hipster interns controlling the media that reaches your eyes and ears

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VsqxFi_EK30

Dayo, you may find this hard to believe, but for people of a certain age cassette mixtapes are not a hipster totem, they're just what everyone used to do.

lies

In fact up to 2003-04 I had friends who still made mixtapes because they didn't own computers with CD-R/W. Then came the great eMachine consolidation and all those poor fuckers came into the 21st century.

I was still making mix tapes as late as 2007 because my truck didn't have an e-machine.

one thing i notice is the bumper music on news channels like MSNBC and Fox is totally being chosen by gen x'ers now...it's all Mission of Burma, Magazine, the Fall, etc. which makes for even stranger viewing when you compare the music to the pablum they're serving

yeah the nba finals once played 'shook ones pt ii' as outro music to a commercial break

anyway I think that even in the hey day of the mixtape, you had to be of a special type to have had experience in making one? how many people these days make mp3 playlists to send to each other? or did a lot of people make mixtapes for just personal use

sincerely, someone who was born in the mid 80s

Ever make a playlist for yourself? Throw together something for a road trip or because you've got some grinding to do on your work computer?

Same thing for mixtapes. If I knew I was going on a roadtrip somewhere, even by myself, I'd make one.

I've always been an albums kind of guy

dr. whiney approves of this thread

idk man I just feel that if you really want to ram on the 30s-50s nostalgia button why not choose something even more relatable, like idk transferring your kids little league games to a VHS tape using a VCR, or trying to program the VCR to tape the big game 7 of the 1988 world series

A PhD in Pain xp

those mixtapes don't look particularly hip to me

dayo otm, this is just the thing where something kitschy confusedly enters our collective memory as a signifier of cutesiness, two to three years after it fades out of existence, like 8mm film of beach frolicking, like chocolate bars nobody buys that are revived nostalgically, like the appreciation for the music of Len

or trying to program the VCR to tape the big game 7 of the 1988 world series

Probably couldn't get the rights from MLB.

anyway I think that even in the hey day of the mixtape, you had to be of a special type to have had experience in making one?

I was born in '81 and I'm kind of an album-oriented dude, too, but I would copy half an album on to one side of a cassette, and the other side would have a bunch of extra space so I'd put several random songs from other stuff I liked, then spend the afternoon jumping my bike off the edge of the driveway while listening to my mixtape

so, dayo, you missed this by a scant couple years

everybody made mixtapes

even your mom?

my mom and dad couldn't figure out how to record their records onto tape, but they are members of the silent generation so

My parents never really recorded their records on to tape, but I think it was due to busyness and laziness.

I'm just a little mystified that there's this huge hidden generation of ex-mixtapers out there to who you want to sell car insurance

I traded mixtapes with friends in middle school, that generation is like 30 years old and still working menial car insurance sales jobs, dayo

Hidden? Mixtapes aren't like some obscure piece of arcana like Studs Kirby or hologram stickers of Ken Griffey Jr. at Denny's.

my 20 year high school reunion was just last weekend. i didn't go, but i "got to" see all the pictures of it, as well as historical ones, on facebook. my h.s. classmates probably made mixtapes that looked like the ones in those ads, and they were far from hip.

guess the media airwaves are not really being controlled by the hipster illuminati after all

hipster illuminati is an oxymoron

Calling gen-x'ers hipsters kinda sounds like when my dad gets yuppie and baby boomer confused.

otm

I had no idea that Gen X started in 1973

Dude, you could probably pull it back to 1964,

but those were the original hipsters

Dayo, you can call yourself Generation Y if you want, but I prefer to call you all THE BABY-ON-BOARD GENERATION.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pURFU3pL93o

Gen X-ers are in their mid 30s - to late 40s atm

what do you gen x'ers call the people mid 20s - mid 30s?

thanking you pplains

xp naive

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Generation_Y

I call them annoying, for the most part

trying to program the VCR to tape the big game 7 of the 1988 world series

there was no game 7 in the 1988 world series, you commie

what do you gen x'ers call the people mid 20s - mid 30s?

lol so many open goal responses

80s mixtape people didn't stay 16, dayo, many of them grew up and got real jobs and are now wistful about the things thay used to do when they were younger and had dreams

oh, snap, mookie.

http://media.tumblr.com/tumblr_ls5bljICGH1qlbnt4.jpg

my wife got so mad at me in that scene of IB when I shouted "OMG HE JUST BLEW THEIR COVER"

I feel like DJP and I, after a few drinks, would be a lot of fun at the movies. In that everyone else would hate us.

this is ein officeren tisch!!!

dayo otm, this is just the thing where something kitschy confusedly enters our collective memory as a signifier of cutesiness, two to three years after it fades out of existence, like 8mm film of beach frolicking, like chocolate bars nobody buys that are revived nostalgically, like the appreciation for the music of Len

― , Blogger (schlump), Thursday, August 9, 2012 4:42 PM (1 hour ago) Bookmark

wanna post this to the 'is deej a hipster' thread

how many people these days make mp3 playlists to send to each other?

This is one of the main things I do on spotify!

Not suggesting its something "hip" that "cool" people do... but Mordy will back me up if he wanders in... its all about playlist sharing now.

I was an obsessive mixtaper, now an obsessive playlist-maker on itunes, spotify, all playlist places. the mixing, I can't stop the mixing!

mixtapes were as much a rap phenomenon as anything else where I grew up - at the record store in Norwalk CA down the street from where I lived '89-'92 there were custom-made mixtapes by people who weren't on KDAY but were presumably DJs at dances: it was a good way to get all the rap singles you wanted w/o breaking the bank & usually you could hear one or two things you were curious about or hadn't heard of. they also had lots of oldies mixtapes in desktop-printer astrobrite j-cards & made-up album titles. However I don't doubt that Generation Think About Hipsters will write its own version of history where mixtapes were always about "hipster" music.

attempting to find much evidence that these tapes existed is hard but fortunately for history Dr. Dre used to make some & sell them at the swap meet (swap meet is a big weekly deal in southern California, or used to be) -- at least one of them circulates online and it looked like this:

http://www.rapmusicguide.com/amass/images/inventory/6225/Dr.%20Dre%20-%20Cuts%20Like%20These%20(Rodium%20Swap%20Meet%20Mix%20Tape).jpg

so, yeah, def v. "hipster," by all means let's worry about indie rock some more on a thread whose actual root is rap culture

Mixtapes very much still a thing in rap culture, only now they're DJ sets people download into their iPods... but they still call them mixtapes!

No doubt I now grew very pale; — but I talked more fluently, and with a heightened voice. Yet the sound increased — and what could I do? It was a low, dull, quick sound — much such a sound as a pencil makes when enveloped in cassette spool. I gasped for breath — and yet the tumblr whites heard it not. I talked more quickly — more vehemently; — but the noise steadily increased. I arose, and argued about trifles, in a high key and with violent gesticulations; — but the noise steadily increased. Why would they not be gone? I paced the floor to and fro, with heavy strides, as if excited to fury by the observations of the men; — but the noise steadily increased. Oh God! what could I do? I foamed — I raved — I swore! I swung the chair upon which I had sat, and grated it upon the boards, like something I once heard on a Boredoms track, you assholes; — but the noise arose over all and continually increased. It grew louder — louder — louder! And still the men chatted pleasantly, and smiled. Was it possible they heard not? Almighty God! — no, no! They heard! — they suspected! — they knew! — they were making a mockery of my horror! — this I thought, and this I think. But anything better than this agony! Anything was more tolerable than this derision! I could bear those white-framed dimestore shades no longer! I felt that I must scream or die! — and now — again! — hark! louder! louder! louder! louder! —

“Villains!” I shrieked, “dissemble no more! I admit the deed! — tear up the planks! — here, here! — it is the beating of his hipster heart!”

there were several booths of rap dudes selling mix cds last friday night at the monthly first friday too-many-people-in-my-neighborhood-thing here in Oakland.

yeah, this is a very consistent/pervasive thing in rap culture

when i was 13 i invented grunge by putting never mind the bollocks on one side of a 90 minute maxell and lynyrd skynyrd's greatest hits on the other

p. sure you mean skynyrd's 'gold and platinum'

everybody made mixtapes, this is the weirdest thread.

i feel like whiney has taken over everyone's brain.

i used to buy DJ Clue Mixtapes on cassette at Urban Lights in St Paul. in the 00s.

mooks, nope....it was this hideous thing:

i guess it's Skynyrd's Innyrds (gross)

http://listeningroom.lohudblogs.com/files/2010/03/lynyrd_skynyrd-greatest_hits-frontal.jpg

maybe i was older than 13, i don't remember and also grunge had already been invented but not in my town

SO MANY LIES

ugh innyrds -- no live free bird, no cred

hahaha urban lights holy shit

i wrote a big assholish ranty thing abt "man you fuckers dont understand because you never had to deal with walkmans" but then i gave up

when did cheapo disappear (assuming they have)

i made ambitious mix cds from my self-consciously heterogeneous mp3 collection and posted them to web site artofthemix.org (RIP).

cheapo is still rolling on, the one in uptown is fucking crazy huge now, it took over a best buy plus the entire basement below the dead best buy.

wau -- that was my main one too

hahaha urban lights holy shit

i wrote a big assholish ranty thing abt "man you fuckers dont understand because you never had to deal with walkmans" but then i gave up

― O_o-O_O-o_O (jjjusten), Thursday, August 9, 2012 6:56 PM (6 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

haha yeah i had some major "animal house guys going to see otis day & the knights moments" at Urban Lights but that was the only place i knew where to get DJ Clue mixtapes and shit like that...later on, i'd get CD ones at this shady place called Millenium Connect on Chicago and 36th-ish in South....but lots of times it would be open with the door locked and you'd have to knock haha, they supposedly sold pagers and shit, i don't what other, uh, "business interests" they have

one of my earliest musical memories is my aunt putting together mixtapes of glossy revivalist scottish and irish folk music. g d hipster.

mixtapes are the new sock hops for selling shit to graying spenders

ugh innyrds -- no live free bird, no cred

― mookieproof, Thursday, August 9, 2012 6:55 PM Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

It did have an alt. version of Freebird with like two more minutes at the end.

I once made a mixtape for a girl that had Talking Heads' "Memories Can't Wait" in the middle of side one and Living Colour's cover of "Memories Can't Wait" halfway through the other.

A really bad idea.

did she give up the muzz skillings after that?

i once made a mixtape for a girl that had all songs by women on one side and all songs by men on the other. except calvin johnson got to be on the girl side ("hot chocolate boy") and PJ harvey got to be on the boy side ("man-size"). on the cover was a drawing of half a man and half a woman sewn together. i think she liked it. she came by and gave me a dessicated animal head she found in the woods.

It did have an alt. version of Freebird with like two more minutes at the end.

smdh

nmdh

your story was adorable

i think she liked it. she came by and gave me a dessicated animal head she found in the woods.

aw i was once mailed a dead mosquito (srsly)

i was once given parts of a dead bird

ooh a dead bird

how womantic

my cat sure knew how to treat a lady

This thread is eye opening, to realise that theres younger people who honestly didnt think mixtapes were a thing. Everyone did them in my day. I mean its just what you did. Tape songs off the radio. Tape songs off friends records you couldnt find/afford to buy.

The one other thing related that hasnt come up here is the bootleg. I had so so many gig bootlegs, some sixth generation or more dubs (with the accopmpanying dubious quality!). I still have things like the Cocteau's Royal Albert Hall 1984 show, on tape.

Did anyone else buy stuff from Throbbing Lobster, on that note? Or do swaps with him?

(I think thats who it was, who used to do the mixtape demo casette zine out of Boston?)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t01hcHiUvSg

haha - last week i was looking through my tapes for The Cure poll, and found a tape case that was all live recordings of gigs that i had taped from archives at the radio station i'd worked at in college

i also found the case for a bootleg of a bad seeds gig that i'd bought at Mystery Train in Boston - the tape was gone :/ had a really awesome cover of "I Put a Spell On You"

I had a Pixies gig boot from ... christ knows how old it was but you could hear there was only about 15 people in the audience, clapping mildly, like no one knew who they were.

Had the very first Sundays live gig on tape too, that one was a hoot - their freiends are all in the audience heckling the singer.

haha man

summer after college i lived in this enormous house with like 10 ppl. i was still working at the radio station and one of my roommates was all missing his soon-to-be ex girlfriend and asked me to tape some stuff at the station for a mix.

so i basically made this guy a mixtape for his gf, from resources he didn't have. but i was poor and said gimme a couple bucks for the tape, at least. and he threw two dollars on the floor.

needless to say, he's now a gop-voting lawyer

one of the boys i dated in college made me a "missing you" mixtape over spring break - one of the songs on it was "stukas over disneyland" - needless to say, when he dumped me a year later, it totally broke my heart

needless to say, he's now a libertarian conspiracy-theory lover living in Northern Idaho

fwiw I'm 25 and when I was a kid I made mixtapes for myself all the time. if they were for other people they were always CDRs, for some reason.

Constantly made mixes for people, and they made mixes for me. Between friends, the tapes were compilations of cool stuff the other person didn't have because EXPENSIVE IMPORT or I AM NOT BUYING ALL THIS BAUHAUS/JAPAN/4AD. Wrote essays about modern British politics (eg Thatcherism and the response to it) and made mix tapes for the lecturer to be used as 'mood music' while reading said essays (had things like 'Charles Windsor' by McCarthy on them). All the tapes I made for late-'80s plane travel on NWA between home and college featured 'Waitress In The Sky' by the Replacements, for some bizarre reason ;-).

the tapes were compilations of cool stuff the other person didn't have because EXPENSIVE IMPORT or I AM NOT BUYING ALL THIS BAUHAUS/JAPAN/4AD.

This, totally. I grew up in a small country town with little access to any indie/import material. I mean in those days, you did mail order, or went to Sydney, or hoped for friends overseas to... make you mix tapes :) I discovered EVERYTHING I knew in the 80s thanks to Melbourne friends mailing me tapes of loads of c86/4ad/creation/factory stuff. Between that and the Uni radio station (AM Band!) I learned a lot. Kids these days dont know what for with their emusic and their youtubes.

https://fbcdn-sphotos-d-a.akamaihd.net/hphotos-ak-ash4/s720x720/185461_447651861941296_1467557405_n.jpg

Suspect that the painfully uncool people who ended up making mixtapes of Phil Collins and Dire Straits songs to listen to by themselves in the car significantly outnumber the dorky indie people who made mixtapes for the cute girl in school.

they have 2 ears and a heard, don't they?

heart

herd

I used to tape the weekly countdown off of the radio. Also made a couple of what could best be described as "tapes" (for example: The Cure's "The Same Deep Water As You" copied 5 times in a row on both sides of a C90) so I could easily play a favorite song whenever I wanted.

so what you are all telling me is that you would all love to buy some car insurance

In case I'm listening to a tape where someone segues "She's My Ex" into "Taillights Fade" and I drive the Saturn into the rails? You bet!

I have car insurance

but his is cheaper and comes with a mixtape a month

Tell me more

I'm certain that if my insurance company started sending me mixtapes, they would all be full of Trace Adkins

i still listen to my walkman

at this point i would happily buy insurance from any company that doesn't subject me to Flo or the gecko several times a day.

flo vs the gecko

fuggedaboutit! this is NOO YAWK!

This thread is amazing. I was born in 1979 and made my first mixtape off the radio when I was 9: Bon Jovi, Guns n Roses, U2, ...

My parents are the least hipster people of all time and they have a cupboard full of C90s they taped off people.

hipsters dont even exist anymore fyi

the greatest trick the hipster ever pulled

Dayo, come sit beside me here and let me tell you about the long-ago days when we had to record three movies on to the same VHS tape using the shitty, shitty 6-hour setting.

^^^
I remember the days thinking that EP and LP were relatable terms between VHS quality and record quality

pplains, I remember VHS fondly! I have VHS tapes that I made as a kid. and i def remember choosing between the various settings

Suspect that the painfully uncool people who ended up making mixtapes of Phil Collins and Dire Straits songs

lol these are like the coolest bands wtf

one of my friends made long ass audio mixtapes using a VHS player plugged into his stereo

oh that's awesome

but only the coolest bands to listen to through the nostalgic haze of tape hiss, right (xpost)

dayo you can't be that much younger than me (born in '82)? i was still making tapes to walk around with (via walkman) freshman year of college, 'cause it was pre-ipod era and portable cd players were shitty.

born in '86, I asked for discmans for my birthday presents (but only if they had 10 second ESP)

nobody i knew had a walkman, in fifth grade I got my best friend at the time harlem world on CD (my dad helped me buy it at a k-mart), in return he got me a metallica patch, cheap bastard

My parents are the least hipster people of all time and they have a cupboard full of C90s they taped off people.

Actually, I remember thinking that the really hip people were the ones who cared enough about music to actually, like, buy it.

haven't made a mix tape since... 1998? i mean CD-Rs were getting around by then

man, fuck discmen...ate up batteries, broke if you dropped them and were expensive to replace, and skipped all the time (never had one where the shock protection really worked).

i was still making mix tapes till 2003, when i made the momentous decision to buy a cd burner. seemed like a huge investment at the time.

Most enthusiastic tapers I know eventually bought hard copies of stuff first heard on their friends' comps.

yeah my dad worked at a computer parts store and so would get cool stuff for 'cheap,' like, wholesale prices, so I was pretty ahead of the curve. remember selling the leaked copy of marshall mathers for $3 (and getting chewed out by my friend for not selling it for $5!). but I don't think I really made mix-CD-Rs.

i made mix CD-R's for a brief time in the late 90s and early 00s (mixtapes, too). i didn't have a burner, but a musician friend did. only got a CD burner of my own several years after all computers started coming with them, and by that point, i'd graduated to playlists.

in the late 90s i used to make cd-r mixes out of my winamp playlists now in 2012 i just bliss out to the cosmic hum of surging power lines and the radio static my cheap metal fillings pick up

i didnt own my first cassette player until like 2007 which i bought a thrift store to listen to noize tapes i had purchased

I have been getting back into cassette slately but all my tape players have been dying. that was alwyas the biggest problem - the tape players always died at some point, while my minidisc player is still going strong from 2001

i think cassette slately started to believe their own hype after altered zones covered them

I got a Teddy ruxpin recnelyt but it ate my 1908's mixtape. and it inly takes c batteries - that sucks!!!

fuck a ruxpin

no he is nice! he's heavy though and hard. I dotn know if his eyes are supposed to blink or not though

I would also add that not only are cassettes not a hipster totem for me, but I can't really get used to the idea that they are for anyone, like my attitude is still basically "No, really? That will never catch on." There are some things about cassettes that still make me nostalgic I guess, and I happen to have a car with a cassette player so I put on cassettes once in a while, but for the most part they were not the greatest medium and, unlike, say, records, don't seem to have any legit argument for their superiority vs. CDs.

Very OTM. It's a format I was very happy to move beyond. I'm not even sure that I can get that nostalgic about them, besides the basic nostalgia that comes with anything that used to be a part of your life at one time. (Even at their peak, cassettes were always just a discount consumer option, weren't they?)

Yeah me three. Cassettes were a neccesity, for portability reasons and thats about it. They got chewed up, you couldnt start from anywhere you wanted, they'd warp, they hissed.

one thing cassettes did well was hide vinyl noise. i never had any idea how crackly records were till i started digitally transferring vinyl

cassettes are cool and preferable to other formats in one way: durability. i loved being able to basically toss tapes around my car without much risk of scratching them like CDs, even now i kind of enjoy having my old tapes stacked into big boxes.

yeah but as I learned playing the same old-time radio cassettes over and over and over again at bedtime when I was younger, those things will wear out and you will have to hold down the play button to keep them from stopping.

One time I recall cracking the case of a well-loved tape and my parents tried to transfer the tape itself into a cannibalized blank cassette; it worked ok iirc

itt hipsters explain why they love cassette tapes, deny their status as hipster totem

Don't think that's what's happening.

hipsters dont even exist anymore fyi

― Lamp, Friday, August 10, 2012 12:17 PM (4 days ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

O_O

idiot

yeah, i'm far from a hipster and i used to make mixtapes and they remind me of being in high school -- referring to them is about as hipster as referring to "st. elsewhere"

keep it coming, guys

Whiney did u know that Pabst Blue Ribbon used to sponsor the Fibber McGee and Molly show

you're all loathsome hipsters. look at you. listening to audio cassettes. what a bunch of fuckin clowns.

O_O

haha im going to assume yr trolling here but i mean this is 100% true

it's totally true in a sense, sure

Either Im a goth, or Im a hipster, make yr fucking mind up.

CANNOT BE BOTH

gothpster

yeah i guess the term still has some vague descriptive power and lame people will use it as an adjective or something but like 'actual hipsters' no longer exist as a sociological/cultural group but i guess its p embarrassing that i care abt that stuff anyway

That sounds impossible to even pronounce unless u daffy duck xpost

also yes its true that goths can never be cool but idg how thats relevant here

yeah i guess the term still has some vague descriptive power and lame people will use it as an adjective or something but like 'actual hipsters' no longer exist as a sociological/cultural group but i guess its p embarrassing that i care abt that stuff anyway

― Lamp, Tuesday, August 14, 2012 12:31 AM (1 minute ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

water is wet

oh nm.

if you're old enough to remember cassettes, then idly discussing them doesn't scan as a hip affectation. otoh, if you're still buying/issuing music on cassette...

Either Im a goth, or Im a hipster, make yr fucking mind up.

But you were so evidently expressing your hipster love for cassette tapes, Trayce, just like the rest of us:
Yeah me three. Cassettes were a neccesity, for portability reasons and thats about it. They got chewed up, you couldnt start from anywhere you wanted, they'd warp, they hissed.

water is wet

sorry didnt mean to drown you in the obvious here

XD

When I am in DC I see lots of people who definitely aren't hipsters; on the other hand, when I'm in Northampton, everyone I see looks like a hipster, so they can't be hipsters. Also I saw a copy of H1pst3r Pupp13s at a store down the street. They didn't have any cassettes.

otoh, if you're still buying/issuing music on cassette...

you should finish this thought

i buy tapes when they won't let me have the download code on its own

One tap I alway dug was that if you took off "We Will Fall" all three of the Stooges albums would fit on a c90. I delivered a heck of a lot of pizza's to that tape.

until eventually it turned into a reel-to-reel

another smashing ilx thread

http://rwrant.co.za/wp-content/uploads/2010/11/Jeff-Foxworthy.jpg

"If you have a mustache, wear a belt with blue jeans, and talk about cassette tapes on a messageboard, then you - my friend - might just be a hipster."

It's p funny how common "You might a _____ if" foxworthy parodies are these days. Kind of hilarious to think David Spade was at the ground floor of something big

In more ways than one.

http://www2.pictures.zimbio.com/bg/David+Spade+David+Spade+John+Farley+LAX+YEXI8LbdFRqx.jpg

just flashed back to gear's couch for some reason

arguing abt whether or not hipsters still exist on the internet is maybe my idea of hell

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/1/14/Venom_Welcome.jpg

anyway, people of all kinds made mixtapes in the 80s. usually people who were really into music cause it took time and you needed some depth in your music collection to make them. making a mixtape for a crush isn't just some internet meme ppl did this all the time.

one weird thing about Whiney's 24-hour-a-day obsession with all things hipsters is how anything hipsters get into he's willing to brand "hipster" forever. like fuckin A I heard hipsters sit on chairs. CHAIRS ARE HIPSTER OMG, sitting on floor til further advised

I'd wager that the vast majority of people listening to and buying currently-released music on cassette are not in fact hipsters in any sense of the word, except in Whiney-world, where a one-drop/five-second rule applies: if a hipster has heard about it/thought about it/talked about it/seen it in a store window, it's Brand Hipster

listening to the sundays on my walkman is definitely a unparalleled experience

singing "hipster chairs" to myself to the tune of The Soup Dragons' "Kingdom Chairs" and it's all your fault

the Soup Dragons...now gone over to the hipster side

they never made a sports discman as good as the sports walkman, I will say that

the sports Walkman was THE SHIT, mine got run over by a car multiple times and still worked

YES

and making it yellow like that was genius.

Before the iPod was made irrelevant by iPhones, I used to say that Sony could be dominating the mp3 player market if it had the balls it did back in the walkman era.

oh god, i had one of those. looked like a tonka truck, and yeah, it was a tank. loved the "ruggedized" latch.

I know/know of multiple people who have issued new works on cassette tape in the last few years

the LATCH

talk about life-affirming

those people are wrong xpost

Before the iPod was made irrelevant by iPhones, I used to say that Sony could be dominating the mp3 player market if it had the balls it did back in the walkman era.

yeah it is weird how completely the big names dropped the ball in the digital era. I mean obv this is true in other parts of the music industry & across other industries but it's kind of baffling

Oh man the buttons on a sports walkman felt so good to push, they had that perfect amount of soft but firm give.

Rollerblading around in acid-washed jeans -- bottom hems all frayed -- with the sports walkman belt-clipped in the back, oakley shades in full effect, just broadcasting to the world "I don't give a fuck. I may skate off a cliff and be dashed to bits on the rocks below, but my music will JUST KEEP PLAYING."

I know/know of multiple people who have issued new works on cassette tape in the last few years

― your native bacon (mh), Tuesday, August 14, 2012 8:12 AM (4 minutes ago)

and?

yeah it is weird how completely the big names dropped the ball in the digital era. I mean obv this is true in other parts of the music industry & across other industries but it's kind of baffling

well remember, Sony also was the champion of Betamax so it's not like all of their projects were winners

maybe also having a big recorded music division = not wanting to fully commit to this mp3 thing

they could have done branded MP3 players with specific artist albums/discographies preloaded

well remember, Sony also was the champion of Betamax so it's not like all of their projects were winners

Betamax is a marketing failure, though, not a design one - there are Betamax geeks to this day who will happily explain to you why it was better than VHS. They also like LaserDisc iirc

they could have done branded MP3 players with specific artist albums/discographies preloaded

stealing this idea, it is still viable. and if the player resembled a tape deck...oh fuck...DJP, you and I are going to be very, very rich

Just FYI with very little effort you can get "It's a mixtape" stuck in your head to the tune of Men At Work's "It's A Mistake." Try it at home!

Betamax is a marketing failure, though, not a design one - there are Betamax geeks to this day who will happily explain to you why it was better than VHS. They also like LaserDisc iirc

there are also geeks who will happily explain to you why OS/2 was awesome and better than MS-DOS and Windows; basically you should never, ever, ever trust and evangelizing geek

Sony pretty much dropped the ball by grinding away at improving minidisc for years, and then trying to force their own digital audio file format instead of using mp3, and then... just being irrelevant.

omg DJP, I have spoken elsewhere on ilx about this, but I had a summer camp roommate with a father who worked at IBM who spent half his waking moments evangelizing OS/2

I owned a PS/2 for several years; let me tell you, OS/2 was a bag of dicks

I really love geeks fetishizing systems that don't/didn't take hold though. stayed at a professor's house with a friend way back when, dude had a whole library of laserdiscs. watched several - they were fine and all, but it's like: really? you're dropping your coin on these? okee-dokey professor dude, enjoyed your copy of last tango in paris

iirc U2 did a branded iPod w/ their catalog preloaded, might've been a few different artists that did it around that time a few years ago

these days you can get laserdiscs for sooooo cheap and the sleeves are about the same size as LP sleeves

perhaps their time has come

iirc U2 did a branded iPod w/ their catalog preloaded, might've been a few different artists that did it around that time a few years ago

yeah around the time of How To Dismantle An Atomic Bomb iirc; I think it was black and red

i think she liked it. she came by and gave me a dessicated animal head she found in the woods.

You grew up in Poulsbo???

fuck U2

My friend/work colleague still has an operational Amiga which I think he still uses and is part of an online community for. The other day he showed me a blog post about someone who managed to get a (text-only) web browser working on a C64. Which is quite a feat, but... xposts

Does anyone who was buying tapes in 84 or so remember the first clear plastic one they bought?

Mine was Howard Jones - Dream Into Action. It seemed to have come from the platonic realm.

But isn't that true, though?: I thought that in video terms, Beta was considered superior to VHS (which was probably not that hard anyway). I never watched it so I wouldn't know. (xposts)

What is anyone's rationale for releasing things on cassette now? I've heard reasons but not one that makes sense to me.

xpost In the late 90s knew an older guy in Gainesville whose twin passions were MG cars and obsolete british Amstrad computers.

Tapes might actually be more durable than CD-Rs in the long term I guess. At least my 20 year old tapes still mostly play, which can't be said of most of my 10 year old CD-Rs. R.I.P. Hyped 2 Death bootlegs :( xpost

'Twenty-some years on, it’s nice to think that there is, possibly, a twitter.app kicking around for NeXT computers, written by "TimBL" himself'

durability, ease of recording, hip cachet

The other day he showed me a blog post about someone who managed to get a (text-only) web browser working on a C64.

getting lynx or emacs to run on a C64 is not the massively super-impressive feat it may seem to be on the surface

(sez the dude who remembers gopher)

What is anyone's rationale for releasing things on cassette now?

to annoy people

durability, ease of recording, hip cachet

less rippable?

How is a cassette more durable than a digital file? Doesn't magnetic tape basically start deteriorating from day 1? I don't see at all how recording to cassette is easier than digital recording in the present day.

This was awhile back, but still late in the cassette's game.

We went to Hastings, this music and bookstore that's a regional strip mall staple around here. It's 2005 and the place was still stocked to the ceiling with cassettes for sale, all those Staind and Motley Crue tapes still pinned inside those horrible long plastic things that you needed bolt cutters to remove.

Weird thing was the tapes were now as expensive as the CDs, $14.95 and up.

I grew up buying tapes from Hastings, Motley Crue, Metallica, Violent Femmes, but it felt so strange to be in there with an iPod out in the car. Even weirder to pick up a Limp Bizkit cassette tape, like seeing Hot Dog Water on vinyl would have been less surprising.

xpost I suppose you could argue that a cassette goes from listenable to unlistenable on a very slow downward gradient whereas a digital file goes from listenable to unlistenable more or less instantaneously (when CD surface gets scratched or MP3 file becomes corrupt)

I know/know of multiple people who have issued new works on cassette tape in the last few years

― your native bacon (mh), Tuesday, August 14, 2012 8:12 AM (4 minutes ago)

and?

― contenderizer, Tuesday, August 14, 2012 10:20 AM (28 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

yeah it's kind of annoying, i'm actually considering trying to track down a cassette deck again, jesus

How is a cassette more durable than a digital file? Doesn't magnetic tape basically start deteriorating from day 1? I don't see at all how recording to cassette is easier than digital recording in the present day.

― EveningStar (Sund4r), Tuesday, August 14, 2012 10:48 AM (1 minute ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

eh tape is pretty durable overall

but yeah it's not easier

i do like the lo-fi character of cassette recordings though more than lo-fi digital, the tape compression and hiss kind of makes everything sound cool in a way

How is a cassette more durable than a digital file? Doesn't magnetic tape basically start deteriorating from day 1? I don't see at all how recording to cassette is easier than digital recording in the present day.

its kinda rad to have your music exist as a physical object and cassettes are way cheaper than vinyl

I suppose you could argue that a cassette goes from listenable to unlistenable on a very slow downward gradient whereas a digital file goes from listenable to unlistenable more or less instantaneously (when CD surface gets scratched or MP3 file becomes corrupt)

I guess. A WAV or AIFF backed up in a couple of places always seemed pretty secure to me, especially considering how often cassettes warped or got eaten.

I totally get the appeal of analogue recording btw but vinyl is such a better format.

I have tapes that still play back fine. My infocom collection on floppy discs fuggedaboutit.
That's how tapes are more durable than digital.

Lamp, a little known fact is that there was in fact a short-lived physical medium that served as a vessel for digital files known as the Compact Disc. It was like the best of both worlds! But perhaps it was too good to last.

more durable than a compact disc, definitely more than a cd-r

sheesh I'm talking about people who think there's something to releasing on a physical format, obviously you don't give a shit about a lot of things if you're using cassette

I have cassette decks in both cars and listen to my old tapes all the time. The Nice Price bargain-bin tapes sound like shit where they've gottten dirty but the old Maxell/TDK mixtapes sound the same as ever.

Tapes are natural media for long-from noise/drone or sketchbook montage weirdness

let's be real, here, anyone releasing anything on a physical format at this point in the game is either going for the largest possible market (with CD) or they're appealing to a premium niche of some sort

There was this one band that had this fucking tape noise from the cheap boombox they used to record songs, on all of their tracks! After a while, I grew to like it.

I totally get the appeal of analogue recording btw but vinyl is such a better format.

its also crazy expensive and if your only putting something out in like runs of 75 than its not really 'worth it'.

yeah cassettes are just nicer than cd-rs idk this thread, its 2012, jeez

With a CD-R you can immediately put the songs on all of your players with no deterioration in quality. The CD-R itself will also sound as good as ever five years from now as long as you don't scratch it. The cassette will gradually deteriorate, and it's a pain to transfer the music. Tape noise can actually be sort of nice on some albums though, and even very mild distortion.

william basinski to thread

The CD-R itself will also sound as good as ever five years from now as long as you don't scratch it.

If you're lucky. I've got CD-R's that aren't scratched at all that don't play. Like, I bought a sealed copy of a Hyped 2 Death Homework comp last year and half the tracks skipped the first time I played the bastard. Won't rip on my computer either. Sorry Chuck but I won't be buying any more. All my other Hyped 2 Death CD-Rs are fucked now as well but that one I bought new.

Yeah but how old are you, son? Because if you've had cassettes for a long time, you know that all kinds of shit can make them unplayable as well.

Haha, I am old enough to have 20+ year old cassettes that still play.

a lot of my old tapes snapped, twisted, etc.

There's something about rerecordable media that I miss. Being able to record over part of something, on purpose or accidentally, is something that might get lost.

When I was really young I had this Fisher Price tape recorder with a little speaker and mic and would run around recording all kinds of crazy stuff, recording over myself, recording radio or television by holding it up. When I kind of listened through one of those when I was in my early teens, we figured out I had the only spoken recording of my grandmother, who died when I was in second grade. It was in there, sandwiched between the background noise and me reading books.

Hurting 2 OTM.

one day, when we've achieved singularity and all music is channeled through the Endless Mindstream, hipsters will wear t-shirts with pictures of MP3s on them and wax about the superiority of individual song-units.

Ha.

I'm not completely sure why I'm getting worked up over this. Probably because I only ever did things on cassette because I couldn't afford better, was frustrated all the time, and find it perverse that people are now willingly choosing the medium.

But I mean, I do actually like to understand things so am actually curious about the reasoning.

not much in stock now: http://boomkat.com/cassettes/summary/grid

I guess one thing I could say in favor of cassettes is that they take away the burden of endless choice and make it more likely that you'll actually listen to a whole side of a record in one sitting, but combine that feature with portability and car playability, unlike vinyl.

Although I guess a CD does the same, unless you're using a CD changer.

I still own a big box of tapes, only a handful of which have snapped or "worn out." I stuck a Consolidated tape in my car last week and the bass sounded great! For certain genres nothing beats a tape in the car.

^^^^^^^^ tapes in the car will always be a rad idea

But I mean, I do actually like to understand things so am actually curious about the reasoning.

lol i explained it to you twice, you are being obtuse

What is anyone's rationale for releasing things on cassette now? I've heard reasons but not one that makes sense to me.

the appeal of cassettes is that nobody gives a shit about them. even the people who fetishize them don't give too much of a shit. they're a physical thing that isn't a big deal, they're front-loaded with a sort of inconsequentiality. they don't come with press releases, PItchfork doesn't review them & the only places that do know the deal and do little one-graf "decent tape, some amazing stuff on side 2" blurbs. they are a way of putting something out physically that's safely outside of the hype machine. this is why black metal bands started issuing cassette-only stuff again in the late nineties: great way of limiting the reach of something that the adherents thought should remain unhyped. (this met with limited success, obviously, those dudes at hospital productions are pretty sharp.) even if people rip them, they can remain sort of small even if they're really good.

Ok you know those condo developments in areas like williamsburg where they advertise "built in mp3 player dock" as an ammenity? I'm going to develop condos with built-in cassette decks instead, and make millions.

I guess one thing I could say in favor of cassettes is that they take away the burden of endless choice and make it more likely that you'll actually listen to a whole side of a record in one sitting

Ha, that's the one argument that always seemed most perverse to me. "I'm so burdened by the skip button on this CD or playlist! If only I could be locked into whatever running order the record label decided on."

xpost You're right, Lamp. I'm blinded by my hatred of cassettes.
OK, that makes a certain kind of sense, aero.

Ok you know those condo developments in areas like williamsburg where they advertise "built in mp3 player dock" as an ammenity? I'm going to develop condos with built-in cassette decks instead, and make millions.

"C-90s built this yacht"

lounge on the luxurious sun-patio in your oakleys and neon OP tank top as the sounds of a seapunk cassingle massage your eardrums

man young people are so dumb

OK. Deep breaths. Analogue so qualitatively different from CD. Cheaper than vinyl for small runs. Plus, kind of retro and low-pressure. Not completely insane and designed to annoy me.

http://stonesthrow.com/news/2012/07/jonwayne-cassette

"Hey, can I buy one of your tour cassettes?"
"Sure, just wait like 35 minutes while I dub you one."

lounge on the luxurious sun-patio in your oakleys and neon OP Hypercolour tank top as the sounds of a seapunk cassingle massage your eardrums

fixed

Are shuffle buttons a European innovation?

for cassettes? yes

those cassette players that could autoskip to the next track were pretty neat

I only ever did things on cassette because I couldn't afford better, was frustrated all the time, and find it perverse that people are now willingly choosing the medium.

...But I mean, I do actually like to understand things so am actually curious about the reasoning.

― EveningStar (Sund4r), Tuesday, August 14, 2012 9:30 AM (2 minutes ago)

well, it's willful perversity, right? deliberately and perhaps ironically choosing qualities like old-fashioned, clunky, noisy, inconvenient, retro, "weird", and analog over humdrum quality and efficiency. perversity isn't the only factor, though. as others have said, cassettes have real (if modest) virtues. they're cheaper and easier to manufacture than vinyl, especially at home and/or for tiny print runs, and they doesn't catastrophically fail for no apparent reason like some CD-Rs.

there's something secretive and outside about the contemporary use of cassettes. it seems like the perfect expression of self-exiled, low-budget musical subculture's pride in difference and weirdness. goes along with deliberate perversity, i guess.

or just "aero otm"

The last mixtape I made was in late '02 when my car CD player stopped working: I recorded a bunch of Missy Elliott, Sleater Kinney, JT, Eminem, and a bunch of other stuff I loved from that year.

Can anyone in this thread who remembers a time when they had both a CD and a cassette player and substantial music libraries in both formats honestly say that AT THE TIME they preferred cassettes to CDs?

The CD-R itself will also sound as good as ever five years from now as long as you don't scratch it.

it's impossible to code in every pragmatic possibility of behaviour to analyse which holds up better, but i think if you just treat them as two things which are stored in the same way - ie either is kept pristinely in its case or either is left in a plastic box full of pens and sand in your attic - tapes hold up way better? i really think with digital the ~idea~ of their binary perfection transcends the reality of them sometimes being flawed, particularly wrt self-authored things; dvd-rs you recorded, cd-rs, files you encoded & moved around. i def don't think it's a big enough difference either way to make tapes renown for their failings. & sure in some sense they are instantly degrading in the way that analogue stuff (read also: vinyl) technically does, but since digital isn't exempt from getting physically fucked with - snapped, spilt, corrupted, overheated - this isn't really relevant. it still plays.

(i am circumventing most of the qs in the thread because i am so at odds w/y'all, i can't understand why tapemaking is being considered as some weird relic of the '80s, i can see that it might've changed in the past few years but afaik most houses had a tape player in their trusty stereo unit until recently, & a bunch of people were using tapes for their intended "here is an album i own", "here is a thing i recorded" purpose for ease of use)

Can anyone in this thread who remembers a time when they had both a CD and a cassette player and substantial music libraries in both formats honestly say that AT THE TIME they preferred cassettes to CDs?

yes

CDs were sources for my mixtapes, which I played 70% of the time and played exclusively in the car unless I was allowed to borrow my dad's car with the 6 CD changer in the trunk, and even then I would put the changer on full shuffle

I didn't really start exclusively playing CDs until my first job with disposable income (so circa January 1996)

tapes have a way of resurfacing if you don't actively get rid of them and it's like hiding airplane peanuts in your shirt pocket and forgetting about it and then the next morning, wow you have a nice snack.

digital files have a way of disappearing if you don't actively back them up like you have some spare change and think "oh i'll put that in a jar and when I have enough I'll buy an ice cream bar" then one day you'll want an ice cream and be all, where's my money?

Can anyone in this thread who remembers a time when they had both a CD and a cassette player and substantial music libraries in both formats honestly say that AT THE TIME they preferred cassettes to CDs?

Not a straight fight for me because the cassette player was portable but the CD player wasn't - also the CD player was also a tape player and recorder, so I spent a lot of time recording albums from CD to tape which is where I listened to them - I'm still a little startled if I'm listening to say Last Splash (on Spotify of course) and the three songs I didn't tape come on.

tapes have a way of resurfacing if you don't actively get rid of them and it's like hiding airplane peanuts in your shirt pocket and forgetting about it and then the next morning, wow you have a nice snack.

not unless you look under your car seat and find Tin Machine's first album, in which case it's like finding a tarantula in your shirt pocket.

is that tarantula in digilog?

tapes have a way of resurfacing if you don't actively get rid of them and it's like hiding airplane peanuts in your shirt pocket and forgetting about it and then the next morning, wow you have a nice snack.

digital files have a way of disappearing if you don't actively back them up like you have some spare change and think "oh i'll put that in a jar and when I have enough I'll buy an ice cream bar" then one day you'll want an ice cream and be all, where's my money?

― Philip Nunez, Tuesday, 14 August 2012 18:01 (4 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

ha otm

i def don't think it's a big enough difference either way to make tapes renown for their failings

Def think the difference in audio quality is significant although I can recognize that this might not be a priority or could even an asset for some people

Can anyone in this thread who remembers a time when they had both a CD and a cassette player and substantial music libraries in both formats honestly say that AT THE TIME they preferred cassettes to CDs?

yeah, totally and for similar reasons to djp and andrew: i used a tape walkman until 2003!
mix tapes all over the place

^^^

Can anyone in this thread who remembers a time when they had both a CD and a cassette player and substantial music libraries in both formats honestly say that AT THE TIME they preferred cassettes to CDs?

lol, yes, but I am maybe a special case

A friend compiled a Wu solo mix for tape in '98 that is still the best Wu comp ever.

this sounds like a good thread idea

I stopped using a Walkman 23 years ago, when next door's middle child got mowed down by a drunk driver while plugged into her player, crossing with the light at a crosswalk :/

the Walkman I used for most of high school was the one my oldest brother was listening to when he jogged out in front of a truck and was hit, after which he lingered in a coma for a month and then died of a lung infection

:///

Definitely getting nostalgic for soon-lost effects of physical formats: getting a loan of a Led Zeppelin discography box set and spending a weekend listening to it over and over with a pen and paper horse trading which songs would go onto the C90 / 2xC60 before you handed it back on Monday.

Our hi-fI having the frankly magical ability to select the tracks from a CD which would best fit into any specified time length.

And of course albums getting twinned: "Ah yes, Springsteen / Simon during their Tunnel of Love / Graceland period"

xp: yeah

wow, that is sad. i'm glad i mostly just used my walkman while on the bus. and kept the volume respectable.

twining of albums on tape has def resulted in some weird associations btwn bands for me

I've got a tape with Bowie's Tonight on one side and Superunknown on the other!

Matthew Sweet Girlfriend + Velvet Crush In the Presence... is a tape i played A LOT in late highschool

i def don't think it's a big enough difference either way to make tapes renown for their failings

Def think the difference in audio quality is significant although I can recognize that this might not be a priority or could even an asset for some people

― EveningStar (Sund4r), Tuesday, 14 August 2012 18:08 (10 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

sure, that's legit. but the pedant in me would wanna specify that this is maybe why tapes are at least/maybe only preferable for certain things - ie in walkmans & car stereos (where tangled tape was less common than skipping cds?), in your kitchen while you cook or in your room while you sleep (when it isn't necessarily about extreme frequency-rendering fidelity), &c. i def have less of a concern over regularly being exposed to a lower-quality reading of something because it usually isn't having an effect on my enjoyment.

also
mix tapes all over the place

― obliquity of the ecliptic (rrrobyn), Tuesday, 14 August 2012 18:09 (10 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

and i know it's In the Presence of Greatness but there wasn't enough room on the tape label so i'd just written In the Presence...
xp

that tape was called In The Presence of Girlfriend, no?

haha now it is

A) sonic youth - daydream nation
B) savage republic - jamahiriya

^ got a lot of use out of this one

Not a straight fight for me because the cassette player was portable but the CD player wasn't - also the CD player was also a tape player and recorder, so I spent a lot of time recording albums from CD to tape which is where I listened to them - I'm still a little startled if I'm listening to say Last Splash (on Spotify of course) and the three songs I didn't tape come on.

I listened to tapes mostly, but preferred CDs. I remember someone describing the difference as saying how when the street guy paints a yellow line in the middle of the road, it's uneven because of the bumps, holes and asphalt pock marks. On the other hand, CDs were like painting the yellow line in mid-air.

I got the Use Your Illusion albums in high school, but didn't know how to record them onto tape since combined, they were like 150 minutes long. I got a 90 minute tape and a 60 minute tape, rearranged the order of the two albums, and created what I guess would be a double album and a single album of the two. Can't remember the song sequence I recorded them in, which would be passively entertaining to know today.

I have moved into a demographic that is of no interest to any media source that would allow hipster interns to dictate their tone or contents. To a hipster intern, Preparation H is a facile, multi-leveled ironic totem. To a boomer, not so much.

i made an ILM thread for yall: pairs of albums that you had on side A and side B of blank tapes

Matthew Sweet "Girlfriend" + Velvet Crush "In the Presence of Greatness"
Pulp "Different Class" + The Verve "Urban Hymns"
Oasis "What's the Story Morning Glory" + Smashing Pumpkins "Mellon Collie..."
Billy Bragg + New Order (some kind of self-made 'best of')
Belle & Sebastian + The Pixies (" ")

oh whoops meant to post that in the other thread! lols

That's awful, Dan. I'm sorry.

Matthew Sweet Girlfriend + Velvet Crush In the Presence... is a tape i played A LOT in late highschool

― obliquity of the ecliptic (rrrobyn), Tuesday, August 14, 2012 1:26 PM (21 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

I would like a copy of this tape why because it sound intersting.

xp: I appreciate that but condolences really aren't necessary; it was a really really REALLY long time ago.

i am playing an old mix tape right now! from the first three songs, i'm thinking it's from 1999

dudes, i make mixtapes all the time, don't really understand the hate or dismissive posturing here.

i have an mp3 player and a computer

i have a computer, an mp3 player, two record players, a double cassette deck, a cd/radio combo thing.

i have some of those other things, too. for me, personally, i can't imagine a reason to make a mixtape that isn't basically a style move. my friends would rather just get a cd or dvd with the tracks in whatever format.

that's not to say there's anything wrong with mixtapes, just that i do understand why some look askance at them.

form + content = beauty

i think that part of it just also depends on the culture of your friends. like we have organized mixtape exchanges between friends here, so every few months, i make ten copies of one tape i've made, and get ten in return.

also, i am of the opinion that CDs are just digital garbage, and if someone gave me a mix cd, i'd be like, 'great, i won't be able to listen to this in 4 months because it won't fuckin play any longer. thanks anyway'

i just put it in my computer and copy it and then forget about the cd

and by forget about i mean add to my horrible pile of misc cds...

this whole "CD-R suddenly stops playing" thing has never happened to me in about 15 years of making CD-Rs

although some of that may be because I haven't gone back to some of my CD-Rs in a decade, hmmm

i just put it in my computer and copy it and then forget about the cd

yeah. i view CDs as a valueless but efficient file transfer system. would totally make tapes if my friends wanted them, though.

the last time i made a mixtape for someone was a couple years back. i bought an old walkman and some cheap headphones, glued the thing shut with the tape in. painted it solid black (was a metal mix). was not much appreciated.

Definitely getting nostalgic for soon-lost effects of physical formats: getting a loan of a Led Zeppelin discography box set and spending a weekend listening to it over and over with a pen and paper horse trading which songs would go onto the C90 / 2xC60 before you handed it back on Monday.

Yeah I have lots of cassette-specific nostalgia too, like the phase when I decided to hell with dead air (or cut songs) at the end of mixtape sides, so I started writing down all the song times and obsessively arranging them to maximize music on each side. Also the skills I developed at quick and smooth record button start/stopping so I could have seamless transitions between songs (you could actually avoid some of the click between songs by pressing in a certain smooth way). I hated trying to fit all the artists and song titles on those little cardboard jackets though.

Anyway, like most nostalgia, that stuff has nothing to do with superiority of a medium and has more to do with the adolescent energy I put into the activity.

I still burn lots of CD's. I have practically no albums on my hard drive.

I hated trying to fit all the artists and song titles on those little cardboard jackets though.

rapidograph

I loved making tape covers.

me too! i have a bunch that i've saved just cuz the covers were cool, some made by me, some by my friends. if you made your own from scratch, you could have as much room to write or draw as you wanted.

Definitely getting nostalgic for soon-lost effects of physical formats: getting a loan of a Led Zeppelin discography box set and spending a weekend listening to it over and over with a pen and paper horse trading which songs would go onto the C90 / 2xC60 before you handed it back on Monday.

― Andrew Farrell, Tuesday, August 14, 2012 10:21 AM (1 hour ago)

Yeah I have lots of cassette-specific nostalgia too, like the phase when I decided to hell with dead air (or cut songs) at the end of mixtape sides, so I started writing down all the song times and obsessively arranging them to maximize music on each side. Also the skills I developed at quick and smooth record button start/stopping so I could have seamless transitions between songs (you could actually avoid some of the click between songs by pressing in a certain smooth way).

― bert yansh (Hurting 2), Tuesday, August 14, 2012 11:41 AM (4 minutes ago)

the best thing was lying on the floors of my friend's bedrooms, going through their records, and deciding what to tape. something about that really brings back the contented aimlessness and camaraderie of youth.

I used to DJ junior high dances with tapes.

I'd sit up the night before and meticulously cue each tape to the song that I wanted to play, getting it right to beginning of the song and then dialing the spokes back half a turn.

Then I would arrange them in my tape case in the order that I planned to play them.

I got a CD player for Christmas one year, but the school still didn't have one on its PA. But I was just thrilled that I could make a mix tape and that way, I would only have to cue up half of my usual tapes.

Because, you see, I was still attempting to make segues from one player to the other on the dual console they had.

You know what really sucks (sucked)? Being left-handed and trying to fill out mixtape labels without smearing the ink into unreadability.

(you could actually avoid some of the click between songs by pressing in a certain smooth way)

My stereo had a "syncro dubbing" button that I would use to stop the tape without using the stop button; this way, there was no click at all in between songs.

I used the pause button.

I'm kind of pissed, I had halfway inherited a sony tape deck from my parents that was old w/cool silver buttons but I think it got thrown out. I have successfully stolen their "newer" one though.

this whole "CD-R suddenly stops playing" thing has never happened to me in about 15 years of making CD-Rs

Yeah, I don't get that at all. I have literally hundreds of CD-Rs that continue to work flawlessly, even beyond the fact that, as mentioned, they can be backed up to a hard drive within a few minutes. I'm extremely surprised by people claiming that the cassette is the more durable, quality medium.

I have CD-Rs and CDs that will not play but it's because I didn't put them back in their cases and threw them on the car's back seat, lol

i've had CD-Rs start to fail on me recently, especially older stuff. really sucks when it's irreplaceable, like old jams.

My stereo had a "syncro dubbing" button that I would use to stop the tape without using the stop button; this way, there was no click at all in between songs.

― cwkiii, Tuesday, August 14, 2012 12:04 PM (4 minutes ago)

I used the pause button.

― pplains, Tuesday, August 14, 2012 12:04 PM (4 minutes ago)

Stuff like that definitely needs to be backed up.:(

xpost

I had it down to a science, contenderizer. The pause button had just a little "give" in its tension where I could push it down about halfway and at the precise moment, add a little pressure and stop the recording. To start the song, I would give myself a 3-2-1 before I hit play on the CD or I would rewind the spokes with the tip of a pencil on a tape.

Anyway, like most nostalgia, that stuff has nothing to do with superiority of a medium and has more to do with the adolescent energy I put into the activity.

The time it took do some of those things might be the #1 reason I'm glad to move beyond tapes.

very apt xpost

Well, yeah.

What is anyone's rationale for releasing things on cassette now?

people buy them

I used to loop beats off of records by making pause tapes. have any young hipster musicians rediscovered that yet?

i think that's how dj shadow made endtroducing.

pretty sure he used a sampler

it might have been one of those samplers that use tapes.

I had it down to a science, contenderizer. The pause button had just a little "give" in its tension where I could push it down about halfway and at the precise moment, add a little pressure and stop the recording. To start the song, I would give myself a 3-2-1 before I hit play on the CD or I would rewind the spokes with the tip of a pencil on a tape.

― pplains, Tuesday, August 14, 2012 3:12 PM Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Oh wait, yeah, this is exactly what I used to do. I had forgotten.

What is anyone's rationale for releasing things on cassette now?

people buy them

― wk, Tuesday, August 14, 2012 3:20 PM Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

p sure this is not true

i was just at a show where one of the bands were selling cassettes. they sold all of them (they weren't sure ppl would buy so they didn't make that many). of course this is v small scale, but hey.

hmm...

I think his point is that it's unlikely that people are releasing cassettes for strictly commercial reasons, that "people will buy this" is the sole rationale.

In 2002, my band recorded five songs on a home four-track, copied them onto CD-Rs, and released it as Black Box Demos (get it?)

At the end of the last song, because only we thought this was funny, we tacked on one of those XDR tones Capitol used to put at the beginning and ending of their cassette tapes. (We stole ours from the Power Station.)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k4GKl3fnDjs

Here's the funny thing: That Power Station tape still plays. Those CD-Rs? They just bounce back out of the CD player when you try to play them now.

a friend gave me an old tape recorder so that i could bounce mixes down to it from the computer, but it didn't have the right ins. so instead i put a mic on it and sampled the sounds of the buttons being pressed, the motor spinning, etc and used them for percussion on a remix. cool story huh.

I already backed down though:

OK. Deep breaths. Analogue so qualitatively different from CD. Cheaper than vinyl for small runs. Plus, kind of retro and low-pressure. Not completely insane and designed to annoy me.

xpost to self

i like mixtape. i like turtles.

The time it took do some of those things might be the #1 reason I'm glad to move beyond tapes.

are you totally convinced that whatever else you're doing with that time is better? that's where the nostalgia comes in, I think. it was time-consuming, but it was also creative, rather than what I think most of us do with the excess time: absorb the internet passively, skim-read this and that with little effect. (this is why when people lament their ilx use it's weird to me. ilx is actually one of the more productive things people do online imo.)

I'm pretty sure my time management skills are better than they were and that I'm more productive than I was when I was a teenager? I'm able to make much better-sounding mixes with less trouble, which leaves more time to be actually creative instead of fussing over the mechanics. Also, surfing the Internet (which is like 70% ILx for me) > channel-surfing cable TV or radio.

which is like 70% ILx for me

Most of the rest is email; Facebook; news; a politics forum; Wikipedia and other information sources; genuinely helpful discussion forums about stuff like, you know, health. Most of this is more informative than network TV or commercial radio.

i call ILX the internet all the time

or the nostalgia comes in when remembering a time before "time-managment skills" and being productive.

What is anyone's rationale for releasing things on cassette now?

people buy them

― wk, Tuesday, August 14, 2012 3:20 PM Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

p sure this is not true

― bert yansh (Hurting 2), Tuesday, August 14, 2012 4:18 PM (56 minutes ago)

no, it's true, and you'll prolly sell more tapes than CDRs at a show because ppl go "eh it's prolly on the internet somewhere" when they see a CDR

three of my favorite releases by local bands last year were all on cassettes

granted this is in the weirdo rock/noise scene, you're prolly not going to see some roots rock band hawking their new cassette

and underrated aerosmith + contenderizer outlined the rationale - it's hard for your music to stay underground when everything's on the internet, and I do get kinda of nostalgic for the days when I could listen to a band for years and not know what they looked like

+ you can stick a download link in the case if so inclined too
xp

or the nostalgia comes in when remembering a time before "time-managment skills" and being productive.

OK, I buy that one. And, tbh, sure, I guess I do have some nostalgia for just sitting around and listening to the radio (or to albums, which were all on cassette, ha).

Admittedly, I can't say I've especially been keeping up with the weirdo rock/noise scene so I haven't really been exposed to hipster cassette culture in a major way.

Also, the last three cities I've lived in have been Regina, Windsor, and Buffalo. I barely know what hipsters are.

Am going to ask a friend who does keep up with weirdo rock/noise.

Said he likes how they sound, signed off, lol.

I feel like compact discs hit the disposability ceiling at some point (lol AOL discs) and, unless you have some nice package, they're almost instantly thought of as irrelevant, or at least easily copied.

With vinyl/cassette releases, even if you have the digital version and listen to it sometimes, you have an object that gives you a very specific listening experience that you can participate in. There's a tactility to putting a record on, sticking the needle on the record, flipping it. Cassettes don't let you jump to a particular point, also have two different sides that you could do something with thematically or at least have a length limitation.

i call ILX the internet all the time

― obliquity of the ecliptic (rrrobyn), Tuesday, 14 August 2012 17:13 (22 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

haha yeah this is my secret irl code for things like "why i don't own a smartphone" or "why i need to periodically cancel my internet connection"

CDs were objects of affection for very few people - Dr. Whiney I think likes them, but albums & tapes are aesthetically cooler for the most part. Digipak vs. jewel case is ass vs. fart imo

had to hit post real quick before I thought better there

official cassette releases kind of sucked -- tape quality wasn't great, art so small -- but the glory of blank tapes made up for it

"very few people" you are crazy, more like "most people over 30 including the majority of casual music fans". Remember when we used to give CDs as gifts?

i just put some of my mixes on c60 and put them in the record store on consignment

xp because they were the governing music format is all! the only person I've heard express affection for the compact disc as format is Dr Whiney

I now listen to CDs sometimes on my aesthetically-pleasing cd player:
http://www.muji.us/store/media/catalog/product/cache/1/image/400x/9df78eab33525d08d6e5fb8d27136e95/4/5/4548718939374_400.jpg

I don't mind compact discs but they were a major period of my youth! Like I aspired to have a CD player like crazy, then probably bought most music I ever had on CD.

I would like to refer tapehaters to this poll, I was very bummed when I found out my new used car's tape deck was busted. some of this shit is either impossible/v hard to find online, or sounds completely different in digital format. the pleasurable compression you get when you crank misfits' walk among us, or eric b + rakim's follow the leader on tape in a car stereo? you ain't gonna get that out of yr ipod, son.

which cassette in this shoebox full of cassettes should I listen to??

this thread is all about making mix tapes!? i had no idea. i still do this. i love making tapes. i have never burned a cd :(

xxp

someone has tricked you into listening to music on a light fixture

i hoard sealed high bias cassettes.

I'm pretty sure my time management skills are better than they were and that I'm more productive than I was when I was a teenager? I'm able to make much better-sounding mixes with less trouble, which leaves more time to be actually creative instead of fussing over the mechanics.

― EveningStar (Sund4r), Tuesday, 14 August 2012 21:39 (58 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

yeah but i think these things are qualitatively different, not just quantitively. i love that this discussion has veered into actual-behaviours, like how you use things, because that's what it comes down to, & with the internet i am p much resigned t/p much embrace the way things are now - breadth over depth, many things instead of a single thing thoroughly. but making a cd isn't just making-a-tape-but-faster; making a tape means you actually listen to the songs, in full, during the recording; it means you fucking hate the songs because you play intros and outros repeatedly, listening, pained, strained expression on your face, ear cupped to speaker, not even to the songs but to their fade-out phonics & pre-first-beat breaths. & that's just a different thing!, inasmuch as giving someone a tape means anything. similarly their sleeves were way doodlier & scribblier since you had more time & less space with which to work on them. if we think that a mixtape is directly or indirectly (ie as a vehicle for _feelings_ &c) about the act of giving music to someone, gifting it to them, then it's definitely a difference to be doing that ... out loud? rather than in theory, to me. not totally - there are times when making a tape isn't an overwhelming sensory experience or when making a cd is something you do in close proximity w/the contents - but probably usually. i don't think it's mechanics vs creativity, i think it's both.

i find sealed ones in thrift stores but you gotta be on the look out. online they can be way expensive.

Digipak vs. jewel case is ass vs. fart imo

― steven fucking tyler (underrated aerosmith bootlegs I have owned), Tuesday, August 14, 2012 5:40 PM Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

But cassette cases were mostly garbage, and the art was even smaller than on CDs.

spacemen 3's the perfect prescription only sounds right on cassette imo

i hoard sealed high bias cassettes.

― scott seward, Tuesday, 14 August 2012 22:48 (24 seconds ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

one day i am gonna start my insane cassettes on ebay thread in which people sell artfully photographed single still-wrapped japanese chrome tapes for like $90

pulling the insert in and out of a tape case is a shitload easier than that stupid slot in the front of a CD jewelcase

Blowout Comb does sound noticeably better on cassette. I will give you that.

is this for real?!? i was trying to get high bias BASF chrome tapes but couldn't find any!!

blowout comb sounds noticeably better than 90% of hip hop in any format!!

pulling the insert in and out of a tape case is a shitload easier than that stupid slot in the front of a CD jewelcase

― your native bacon (mh), Tuesday, 14 August 2012 22:50 (59 seconds ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

also i am p sure there are more portraits of shirtless 2pac on the all eyez on me cassette sleeve than on any other format artwork, what w/more panels being made necessary by the space needed for text. what other metric do you need.

the complete drunks with guns is another cassette you can pry from my cold dead fingers

almost all rap sounded better on cassette, a lot of hardcore too

i still prefer the sound of vinyl transferred to tape as opposed to the sound of vinyl transferred to cd or mp3. sounds better to me. i never got into reel to reel but i can only imagine that i would like that best of all. i have a reel to reel friend who will make cd copies of reel to reel tapes that he has and they are some of the best sounding cds that i have ever heard.

rap and metal. kinda made for tape. but one reason for that is rap full-length albums on vinyl were often pressed on crappy vinyl and early rap cds sounded terrible too. and sorta the same story with metal.

(rap and metal from the 80's and early 90's that is...)

the cassette version of DU's sex packets had three extra tracks and a super long version of "gutfest". none of that stuff ever even made it to the CD.

Yeah, nothing I've posted should be seen as any sort of slight on reel-to-reel tape.

xposts

all talking heads recs have extended cuts on tape iirc

i would totally buy a scott seward mixtape!!

or accept one as a present!!

those old reel to reel tapes can sound glorious. the closest things to the master recordings really if you think about it. i think about it sometimes.

i would make you a tape. for realz. send me your address.

i used to buy so many blank tapes i actually remember buying them
xp
! rad !

I have to wonder if some of the stuff that sounds better on tape sound that way because it was engineered in the years where cassettes were the dominant format, i.e. it was engineered for tape.

i like making mixes from 45s. cuz i don't sit around listening to a million 45s all day long that much.

(picture of boombox)

Another good thing about cassettes is the catchiness of the term "cassingle". NO ONE would want to buy a "compact dingle"

I have to wonder if some of the stuff that sounds better on tape sound that way because it was engineered in the years where cassettes were the dominant format, i.e. it was engineered for tape.

Seems like the logical explanation.

I have to wonder if some of the stuff that sounds better on tape sound that way because it was engineered in the years where cassettes were the dominant format, i.e. it was engineered for tape.

no, tape naturally brings out certain bass frequencies due to compression

and how it handles signal saturation

rrrobynn you wouldn't happen to like country music would you? i always want to make a mix from my vast collection of small local label country 45s from the 60s and 70s but i don't know who would enjoy that other than me. i also have lots of great 70's reggae 45s that are hard to find and good to listen to on a mix. or i could make a mix of local country and reggae. reggae people loved their country music.

Perhaps there is something unique about how tape handles signal saturation. To what extent would it be impossible to just emphasize desired bass frequencies and apply appropriate compression when engineering for another format, if needed?

the complete drunks with guns is another cassette you can pry from my cold dead fingers

― vincent black shadow giallo (Edward III), Tuesday, August 14, 2012 2:53 PM (4 minutes ago)

would be proud to own this, tbh

i do like country music, but mostly older country, which is obv on 45s!
i also like random rare reggae
it's all good, i trust yr discretion :)

well old music was recorded on tape so maybe tapes just like each other.

i'm listening to a tape right now made by this guy who used to show up at this big zine etc fair we have here every year
a friend and i call the tapes/zines "$2 comes with mixtape" bc that's what it said on them. and maybe that's what they were actually called? totally good project. the music is mostly all old blues and soul but not exclusively.

i have 3 of the tapes but wish i had them alll

no, it's true, and you'll prolly sell more tapes than CDRs at a show because ppl go "eh it's prolly on the internet somewhere" when they see a CDR

three of my favorite releases by local bands last year were all on cassettes

Yeah the stuff about physicality, sound degradation, nostalgia, portability, collectibility, etc. is all relevant to the question of why people buy cassettes. But the only thing that really matters re: releasing cassettes is that some people buy them!

It bugs me that people will act as though it's some kind of big affectation on the part of the artist, when it really just comes down to another physical product that bands can sell at shows. And if people are buying them then why the hell not release them? I applaud any opportunity an artist can find to get a few dollars from fans in this day and age. But I guess it's cool to just steal shit online and then dismiss artists as hipsters for trying to actually sell their music.

how do I like that post

ilx should have an otm button

how would you go about making a bunch of tapes at once? it just seems so laborious

there are hi-speed cassette duplication machines, a buddy of mine actually has one

high-speed dubbing!

but i like to buy tapes at shows AND dismiss artists as hipsters. why can't i do both?

do you stack em like decks and daisy chain them somehow?

i guess duping CDs isn't fun either unless you had one of those robots.

http://www.publishing-expert.com/b2b/pics/Audio_Cassette_Duplicator.jpg

GEM Turbo Trax 3 non-expandable duplicator.
One single unit copies 3 tapes at a time.
Neatly designed and suitable for continuous use this model has a production rate of 73 C60s or 45 C90s per hour.

and believe it or not there are still cassette duplication shops in business

To what extent would it be impossible to just emphasize desired bass frequencies and apply appropriate compression when engineering for another format, if needed?

hello tape emulation plug-ins, or tracking to tape and then transferring to digital, or recording digitally and bouncing the whole mix down to tape before mastering. all three are pretty common.

whole rooms of those tape duplicators during the rap bootleg tape days. and the women packaging the tapes had to be nude so that they wouldn't steal tupac tapes. wait, no, that's crack cocaine.

my friend joseph started a bootleg video business years ago with one lowly govideo vcr that made copies of vhs tapes. now he's a successful businessman!

http://www.diabolikdvd.com/

also he made vhs dupes of hard to find japanese laserdisc editions of old horror movies. he had the best boots. back when it was hard to find stuff. that's how i saw the director's cut of dawn of the dead for the first time.

man laserdiscs sounded so amazing! how did they sound so good? i swear they sounded better than a lot of dvds do now. though i am not a bluray expert so maybe bluray has surpassed them in sound quality.

yeah, most labels putting out cassettes are getting them professionally duped. I read an interview with a guy who does cassette manufacturing in L.A. and he was saying that the business was entirely supported by church groups until a couple of years ago when they all finally switched to CDRs. And then the resurgence of bands putting out cassettes came around at just the right time and saved his business.

but you can get duplicators pretty cheaply. and there are some units (some sony ones for example) that have a master/slave setup so the master unit has 4 slots, one for the master tape and 3 dupes, then there are slave units that just do 4 dupes and you can chain together as many as you want.

some laserdiscs have analog sound.

hello tape emulation plug-ins, or tracking to tape and then transferring to digital, or recording digitally and bouncing the whole mix down to tape before mastering. all three are pretty common.

No, I know. I was just wondering when someone was citing bass/compression as a reason for some things sounding better on cassette. It didn't seem particular to the medium to me. (Tbh, I've never experienced an album sounding better on cassette than on either vinyl or lossless digital. Reel-to-reel is a different ballgame altogether.)

plus if you are going reel to reel than you gotta go quad. its the only way you'll get 500+ dollars for this moody blues record:

http://www.popsike.com/The-Moody-Blues-Reel-to-Reel-Quad-Dolby-Near-Mint-NR/120117232729.html

quad + dolby even.

that must sound so phat.

fyi: if you are buying old reeltoreel tapes on spec make sure they are the 7 and a half inch ones. those are the ones the audiophiles want.

(7 & a half inches per second that is.)

pretty sure my dad still has a reel-to-reel deck. that was bought, but the amp and tuner he built via heathkit. i used to know how to splice shit and everything.

rrrobynn you wouldn't happen to like country music would you? i always want to make a mix from my vast collection of small local label country 45s from the 60s and 70s but i don't know who would enjoy that other than me. i also have lots of great 70's reggae 45s that are hard to find and good to listen to on a mix.

pretty sure I speak for like half the people on this board when I say I would be fucking stoked to hear mixes of this stuff from you

^^^^

tbh you should demand ian let you do an east village radio show

yeah, i too wanna hear those mixes scott

I really love geeks fetishizing systems that don't/didn't take hold though. stayed at a professor's house with a friend way back when, dude had a whole library of laserdiscs. watched several - they were fine and all, but it's like: really? you're dropping your coin on these? okee-dokey professor dude, enjoyed your copy of last tango in paris

― steven fucking tyler (underrated aerosmith bootlegs I have owned), Tuesday, August 14, 2012 11:36 AM (Yesterday)

yeah laserdisc fetishists are kinda lol but if I may geek out here for a second there are instances where the LD version of a movie remains the best available e.g. the japanese laserdisc of the evil dead is a more effective presentation compared to later DVD releases

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WeaLiJVvy1c

pretty sure my dad still has a reel-to-reel deck. that was bought, but the amp and tuner he built via heathkit. i used to know how to splice shit and everything.

Ha, when I volunteered at the campus radio station in my first year 97-98, we still used tape reels so I had the experience of literally cutting and splicing tape, etc. The next year they went digital. I suppose that's a case where I'm glad we moved on but I can still feel the nostalgia.

tbh you should demand ian let you do an east village radio show

― mookieproof, Tuesday, August 14, 2012 11:33 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Whenever skot comes to new york he is too busy to go record shopping & hang out and listen to tunes :(

Does anyone have any Smylonylon tapes? I have just one, in MP3 form, that I downloaded off a blog 5 years ago and it's so amazing and I don't even know the tracklist...

Scott someday I will ask u to tape that Dave Clark Five stereo best of for me ^_^

i do have a few actually, terrible sound quality obv

it was pretty nice to be a cassette buyer in the early 00s--seemingly once a week someone would donate a batch of cool old tapes to the Goodwill and you could buy them for 25 cents each.

Given that the cassette topic is probably nearly exhausted, I wonder if we can still restore this thread to its original purpose, which was actually not a bad idea.

Edward III that youtube makes me want to smoke bowl after bowl after bowl

smoke trees b4 they smoke u

http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y176/edwardiii/evlded_ld_dvd.jpg

the dvd looks way better and has a lot more detail in the shadows. the laserdisc is just graded in an overly contrasty way which looks kind of superficially "better" but isn't really what's on the negative. we have better TVs now than we did in the '80s, so there's no need to watch that contrasty version, although you can probably buy the DVD and set your TV to some horrible "vivid" setting or something which will give you the same effect.

agreed. laserdisc has an ugly magenta (followed by cyan) tint too.

agree, but i'd like to do a head-to-head on a good TV. really like the natural look of sunlight on grass in the LD version, something that does seem to have been lost on the DVD.

but i like the blues in the laserdisc version.

don't know how blue the actual movie was originally.

DVD "looks better" vs LD "feels scarier"

plus the blu-ray was the first release to actually use the original 16mm negative

in the 90's my girlfriend at the time bought this huge stereo/t.v. setup and we got a laserdisc player and i bought stuff and watching some of those with the player hooked up to a stereo and big speakers were some of the most amazing movie-watching experiences of my life. and the sound was out of this world. had suspiria and the invasion of the body snatchers remake and the fog on laserdisc and i swear those rocked so hard. beautiful picture and huuuuuuuuge sound. suspiria was jawdropping. but i suppose i could do the same sort of thing now with a bluray player and big speakers. one of these days.

every DVD release of ED has had color timing issues btw

http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y176/edwardiii/ed_elite4x3.png
http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y176/edwardiii/ed_ab4x32.png
http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y176/edwardiii/ed_bd4x3.png

Sorry, mans. I only watch laser discs on this kind of TV.

http://curtismathes.webs.com/cm%20old%20eeee.jpg

yeah there's room for "interpretation" in all of this... prints that shipped to theaters prob all had varying tints anyway

we had wealthy quasi-friends who actually had a tv like that. Passover at their house meant getting to play on their pinball machines in the basement.

hard to say what's actually "color timing issues" and what's just different people doing the telecine. I'm a purist in that I want a movie to look exactly like it would have looked in theaters on its original release and I want CDs to sound just like the original LP, not remixed or remastered. But I guess if there's no point of reference, who's to say what's correct. I like the pink sky in the Elite DVD you posted above but the bluray is probably the most accurate right? Or the negative actually has a weird pink tint and the person who graded the bluray transfer decided to "correct" it? Who knows.

xp

blu-ray supposedly the most unfucked-with transfer yet

of course, it's missing the original mono audio track

*watches the wicker man on betamax*

prez of sony was the one who went to his grave bemoaning the fact that people didn't embrace beta? i think i read it in a geeta article. i could have it wrong though. would have to actually google that or something.

I only watch movies on deltamax

Had one of these for most of my childhood til it finally broke down around the turn of the century:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capacitance_Electronic_Disc

Nostalgia for the days when movies had a Side 1 and Side 2...

I had DVDs like that!

Oh wow, I had no idea they were still doing that. I've had DVDs where one side is widescreen and the other is fullscreen, but I thought the days of stopping halfway through movies to flip the disc over had passed!

The original DVD of Goodfellas was like that, if I recall

you recall correctly, we called em flippers

Earlier DVDs sometimes did that because manufacturing dual layer discs was still expensive -- they'd just use a two-sided lower density dvd instead

The benefit of Betamax iirc is that they don't even have to chase or rape their prey, so to speak.

had a betamax when I was in high school, used to have forbidden zone, welcome to la, flesh gordon, bought from the local record store when they liquidated their beta rental business

still have a betamax in the basement but no movies except the homemade slasher film I did when I was 16

Started playing around with a tape recorder when I was 8-9. Recorded songs offa MTV.

Never really did mixtapes until I started doing college radio and using the prod studios there, and switched to CDr in 2000 or so.

Now, being a tapehead with VHS, THAT is a different story.

I still have one or 2 old BASF casettes that are of me and my brother nattering into the microphone telling stories and singing. I was 5, G was 3. So that'd be in 1976. The tape *just* still plays, but is rather warped now. I've been telling stories and playing DJ into tapes since I was in primary school.

okay rrrobyns tape is almost done. pretty funky. all from 45s except for one track.

i swear this year i will figure out a good painless way to upload mixes to the interweb. all the old mixes maria would upload for me to ilx were tapes! she would digitize tapes i would make.

but if i can figure out how to start my own youtube channel i can do anything!

(i'm very low tech)

and now the world can see my messy house! its a start. and it did inspire me to clean the house. the four of us are pretty good at wrecking the place.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vEeUd0Yf-pY&feature=channel&list=UL