I take that back. There’s not just one “most exciting sound in the world.” There are actually two, and if I think about it long enough I may come up with three.
The first one is the sound that an old-fashioned screen door makes when you slam it (see my earlier post).
The second, the sound of an in-line Chevy 6 engine with dual exhausts and glasspack mufflers.
In 1962 the engine of my ’53 Chevy needed help. The previous owner had beat the tar out of his dad’s low-mileage Two-Ten 2-door, and now it was time for me, the third owner, to fix it.
I wanted to listen to it one more time, and to preserve the sound for future generations. So I set up the Webcor tape recorder (reel to reel) and placed the microphone in my upstairs bedroom window.
In this recording you’ll hear me race down the stairs, run through the dining room and the kitchen, slam that wonderful screen door, then start the old warrior and rev it up.
You can call ’em anything you like: “duals,” “twins,” “pipes,” “twice pipes,” or just “those obnoxious neighbor kids raising heck again,” but the sound still reminds me of a WWII dive bomber.
Listen to this, and let it take you back to the day.
Where were you in ’62?