Will Cassette Tapes ever just die already?

[furrypedro]

nothing like a good mixtape, anything in disc form just isn't the same.

[Lunkhead]

I still have a box of them, and I'm not sure what to do with them. They're about half music and half 4-track stuff, which is totally unrecoverable at this point. I don't have my tape player set up anywhere, and I'm thinking about getting rid of it. I should probably just get rid of all of it, since I don't want to lug around a box of cassettes for the rest of my life.

[fodroy]

Mixtapes are fun, even if I don't own a tape player to make/listen to them with. I like how crappy some things can sound on tape.

[anti-m]

Funny! I was just recently mourning the passing of the mix tape. Here's what I believe we've lost in our transition to a digital age:

1. The necessity of coherent construction. It's a lot harder to skip around from song to song on a mix tape. For this reason, the best mixtape makers put a lot of thought into "album flow," or how well one song flows into another. The tape becomes a "whole" rather than a collection of individual songs.

2. A clear separation between sides "A" and "B" It was nice to have a clear point of distinction -- it allowed me to make mix tapes with two distinct parts or moods.

3. Physical Album Art I always got a kick out making fancy tape cases (or CD covers for that matter)

Ok, I know you SF wiseguys will rightly point out that one could still have 1, 2, and 3 with a collection of MP3s or whathaveyou... but my point is that the mixtape almost forced you to incorporate these attributes.

I haven't made a mix tape for anyone in about 5 years, I think.

[HeuristicsInc]

I make myself mix CDs all the time, still. Then the tracks get shoved in my huge mp3 directory for later shuffling. I did kind of miss the Side A/Side B thing, but what I don't miss is the difficulty of figuring out how much time was left on the side of the tape, and then having to do it again for Side B!
Anyway what I'm trying to say is that I still get that album-flow kick going with CDs.
-bill

[Niveous]

My GOM song was done on a 4 track. It was very funny after I made the decision to do it 4 track instead of straight to PC there was a great hunt through the house for blank cassettes.

I'm in the same boat as Anti-M. I kinda miss 'em. Except when they snapped. God, I hated that. Or when one of the kids got hold of one and pulled the tape out! Or when the pressure pad would fall out! ...

[fodroy]

I liked with mix tapes how no matter how different songs are in production quality the quiet sound of the tape made it seem a lot smoother.

And I also agree with Anti-M's points about tapes.

[Bjam]

I used to tape songs off of the radio, and then play them back and learn the words. That's about the only time I used tapes. By the time I got around to appreciating music, CDs were the cool thing. Now CDs are barely cool anymore.

O, how times have changed! Whineth!

[jute gyte]

Tapes are definitely alive and well in the noise community. Check out some awesome ones here.

[Nigel (spOOn) Clements]

I hate cassettes, they'll never replace vynu..vina..vyni.. records!

[j$]

I employ a midget in a tutu to come round and croon songs softly in my ear as I sleep. All other formats are redundant.

[deshead]

Mix tapes (and crooning midgets) aside, if you've never recorded with a 4-track you really should.

[fodroy]

One day your midget will die. Then where will you be? In the cold, Johnny Cashpoint. In the cold.

[j$]

I'll just get another one ....

[Hoblit]

I would prefer VINYL over tape at this point. CDs are the way to go. If they start to skip, rip them and burn new copies.

Let the (mixed or other) tape go...

[boltoph]

I still have cassette player in my car, plus a large collection of old tapes. I still roll 'em every day or so!

...but also using a radio adapter for my mp3 player when I'm not listening to tapes or radio...

[Caravan Ray]

In 1974 my parents bought a Mazda, that came equipped with an 8-track cartridge player. In all the time we had that car - we only did ever find 2 8-track cartridges to play in it: Mrs Mills' Honky-Tonk Party Hits and Marty Robbins' Gunfighter Ballads. I let Mrs Mills go, but I do now have Marty Robbins' Gunfighter Ballads on CD.

[Elias_Aquarius]

I use cassettes in a tape-recorder to, well, tape stuff.

[WeaselSlayer]

My Helmet tape melted. I was very sad. I love tapes in the car, but anywhere else it's a pain in the ass.

[furrypedro]

I am very sorry to hear that.

I made 2 mixtapes recently, they ran thusly:

Mixtape A: A Fairwell to Timmys
Side A
1. Introduction by Cleofis Randolph the Patriarch
2. Refused - New Noise
3. B 52's - Private Idaho
4. Cap'n Jazz - Yes, I am talking to you
5. Heavy Vegetable - Song for Wesley
6. Russian Futurists - Precious Metals
7. Rainer Maria - The reason the night is long
8. Lift to Experience - These are the days
9. Daft Punk - Digital Love
10. National Forest - AM Lights
11. Traveling Wilburys - The end of the line
12. The Primitives - Lead me astray
Side B
1. Chris Clark - Lord of the Dance
2. Mates of State - Punchlines
3. The Spinto Band - So Kind, Stacy
4. Rocket From the Crypt - On A Rope
5. The Teenagers - Homecoming
6. The Dirty Projectors - Not Having Found
7. Smoke Fairies - Sea Shanty
8. Fun Lovin' Criminals - Scooby Snacks
9. Johnny Cash - Folsom Prison Blues
10. Pixies - River Euphrates
11. Unwed Sailor - The House of Hopes....Dreams....and Wishes
12. Life Without Buildings - The Leanover


Mixtape B: Chief Administrator, Suck My Oil
Side A
1. The Flaming Lips - The Abandoned Hospital Ship
2. Ini Kamoze - Here comes the Hotstepper
3. Buck65 - Leftfielder
4. Bjork - I Miss You (remix)
5. Metronomes - Cub
6. Architecture in Helsinki - Wishbone
7. Gutevolk - Portable Rain
8. Islands - Rough Gem
9. Guided by Voices - Exit Flagger
10. Idlewild - A Distant History
11. Bonnie 'Prince' Billy - A minor place
12. TV on the Radio - Province
Side B
1. Plans & Apologies - Nabbo
2. The Promise Ring - Red & Blue Jeans
3. Clap Your Hands Say Yeah - Over & Over Again
4. Braid - Niagara
5. The Mountain Goats - Snow Owl
6. Death Cab For Cutie - 405 (acoustic)
7. The Forms - Stravinsky
8. By The End Of Tonight - Waiting for an island
9. Tennnis Coats - Meu Mou Rainbow
10. the bluetones - Down at the reservoir
11. Enon - Sold!
12. The Lemonheads - Rudderless

...and they are proving most satisfying for cruising round Chatham's unfashionable Luton end with the windows down. now all I need is one of those old school 80's ghetto blasters as my one's got a broken speaker.

thought I'd share that with you.

[mrbeany]

I used MP3s of CDs I had ripped to make mxtapes for my car, as it only had a tape player.

Then my car's tape player stopped working. Trying to clean the thing didn't help.

I started dating the lady that became my wife, and she had a car with a tape player in it.

However that car's tape player blew before she even owned it.

I sort of think cassette tapes just kind of blow.

The whole A vs B side of the tape thing does not exist cleanly with CDs, that is correct. Of course, you never actually flip CDs, so the cleanest way to get the same thing is to just have two different CDs. If you want to keep smaller size, you may try a "Mini CD" which usually holds 24 minutes. This isn't quite the 30/45 minutes you'd get on a cassette tape, but really, if you want something longer you can just use a separate full-size CD.

The last time I made mix tapes, I was making all tracks segue. (One of the advantages of recording from a computer.) This is more difficult to do with a CD, but really, the effect just didn't work with some songs. It was more of a novelty than anything.

The great thing about using the computer to organize the data for the mix tapes/CDs is that (1) it is easy to see how long the side is getting, and (2) when it stops working you can make another easily. If you've normalized the audio in your MP3/Ogg/Flac collection, then you don't need to worry about tracks having differing loudness, too.