playing discs recorded on a different manufacturer's machines to that of the original recording machine.^[44]
• Shorter recording time: Up to six hours on a single-layer disc (with sub-VHS quality) versus approximately 12 hours on a T-240/DF480 tape in EP.
• Compression artifacts: MPEG-2 video compression can result in visible artifacts such as macroblocking, mosquito noise and ringing which become accentuated in extended recording modes (more than three hours on a DVD-5 disc). Standard VHS will not suffer from any of these problems, all of which are characteristic of certain digital video compression systems (see DCT) but VHS will result in reduced luminance resolution, which makes the picture look horizontally blurred (resolution decreases further with LP and EP recording modes).^{[citation needed]}

Blu-ray Disc[link]

A newer optical disc format is Blu-ray Disc, which is the designed successor to DVD. (A competing format to Blu-ray was HD DVD, which was withdrawn from the market, conceding to Blu-ray.) A single Blu-ray Disc can hold up to 128GB (over 25 times the capacity of a single-layered DVD) of information including up to 1080p High-definition video, high definition photos, music, and more.

High-capacity digital recording technologies[link]

High-capacity digital recording systems are also gaining in popularity with home users. These types of systems come in several form factors:

• Hard disk-based set-top boxes
• Hard disk/optical disc combination set-top boxes
• Personal computer-based media center
• Portable media players with TV-out capability

Hard disk-based systems include TiVo as well as other digital video recorder (DVR) offerings. These types of systems provide users with a no-maintenance solution for capturing video content. Customers of subscriber-based TV generally receive electronic program guides, enabling one-touch setup of a recording schedule. Hard disk-based systems allow for many hours of recording without user-maintenance. For example, a 120 GB system recording at an extended recording rate (XP) of 10 Mbit/s MPEG-2 can record over 25 hours of video content. However, the DVR technology does not allow for portability or long-lasting storage.

References[link]

External links[link]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: VHS

• BBC News article: Death of video recorder in sight
• HowStuffWorks: How VCRs work
• The 'Total Rewind' VCR museum covering the history of VHS and other vintage formats

Phil Collins
Phil Collins performing in Perugia, Italy, 1996
Background information
Birth name	Philip David Charles Collins
Born	(1951-01-30) 30 January 1951 (age 61) Chiswick, Middlesex, England, United Kingdom
Genres	Progressive rock, rock, pop, pop rock, soft rock, jazz fusion, R&B, big band
Occupations	Singer-songwriter, musician, actor
Instruments	Vocals, drums, percussion, guitar, piano, keyboards
Years active	1968–2011
Labels	Virgin, Atlantic
Associated acts	Genesis, Brand X, Flaming Youth, Philip Bailey, Eric Clapton, the Phil Collins Big Band, Frida Lyngstad, Brian Eno
Website	philcollins.co.uk

Philip David Charles "Phil" Collins, LVO (born 30 January 1951)^[1] is an English singer-songwriter, drummer, pianist and actor best known as a drummer and vocalist for British progressive rock group Genesis and as a solo artist.

Collins sang the lead vocals on several chart hits in the United Kingdom and the United States between 1975 and 2010, either as a solo artist or with Genesis. His singles, sometimes dealing with lost love, ranged from the drum-heavy "In the Air Tonight", dance pop of "Sussudio", piano-driven "Against All Odds", to the political statements of "Another Day in Paradise".

Collins's professional music career began as a drummer, originally in a band called The Real Thing with Andrea Bertorelli, who later became his first wife. Collins played drums and shared lead vocals (with Brian Chatton) in Flaming Youth which recorded one album, (Ark II). In 1970, he took over drums for Genesis, which had already recorded two albums. In Genesis, Collins originally supplied backing vocals for front man Peter Gabriel, singing lead on only two songs: "For Absent Friends" from 1971's Nursery Cryme album and "More Fool Me" from Selling England by the Pound, which was released in 1973. Following Gabriel's departure in 1975, Collins became the group's lead singer.

His solo career, heavily influenced by his personal life, brought both himself and Genesis commercial success. According to Atlantic Records, Collins's total worldwide sales as a solo artist, as of 2000, were 150 million.^[2] Collins has won numerous music awards throughout his career, including seven Grammy Awards, five Brit Awards—winning Best British Male three times, an Academy Award, and two Golden Globes for his solo work.^[3][4] He was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame as a member of Genesis in 2010.

Collins is one of only three recording artists (along with Paul McCartney and Michael Jackson) who have sold over 100 million albums worldwide both as solo artists and (separately) as principal members of a band.^[5] When his work with Genesis, his work with other artists, as well as his solo career is totalled, Collins had more top 40 hits on the Billboard Hot 100 chart during the 1980s than any other artist.^[6] In 2008, Collins was ranked the 22nd most successful artist on the "The Billboard Hot 100 Top All-Time Artists".^[7]

Early life[link]

Collins was born in Chiswick, London, the son of Winifred M. "June" (née Strange), a theatrical agent, and Greville Philip Austin Collins, an insurance agent.^[8][9] He was given a toy drum kit for Christmas when he was five. Later, his uncle made him a makeshift one that he used regularly. As Collins grew older these were followed by more complete sets bought by his parents.^[10] He practiced by playing alongside the television and radio, and never learned to read and write conventional musical notation; instead, he uses a system he devised himself.^[11]

Early career[link]

His professional training began at 14 when he entered Barbara Speake Stage School.^[12] He began a career as a child actor and model, and won his first major role as the Artful Dodger in the London production of Oliver!. He was an extra in the Beatles' A Hard Day's Night, one of hundreds of screaming teenagers during the TV concert sequence and seen fleetingly in a close-up. He was also in Chitty Chitty Bang Bang as one of the children who storms the castle at the end of the film, but it was cut.^[13] He also auditioned for the role of Romeo in Romeo and Juliet (1968),^[14] a role won by fellow Artful Dodger actor Leonard Whiting.^[15] Collins was among the last three finalists for the role of I.Q. on the American children's television show The Bugaloos (he lost out to English actor/musician John McIndoe).^[16]

Despite the beginnings of an acting career, Collins continued to gravitate towards music. While attending Chiswick Community School he formed a band called the Real Thing and later joined the Freehold. With the latter group, he wrote his first song titled "Lying Crying Dying".^[17]

Collins's first record deal came as drummer for Hickory, who changed their name to Flaming Youth by the time of their sole album, Ark 2 (1969).^[18] A concept album inspired by the recent media attention surrounding the moon landing, Ark 2 (with Ronnie Caryl, Brian Chatton and Gordon (Flash) Smith), failed to make much commercial success despite positive critical reviews. Melody Maker featured the album as "Pop Album of the Month", describing it as "adult music beautifully played with nice tight harmonies".^[19] The album's main single, "From Now On", failed on the radio. After a year of touring, band tensions and the lack of commercial success dissolved the group. In 1970, the 19-year old Collins played percussion on the George Harrison song "The Art of Dying". Harrison credited him in the liner notes to the remastered CD version of the album released in 2000.^[20]

Genesis era[link]

In 1970, Collins answered a Melody Maker classified ad for "...a drummer sensitive to acoustic music, and acoustic twelve-string guitarist".^[21] Genesis placed the ad after having already lost three drummers over two albums.^[22] The audition occurred at the home of Peter Gabriel's parents. Prospective candidates performed tracks from the group's second album, Trespass (1970). Collins arrived early, listened to the other auditions while swimming in Gabriel's parents' pool, and memorised the pieces before his turn.^[23]

Collins won the audition. Nursery Cryme was released a year later. Although his role remained primarily that of drummer and backing vocalist for the next five years, he twice sang lead vocals: once on "For Absent Friends" (from Nursery Cryme) and once on "More Fool Me" (from Selling England by the Pound).

In 1974, while Genesis were recording the concept album The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway, Brian Eno (who is credited with "Enossification" for electronic vocal effects on the track "Grand Parade of Lifeless Packaging") needed a drummer for his album Taking Tiger Mountain (By Strategy).^[24] Collins was sent to fill the gap, and played drums in lieu of payment for Eno's work with the band. Collins later contributed drums to the Brian Eno 1975, and 1977 art rock releases Another Green World and Before and After Science.

In 1975, following the final tour supporting the album The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway, Gabriel left the group to pursue a solo career. Collins became lead vocalist after a lengthy but ultimately fruitless search for Gabriel's replacement (where he sang back-up with the over 400 hopefuls that reportedly auditioned).^[25] In the short term, the group recruited former Yes and King Crimson drummer Bill Bruford to play drums during live shows, although Collins continued to play during longer instrumental sections. Bruford's drumming can be heard on the track "The Cinema Show" on the live album Seconds Out. He was soon replaced by ex-Frank Zappa band member Chester Thompson, who became a mainstay of the band's live line-up. Collins, however, continued to play drums on all of the group's studio recordings.

The first album with Collins as lead vocalist, 1976's A Trick of the Tail, reached the American Top 40, and peaked high as No.3 on the UK charts. Said Rolling Stone, "Genesis has managed to turn the possible catastrophe of Gabriel's departure into their first broad-based American success."^[26] Following the recording of Genesis's next album Wind and Wuthering guitarist Steve Hackett left the group to pursue his own solo career. The group decided to continue as a trio for recording with Mike Rutherford playing guitar and bass in the studio, although the lineup was regularly augmented by Chester Thompson and American guitarist Daryl Stuermer for concert tours.

Collins simultaneously performed in a jazz fusion group called Brand X. The band recorded their first album, Unorthodox Behaviour, with Collins as drummer, but because Genesis was Collins's priority, there were several Brand X tours and albums without him. Collins credits Brand X as his first use of a drum machine as well as his first use of a home 8-track tape machine.^[27]

Collins also performed on Steve Hackett's first solo album, Voyage of the Acolyte, on which he sang lead vocals and played drums. As the decade closed, Genesis began a shift from their progressive rock roots and toward more accessible, radio-friendly pop-rock music. The album ...And Then There Were Three... featured their first UK Top 10 and US Top 40 single, "Follow You Follow Me".^[28][29]

	"Dance on a Volcano" (1976) noicon The first track from Genesis's A Trick of the Tail was Collins's début as the group's full-time lead singer. A progressive rock track, it contrasts with the style of his later work.
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In the 1980s, while Collins developed as a songwriter and established a parallel career as a solo artist, Genesis recorded a series of highly successful albums including Duke, Abacab, Genesis, and Invisible Touch. The latter album's title track reached No.1 on the American Billboard singles chart, the only Genesis song to do so. The group received an MTV "Video of the Year" nomination in 1987 for the single "Land of Confusion" (which featured puppet caricatures created by the British satirical team Spitting Image) but lost out to Peter Gabriel's solo hit, "Sledgehammer".^[30] Reviews were generally positive, with Rolling Stone's J. D. Considine stating, "every tune is carefully pruned so that each flourish delivers not an instrumental epiphany but a solid hook."^[31]

Collins left Genesis in 1996 to focus on his solo career.^[17] The last studio album with him as the lead singer was 1991's We Can't Dance. He and Gabriel reunited with other Genesis members in 1999 to re-record "The Carpet Crawlers" for Genesis's Turn It on Again: The Hits. When in the mid-2000s discussions of a possible Genesis reunion arose, Collins stated that he would prefer to return as the drummer, with Gabriel handling the vocals.^[32] Eventually Turn It On Again: The Tour was announced for 2007, with the Collins/Rutherford/Banks line-up.

In March 2010, Phish guitarist Trey Anastasio was asked to pay tribute to Genesis, one of his favourite bands, upon being inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame. In addition to Anastasio's speech, Phish appeared and performed two Genesis songs, "Watcher of the Skies" and "No Reply At All". Collins and his Genesis band-mates (minus Peter Gabriel) attended the ceremony but they did not perform.

Solo career[link]

Early solo recordings (1981–1983)[link]

The dominant theme running through Collins's early solo recordings (although never specifically mentioned in his songs) was the acrimonious breakdown of his first marriage and then-recent divorce. Two songs he wrote on the Genesis album Duke, "Please Don't Ask", and the Top 20 hit "Misunderstanding", dealt with failed relationships. One year earlier, he had played drums and sung backing vocals on John Martyn's Grace and Danger, an album whose main theme is also marriage break-up. With the recording of his first solo album, Face Value, Collins attributed his divorce as his main influence,^[33] as can be inferred from songs such as "If Leaving Me Is Easy".

	"In the Air Tonight" noicon "In the Air Tonight" from Face Value (1981), was the first single of Collins' solo career.
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Collins made his live debut as a solo performer, appearing at the invitation of producer Martin Lewis at the Amnesty International benefit show, The Policeman's Other Ball at the Theatre Royal in London in September 1981, performing two songs from Face Value including "In the Air Tonight" and "The Roof is Leaking" accompanying himself on piano. Face Value became a surprise international success topping the charts in at least seven countries and hitting the top ten of the Billboard 200 eventually going triple-platinum in the US. Hits from the album included "In the Air Tonight", "I Missed Again" and "If Leaving Me Is Easy". In 1982, he produced ABBA member Frida's solo album, Something's Going On, which helped to spawn the title track, "I Know There's Something Going On", which became a hit.

Much like Face Value, many of the songs from Collins's 1982 follow-up album, Hello, I Must Be Going!, came from Collins's marital problems with his first wife such as "I Don't Care Anymore" and "Do You Know and Do You Care". Collins’s early albums had a dark presence, usually heavy on the drums. Regarding Face Value, he says, "I had a wife, two children, two dogs, and the next day I didn't have anything. So a lot of these songs were written because I was going through these emotional changes."^[34] There were occasional poppier influences–Face Value's "Behind the Lines", for example, was a jazzy remake of a Genesis song he co-wrote. Face Value was a critical and multi-platinum success, and saw Collins’s profile increase further. Hello, I Must Be Going! gave him a UK No.1 for his cover of the Supremes' "You Can't Hurry Love". The album went triple-platinum in the United States, like its predecessor. The Supremes' cover was his first Top 10 US hit (it also hit the Top 10 of Billboard's Adult Contemporary chart). The album also reached No.2 on the UK album chart, spending well over a year there.^[28]

Two years before, Collins had played drums on Peter Gabriel's third self-titled record (often referred to as Melt), the first record to feature the "gated reverb" sound, which was used on the song "Intruder". Gabriel reportedly "didn't want any metal on the record" and asked Collins to leave his cymbals at home, to concentrate on the sound of his kit more heavily than usual. Studio engineer Hugh Padgham augmented the drum sound by using a microphone normally intended for studio communication rather than recording and feeding it through a signal processor called a noise gate. This allowed the reverberation added to the drums to be suddenly cut off before it naturally decayed. The result was the arresting "gated reverb" which became Collins signature sound. This was the same 'big drum sound' used on such songs as "In The Air Tonight", "Mama" by Genesis, and Frida's "There's Something Going On".

Mid-career (1984–1992)[link]

	"Against All Odds" noicon "Against All Odds" from the soundtrack of the same name (1984), is a piano-driven ballad. "Another Day in Paradise" noicon A sample of "Another Day in Paradise" from ...But Seriously (1989). The ballad was written to bring attention to the problem of homelessness
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Collins changed his musical style with the release of the ballad, "Against All Odds (Take a Look at Me Now)", which was the theme song to the movie of the same name in 1984. The more pop-friendly and radio-accessible single became Collins's first solo single to reach number-one on the Billboard Hot 100.^[29] Later that year, Collins contributed to production on Earth, Wind & Fire singer Phillip Bailey's debut album, Chinese Wall, collaborating with Bailey on the hit duet, "Easy Lover". Collins featured on Band Aid's "Do They Know It's Christmas", he played drums and sang on the song. Collins released his most successful album, No Jacket Required, in early 1985. It contained the hits "Sussudio", "One More Night", "Don't Lose My Number", and "Take Me Home", as well as the less known yet equally robust "Who Said I Would", and "Only You Know and I Know". The album featured Sting, Helen Terry and ex-bandmate Peter Gabriel as backing vocalists. He also recorded the successful song "Separate Lives", a duet with Marilyn Martin, and a US number one, for the movie White Nights.^[29] Collins had three US number one songs in 1985, the most by any artist that year.^[29] No Jacket Required went on to win several Grammy awards including Album of the Year.

No Jacket Required received criticism that the album was too safe, despite its upbeat reviews and commercial success. A positive review by David Fricke of Rolling Stone ended, "After years on the art-rock fringe, Collins has established himself firmly in the middle of the road. Perhaps he should consider testing himself and his new fans' expectations next time around."^[35] "Sussudio" also drew criticism for sounding too similar to Prince's "1999", a charge that Collins did not deny.^[36] Nevertheless, the album went straight to #1 in the US and UK. In 1985, Collins was invited by Bob Geldof to perform at the Live Aid charity event. Collins had the distinction of being the only performer to appear at both the UK concert at Wembley Stadium and the US concert at JFK Stadium in Philadelphia. He accomplished this by performing early in the day at Wembley as both a solo artist and alongside Sting, then transferring to a Concorde flight to the US enabling him to perform his solo material, and drum for Led Zeppelin and Eric Clapton in Philadelphia. While being a guest on major artists' hit recordings, Collins continued to enjoy solo success even while on tour with Genesis, besides from his number-one duet with Marilyn Martin in 1986, Collins would score two more hits from movies with the singles, "Two Hearts" (No.1 US, No.6 UK), and "Groovy Kind of Love" (No.1 UK, No.1 US), the latter two from the soundtrack of his feature film, Buster.^[28][29]

In 1989, Collins produced another successful album, ...But Seriously, featuring the anti-homelessness anthem "Another Day in Paradise", with David Crosby on backing vocals. (Collins later went on to co-write, sing and play on the song "Hero" on Crosby's 1993 album Thousand Roads.) "Another Day in Paradise" went to Number 1 on the Billboard Charts at the end of 1989 and won Collins Best British Single at the 1990 Brit Awards, and the 1991 Grammy Award for Record of the Year.^[37][38] In the process, it became the last No.1 US pop hit of the 1980s. The album ...But Seriously became the first No.1 US album of the 1990s and the best-selling album of 1990 in the UK. Other songs included "Something Happened on the Way to Heaven" (No.4 US, No.15 UK), "Do You Remember?" (not released in the UK, but a No.4 hit in the US), and "I Wish It Would Rain Down" (the latter featuring Eric Clapton on guitar) (No.3 US, No.7 UK).^[28][29] Songs about apartheid and homelessness demonstrated Collins’s turn to politically-driven material. This theme recurred on his later albums. A live album, Serious Hits... Live!, followed. In September 1990, Collins performed "Sussudio" at the 1990 MTV Video Music Awards in Los Angeles.^[39]

Later solo work and Genesis reunion (1993–2008)[link]

Collins's record sales began to drop with the 1993 release of Both Sides, a largely experimental album that, according to Collins, included songs that "were becoming so personal, so private, I didn't want anyone else's input".^[40] Featuring a less polished sound and fewer up-tempo songs than his previous albums, Both Sides was a significant departure. Collins used no backing musicians, performed all the vocal and instrumental parts at his home studio, and used rough vocal takes for the final product. The album was not well received by radio. Its two biggest hits were "Both Sides of the Story" and "Everyday". Collins worked on the album completely independently of his record company, and took them by surprise when he delivered them a completed album that they were unaware he was making.

Collins officially parted ways with Genesis in 1996 to focus on his solo career (Genesis would produce one album without Collins—...Calling All Stations...—before going on hiatus). Collins attempted a return to pop music with Dance into the Light, which Entertainment Weekly reviewed by saying that "(e)ven Phil Collins must know that we all grew weary of Phil Collins".^[41] It included minor hits such as the title track and the Beatles-inspired "It's in Your Eyes". Although the album went Gold in the US, it sold considerably less than his previous albums. Despite this, the subsequent tour regularly sold out arenas.

In 1996, Collins formed the Phil Collins Big Band. With Collins as drummer, the band performed jazz renditions of various Collins and Genesis hits. The Phil Collins Big Band did a world tour in 1998 that included a performance at the Montreux Jazz Festival. In 1999, the group released the CD A Hot Night in Paris including big band versions of "Invisible Touch", "Sussudio", and the more obscure "The Los Endos Suite" from A Trick of the Tail.

Phil Collins's star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, 6834 Hollywood Blvd

A compilation album ...Hits was released in 1998 and sold very well, returning Collins to multi-platinum status in America. The album's sole new track, a cover of the Cyndi Lauper hit "True Colors", received considerable play on US Adult Contemporary stations while peaking at No.2.^[42] Some of Collins's earlier hits (e.g. "I Missed Again", "If Leaving Me Is Easy", etc.) and other successes were not included in this compilation.

Collins's next single, "You'll Be in My Heart", from the Disney animated movie Tarzan, spent 19 weeks at No.1 on Billboard's Adult Contemporary chart – the longest time ever up to that point. The song won Collins an Academy Award for Best Song. It was his third nomination in the songwriters' category, after being nominated in 1985 and 1989. Collins was awarded a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, on 16 June 1999.^[43]

Collins performing in Barcelona, Spain in July 2004

In 2002 Collins released Testify. Metacritic's roundup of album reviews found this record to be the worst-reviewed album at the time of its release, though it has since been "surpassed" by three more recent releases.^[44] The album's "Can't Stop Loving You" (a Leo Sayer cover) was yet another #1 Adult Contemporary smash hit for Collins. Testify sold 140,000 copies in the United States by year's end, although a successful worldwide tour followed.^[45]

That same year Collins accepted an invitation to drum for the "house band" at a concert celebrating Queen Elizabeth II's Golden Jubilee. In 2003 announced his last solo tour^[46] – the "First Final Farewell Tour", a tongue-in-cheek reference to the multiple farewell tours of other popular artists. In 2006 he worked with Disney on a Broadway production of Tarzan, a musical which received generally mixed reviews. In 2007 Collins reunited with his Genesis bandmates Tony Banks and Mike Rutherford for Turn It On Again: The Tour, a tour of Europe and North America. During the tour Genesis performed at the Live Earth concert at Wembley Stadium. Following the band's performance, presenter Jonathan Ross had to apologise to viewers watching the televised version as Collins had used a swear word while singing "Invisible Touch".

[edit] Going Back and retirement (2009–2011)

In October 2009, it was reported that Collins was to record a Motown covers album. He told a German newspaper, "I want the songs to sound exactly like the originals", and that the album would feature up to 30 songs.^[47] In January 2010, Chester Thompson said that the album had been completed and would be released some time soon. He also revealed that Collins managed to play the drums on the album despite the adverse effects of his recent spinal operation.^[48] It was the first solo album Collins had recorded which consisted entirely of songs written by other people.

Going Back was released on 13 September 2010, entering the UK charts at number 4, rising to number one the following week.^[49] In early summer 2010, Collins played six concerts entirely dedicated to the music from Going Back. These included a special programme, Phil Collins: One Night Only, which was broadcast on ITV1 on 18 September 2010. Collins also promoted Going Back with his first and only appearance on the BBC's foremost music series Later... with Jools Holland, broadcast on 17 September 2010.

As of January 2011, Collins has spent 1,730 weeks in German music charts – 766 weeks of them with Genesis albums and singles and 964 weeks with solo releases.^[50]

Citing health problems and other concerns, Collins announced on 4 March 2011 that he was taking time off from his career, prompting widespread reports of his retirement.^[51] Days later, on 7 March, his UK representative told the press, "He is not, has no intention of, retiring."^[52] However, later that day, Collins posted a message to his fans on his own website, confirming his intention to retire in order to focus on his family life.^[53][54]

Drums and other equipment[link]

Phil Collins uses Gretsch drums and Sabian cymbals. Drums (all single headed concert toms except for the snare): 20" Bass Drum, 18" Floor Tom, 16" Floor Tom, 15" Mounted Tom, 12" Tom, 10" Tom, 8" Tom, 14"x4" Snare, 14" Phil Collins Special.

Cymbals: HH Medium Crash 20" – HH Extra Thin Crash 17" – Hi-Hats 15" – HH China 20" – HH Medium-Thin Crash 16" -HH China 22" – HH Raw Bell Dry Ride 21".^[55]

Until 1986, Collins played Paiste and Zildjian cymbals. Other drums he's used over the years are Premier, Noble & Cooley, Pearl, Simmons and Ludwig drums. He uses a Ludwig Speed King pedal and Pro Mark sticks.

Other instruments which have become synonymous with Collins's sound (particularly in his post-1978 Genesis and subsequent solo career) include the Roland CR-78 and Roland TR-808 drum machines, Sequential Circuits Prophet-5 synthesizer,^[56] and the Yamaha CP-70 electric grand piano.

Career as producer[link]

For his solo career and his career with Genesis, Collins produced or co-produced virtually all of his singles and albums, the notable exceptions being "Against All Odds (Take A Look At Me Now)" (produced by Arif Mardin), and his cover of "True Colors" (produced by Kenneth "Babyface" Edmonds.)

Collins also maintained a career as a producer for other artists throughout the 1980s, usually working on outside projects at the rate of one artist per year. His first outside work as a producer was the 1981 album Glorious Fool for John Martyn; he followed that up by producing Frida's 1982 album Something's Going On, which contained the international hit "I Know There's Something Going On".

1983 found Collins producing two tracks for Adam Ant, both of which hit the UK charts: "Puss 'N' Boots" and "Strip". ("Strip" was a minor US hit as well.) In 1984, he produced Phillip Bailey's album Chinese Wall, from which the hit Bailey/Collins duet "Easy Lover" was drawn. This album also contained the Bailey hit "Walking On The Chinese Wall".

In 1985, Collins produced several tracks on the Eric Clapton album Behind The Sun. The following year, he produced (in collaboration with Hugh Padgham) one track for Howard Jones, the international hit "No One Is to Blame".

Returning to work with Clapton, Collins was one of the producers on his 1987 album August. The UK top 20 single "Behind The Mask" was drawn from this album, and this particular track credited production to "Phil Collins in association with Tom Dowd."

In 1988, Collins and Lamont Dozier collaborated as writers and producers of the Four Tops top 10 UK hit "Loco In Acapulco", which was taken from the soundtrack of the film Buster, in which Collins starred. Finally, in 1989, Collins was one of the producers of the Stephen Bishop album Bowling in Paris, which included the US Adult Contemporary hit "Walking on Air", produced by Collins and Padgham.

Films, theatre and television[link]

The majority of Collins's film work has been through music. Four of his seven American number one songs came from film soundtracks, and his work on Disney's Tarzan earned him an Oscar. Collins even sang German, Italian, Spanish and French versions of the Tarzan soundtrack for the respective film versions. Collins's acting career has been brief. As a child, he appeared in three films, although two of the films were for brief moments as an extra. Besides the aforementioned A Hard Day's Night (1964), Collins's first lead role was in a children's film Calamity the Cow (1967).

Collins wrote and performed the title song to Against All Odds in 1984. The song became the first of his seven American number one songs and received an Academy Award nomination for Best Song. Collins was not invited to perform the song at that year's presentation, although he was in the audience as the song's composer. Collins had arranged his US tour to accommodate the possibility of appearing on the telecast in the event his song was nominated for an Oscar. It is believed that the producers of that year's Academy Awards show were not aware of his prominence as a musical performer. A note to Collins's label from telecast co-producer Larry Gelbart explaining the lack of invitation stated, "Thank you for your note regarding Phil Cooper [sic]. I'm afraid the spots have already been filled". Collins instead watched Ann Reinking perform his song.^[57] For a long time afterwards, he would introduce his performance of "Against All Odds" at his concerts by saying: "Miss Ann Reinking's not here tonight, so I guess I'll have to sing my own song".

As a vocalist, Collins sang Stephen Bishop's composition "Separate Lives" for the film White Nights (1985) as a duet with Marilyn Martin. The single of the recording became another number one hit for Collins. The song itself was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Song (a category that honours the composer, not the vocalists). Bishop's song had parallels to some of the songs on Collins's first two albums. Writer Stephen Bishop noted that he was inspired by a failed relationship and called "Separate Lives" "a song about anger".^[58] When the song was being nominated for an Academy Award, in interviews about the original snub by the Academy for "Against All Odds", Collins would jokingly say "the hell with him – I'm going up too," referring to if Bishop's song were to win the award.^[59]

Collins's first film role since becoming a musician came in 1988 with Buster about the Great Train Robbery, which took place in England in August, 1963. The film received good reviews and Collins contributed four songs to the film's soundtrack. His rendition of "Groovy Kind of Love", originally a 1966 single by the Mindbenders, with lyrics by Toni Wine and music by Carole Bayer Sager, but with the melody of the Rondo section of Muzio Clementi's "Sonatina in G major", op. 36 no. 5 reached number one. The film also spawned the hit single "Two Hearts", which he wrote in collaboration with legendary Motown songwriter Lamont Dozier; the two artists would go on to win a Golden Globe for Best Original Song and receive an Oscar nomination in the same category, the second such honour for Collins; "Big Noise", written by Phil Collins and Lamont Dozier, which included Collins on vocals (although the song was not released as a single, an instrumental version of this song appeared as the B-side to the single version of "A Groovy Kind Of Love".) The final song, "Loco In Acapulco", was another collaboration between him and Dozier, with the vocals performed by the legendary Motown group the Four Tops. Film critic Roger Ebert said the role of Buster was "played with surprising effectiveness" by Collins, although the film's soundtrack proved more successful than the film did.^[60]

Collins had cameo appearances in Steven Spielberg's Hook (1991) and the AIDS docudrama And the Band Played On (1993). He starred in 1993's Frauds, which competed for the Palme d'Or at the 1993 Cannes Film Festival.^[61] He supplied voices to two animated features: Amblin's Balto (1995) and Disney's The Jungle Book 2 (2003). A long-discussed but never completed project was a film titled The Three Bears; originally meant to star him alongside Danny DeVito and Bob Hoskins, he often mentioned the film, though an appropriate script never materialised.^[62]

Collins performed the soundtrack to the animated film Tarzan (1999) for the Walt Disney Company. Collins won an Academy Award for "You'll Be in My Heart", which he performed at that year's telecast as well as during a Disney-themed Super Bowl halftime show. The song, which he also recorded in Spanish among other languages, became his only appearance on Billboard's Hot Latin Tracks.^[42] Disney hired him, along with Tina Turner, in 2003 for the soundtrack to another animated feature film, Brother Bear, and had some airplay with the song "Look Through My Eyes".

On television, he twice hosted the Billboard Music Awards. He also appeared in an episode of the series Miami Vice, entitled "Phil the Shill", in which he plays a cheating con-man. He also guest starred in several sketches with The Two Ronnies. Most recently, he had a cameo appearance on the television series Whoopi.

In 2001, Collins was sought out by the satirist Chris Morris, and appeared in the Brass Eye 'Paedophile Special' endorsing a spoof charity called 'Nonce Sense'. At one point Collins, dressed in a matching baseball cap and t-shirt emblazoned with the name of this fictitious charity, stares into the camera and declares: "I'm talking Nonce-sense."

In 2005, Collins's work on Brother Bear was expanded as Disney used the song "Welcome" as the theme for Walt Disney's Parade of Dreams, the main parade celebrating the 50th Anniversary of Disneyland.

In 2006 Disney's Tarzan was adapted for Broadway. Collins contributed 11 new songs and instrumental pieces, and was deeply involved in the production. Unlike the film, where Collins sang all the material, the characters sang on stage.

Collins made an appearance as himself in the 2006 PlayStation Portable and PlayStation 2 video game Grand Theft Auto: Vice City Stories, set in 1984. He appears in three missions in which the main character must save him from a gang that is trying to kill him, the final mission occurring during his concert, where the player must defend the scaffolding against saboteurs while Phil is simultaneously performing "In the Air Tonight." After this, the player is given the opportunity to watch this performance of 'In the Air Tonight.' "In the Air Tonight" was also featured in the soundtrack of Grand Theft Auto: Vice City Stories and it was also featured in the film Aqua Teen Hunger Force Colon Movie Film For Theaters, the 2009 movie The Hangover and the 2007 Gorilla commercial for Cadbury's Dairy Milk chocolate. The advertisement also helped the song re-enter the New Zealand RIANZ Singles Chart at number three in July 2008, the following week reaching number one, beating its original 1981 No.6 peak. Phil Collins had several ties to the hit show Miami Vice with 5 songs used in the course of the series as well as having starred in the episode "Phil The Shill."

Phil Collins was portrayed in the hit cartoon South Park in the episode "Timmy 2000" holding his Oscar throughout, referring to his 1999 win for "You'll Be In My Heart", which defeated "Blame Canada" from South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut. He was seen again in the episode "Cartman's Silly Hate Crime".

Phil Collins appears briefly in the Finnish animated sitcom Pasila in the episode "Phil Collins Hangover". The music of this episode is a pastiche of Phil Collins' "Another Day In Paradise".

Personal life[link]

Family[link]

Collins has been married three times. He married Canadian Andrea Bertorelli in 1975. They met as students in a drama class in London.^[63][64] They had a son, Simon Collins, and Collins adopted Bertorelli's daughter Joely Collins, a Canadian actress. They divorced in 1980, after she started an affair with their painter and decorator. Collins later appeared on the BBC's Top of the Pops singing his 1981 solo hit "In The Air Tonight" with a pot of paint and brush positioned near his piano.^[65] Collins has since claimed that the presence of the paint and brush was coincidental.

Collins met his second wife, Jill Tavelman, in 1980. They were married from 1984^[66] to 1996. They had one daughter, Lily Collins, born in 1989.^[67] Collins openly admits that some of their divorce-related correspondence was by fax (one, about access to their daughter, was reproduced in the Sun), but denies that this took her by surprise.^[64] Collins paid Jill £17M as final settlement.^[65]

Collins married his third wife, Orianne Cevey, in 1999 after a five year romance.^[65] They have two sons, Nicholas and Matthew. They bought Sir Jackie Stewart's former house located in Begnins, Switzerland, overlooking Lake Geneva. Announcing their separation on 16 March 2006, they were divorced on 17 August 2008. Collins reportedly paid Cevey £25M in settlement.^[65] Collins has said he will continue to live in Switzerland to be near the children. He is currently residing in Féchy, while also maintaining homes in New York and Dersingham, Norfolk, England.^[65][68] In 2008, Collins was quoted in People Magazine: "Marriage is a difficult proposition. But I haven't given up on it, either."^[69] Collins, however, stated in 2010 that he had no intention of marrying again.^[70]

Fortune[link]

Collins was estimated to have a fortune of £115 million in the Sunday Times Rich List of 2011, making him one of the 20 richest people in the British music industry.^[71]

Court case[link]

On 29 March 2000, Phil Collins launched a case against two former musicians from his band to recoup £500,000 ($780,000) in royalties that were overpaid. Louis Satterfield, 62, and Rahmlee Davis, 51, claimed their contract entitled them to 0.5 per cent of the royalties from Serious Hits... Live!, a live album recorded during Collins's Seriously, Live! World Tour tour in 1990. Their claim was they were an integral part of the whole album, but Collins responded the two should only receive royalties from the five tracks in which they were involved.^[72] Instead of asking for a return of what Collins considered overpayment, he sought to recoup the funds by withholding future royalties to Satterfield and Davis, which amounted to less than an annual sum of £12,500 ($20,000) each.

On 19 April 2000, the High Court ruled that the two musicians would receive no more royalty money from Phil Collins. The amount that Collins was seeking was halved, and Satterfield and Davis (who originally brought the suit forward in California) would not have to repay any of it. The judge agreed with Collins's argument that Satterfield and Davis should have been paid for only the five tracks on which they performed, including the hit "Sussudio".^[73]

Health problems[link]

Collins reported losing his hearing in his right ear in 2000 due to a viral infection. In September 2009, it was reported that Collins could no longer play drums, due to a recent operation to repair dislocated vertebrae in his neck.^[74] A statement from Collins on the Genesis band website said, "There isn't any drama regarding my 'disability' and playing drums. Somehow during the last Genesis tour I dislocated some vertebrae in my upper neck and that affected my hands. After a successful operation on my neck, my hands still can't function normally. Maybe in a year or so it will change, but for now it is impossible for me to play drums or piano. I am not in any 'distressed' state; stuff happens in life."^[75]

Honorary Degrees[link]

Collins has received several honorary doctorates in recognition of his work in music and also for his personal interests. In 1987, he received an honorary doctorate of fine arts at Fairleigh Dickinson University.^[76] . In 1991, he received an honorary doctorate of music at the Berklee College of Music.^[77] Then on 12 May 2012, he received an honorary doctorate of history at McMurry University in Abilene, Texas for his research and collection of Texas Revolution artefacts and documents, which has led him to own one of the world's largest private collection of Alamo related artefacts.^[78] His passion for the Battle at the Alamo has also led him to write the book The Alamo and Beyond: A Collector's Journey, published in 2012.^[79]

Activism[link]

Collins was appointed a Lieutenant of the Royal Victorian Order in 1994 in recognition of his work on behalf of the Prince's Trust.^[80]

Collins has stated he is a supporter of animal rights and People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA). In 2005, he donated an autographed drumstick in support of PETA's campaign against Kentucky Fried Chicken.^[81]

Collins also has a long-standing interest in the Alamo. He has collected hundreds of artefacts related to the famous 1836 battle in San Antonio, Texas, narrated a light and sound show about the Alamo, and spoken at related events.^[82] He has completed a book entitled "The Alamo and Beyond: A Collector's Journey" published by Statehouse Press, based in Buffalo Gap, Texas.^[83]

Collins has often been mentioned erroneously in the British media as being a supporter of the Conservative Party and an opponent of the Labour Party. This derives from the famous article in the Sun, printed on the day of the 1992 UK general election, titled "If Kinnock wins today will the last person to leave Britain please turn out the lights", which claimed that Collins was among several celebrities who were planning to leave Britain in the event of a Labour victory.^{[citation needed]} Shortly before the 2005 election (when Collins was living in Switzerland), Noel Gallagher is reported as saying: "Vote Labour. If you don't and the Tories get in, Phil is threatening to come back."^[84] However, Collins has since stated that although he did once claim many years earlier that he might leave Britain if most of his income was taken in tax, which was Labour Party policy at that time for top earners, he has never been a Conservative Party supporter and he left Britain for Switzerland in 1994 purely because he met a woman who lived there. He said of Gallagher: “I don’t care if he likes my music or not. I do care if he starts telling people I’m a wanker because of my politics. It’s an opinion based on an old misunderstood quote.”^[85] Despite his claim that he did not leave Britain for tax purposes, he was one of several super-rich figures living in tax havens who were singled out for criticism in a report by the charity Christian Aid in 2008.^[86] Questioned about his politics by Mark Lawson in an interview broadcast in 2009, Collins said: "My father was Conservative but it wasn't quite the same, I don't think, when he was alive. Politics never loomed large in our family anyway. I think the politics of the country were very different then."^[87]

Collins founded the Little Dreams Foundation in February 2000, which aims to "realise the dreams of children in the fields of sports and art" by providing future prodigies aged 4 to 16 years with financial, material, and mentoring support with the help of experts in various fields.^[88]

Collins supports the South African charity the Topsy Foundation, which provides relief services to some of South Africa's most under-resourced rural communities through a multi-faceted approach to the consequences of HIV and AIDS and extreme poverty. He donates all royalties earned in South Africa to the organization.^[89][90]

Collins is a patron of the charity Children in Hunger, a small UK based charity working to combat child poverty in Brazil.^[91]

Discography[link]

Genesis[link]

Studio albums[link]

Number one singles[link]

"In the Air Tonight" re-entered the New Zealand charts in 2008 at No.3 and then peaked at No.1, after featuring in a Cadbury Gorilla advertisement.

See also[link]