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Audio cassettes: despite being ‘a bit rubbish’, sales have doubled during the pandemic – here’s why


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Despite having been superseded in functionality first by the compact disc (CD) and then the digital file (mp3 and mp4), the audio cassette retains a special place in the history of audio technology, with mixtapes a precursor to playlists, and the Walkman the precursor to the iPod.

And, despite being considered aesthetically and materially inferior to the vinyl record that came before it, the audio cassette is actually experiencing something of a resurgence – partly for sentimental reasons, but also because, with gigs cancelled, it’s a smart way for smaller artists to monetise their work. According to British Phonographic Industry figures, 156,542 cassettes were sold in the UK last year, the highest figure since 2003 and an increase of 94.7% on 2019 sales. Seemingly out of the blue, global pop icons such as Lady Gaga, the 1975, and Dua Lipa have started rushing out their new releases on cassette.

With today’s independent artists, cassettes actually represented a cost-effective means of providing a physical product, far cheaper than pressing a vinyl record and printing sleeves and packaging. As one label owner put it, “we tend to release on tape because it’s cheap to manufacture, it’s easy to recoup, and it leaves money left over for the bands to get something”.

While the practices of these small, independent artists may feel quite far removed from the recent embrace of cassette tapes by mainstream pop stars, each arguably has their roots in a desire for analogue products we can touch in an increasingly digital world mediated via screens. the conversation, Iain Taylor, Lecturer in Music Industries, Birmingham City University

 

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That seems odd, wouldn't burning CDs offer better quality, lower costs and better consumer compatibility?

Where are people finding working Walkmans or cassette decks to play these homemade cassettes on?

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Guest Old Man Rubber
13 hours ago, pwstereo said:

That seems odd, wouldn't burning CDs offer better quality, lower costs and better consumer compatibility?

Where are people finding working Walkmans or cassette decks to play these homemade cassettes on?

 

Sounds odd but - quite a few people who buy them don't play them.  Its more like a bit of merch, an artifact that's a bit easier to store away than a vinyl LP. 

 

Having said that, you can buy a very cheap walkman on Ebay for not much money and it doesn't take up as much space as a turntable.  The post office was selling a little retro cassette boombox not too long ago that had bluetooth built into it, it's not a great sounding bit of kit but it's kind of fun to own.

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>Its more like a bit of merch, an artifact that's a bit easier to store away than a vinyl LP. 

 

I am a little annoyed with myself for getting rid of all my cassettes as they were small and are nice little artist artifacts. I also think Tape players are a relatively easy and cheap way to have VU meters which seems to be becoming desirable again.

 

I noticed Taylor Swift re-released fearless on cassette also

 

Edited by silver_man
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I gave all my cassette tapes away when I emigrated from UK, mainly because I collected them while working in Oman and they were all rip off Thai copies as that was all we could get.

I had around 250 tapes and at a fine of $1000 each if caught by customs, I opted out.

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Back in the day, pirated tapes were easily available in the night markets, vinyl too. The record shops also offered a service of recording LPs onto cassette of your choice, some producing quite good sounds too as they were done on quality gear. The original products were no match.

 

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My take on the issue is while compact cassette tapes are a bit limited in terms of audio quality (especially compared to CD, SACD and vinyl) the actual difference in audio fidelity isn't a complete abomination if the tapes are of good quality and you're talking at least a mid-fi stereo setup. Also the tapes as collectable items are awesome. Couple this with a nostalgic value - eg. the first foray into music collection and listening being cassette tapes (such as in my case ---- and many other gen x + late boomer people will have similar experiences). I still have all my tapes I've ever bought plus many tapes of newly discovered songs/bands etc recorded directly from FM in my childhood/teenage years. And the customisation factor enabling playlist sharing, underground-never-heard-of-bands music discovery and sharing, copying awesome bootlegs etc.....

 

I rarely listen to my tapes, however I do listen and very much enjoy the experience each and every time.

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Guest Old Man Rubber

Like most of you I dumped my teenage tape collection.  A lot of the factory / pre-recorded tapes were of pretty woeful quality though so I'm not that nostalgic about them.  Have slowly been replacing what I remember I had with 2nd hand vinyl and it's a lot of fun to have that body of music back, even if it's a bit of a cringe.  I do have a few cassette players (including a couple of good quality 3 head units) and a few tapes I picked up at tip shops.

 

It sounds a bit weird but other peoples mix tapes are lots of fun when you come across them.  I never buy them unless they are good quality tapes (TDK or the like) and major bonus if they have carefully written out the track list.  A couple of those have clearly been recorded from CD and the quality is surprisingly good.

 

One thing I had forgotten about what the "XDR burst" noises at the end of the really late pre-recorded tapes.  I was playing something from the tip shop the other day and after the side was finished it made that noise -  took me right back to the 1980s instantly.

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20 hours ago, silver_man said:

I also think Tape players are a relatively easy and cheap way to have VU meters 

which seems to be becoming desirable again.

 

 

Used to able to buy VU/power meters in a separate box, that you can connect to any convenient point in your signal chain.  They don't even become part of it, they work just like using a multimeter to measure the signal.

 

Maybe there's a market I can tap into  :)  

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I'm now spinning my cassette tapes, or should that be "spooling" after reading this thread, and old memories flooding back regardless of the lo-fi quality!

Yes the factory/pre-recorded tapes quality was woeful, I wonder if the newly-released ones these days are any better?

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Guest Old Man Rubber
1 hour ago, YCC said:

I'm now spinning my cassette tapes, or should that be "spooling" after reading this thread, and old memories flooding back regardless of the lo-fi quality!

Yes the factory/pre-recorded tapes quality was woeful, I wonder if the newly-released ones these days are any better?

They have no excuses to make them rubbish.  Depends if they are using decent tape stock and mastering things properly for cassette too, which is likely a completely lost art.

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I never bought pre-recorded cassettes, the ones I have heard generally all had pretty ordinary sound quality.

 

In the days before CD, I used to buy blank cassettes and often made recordings of some of my LP records (or others I had borrowed). Would often play the cassette copy instead of the original LP, and sound quality was certainly better to my ears than pre-recorded cassettes of the same titles.

 

Still have all my cassettes buried away in the back of a cupboard.

 

Also have a few home made cassettes of family conversations.

 

I also have a bootleg I made of Melbourne band Sid Rumpo when I was 17. They were the support act for B.B. King when he played at the Apollo Stadium here in Adelaide in 1973. I smuggled a portable Sony cassette recorder in and hid it under a cordurory jacket. I actually recorded the whole concert, including all of the support band and B.B. King. Unfortunately the batteries ran out very early on and the resulting wow and flutter was so bad that most of the tape was unsalvageable (imagine some very out of tune chipmunks). The first 2 or 3 tracks of Sid Rumpo were not too bad though and were worth keeping, the rest of the tape was later overwritten (so no B.B. sadly). More recently I have digitised the small part that remains. Sound quality is so so, but not quite as bad as one might expect, I think the heavy corduroy jacket that was hiding the recorder must have acted as some kind of crude filter or sound level control. I have always kicked myself for not smuggling in a power cord. We were sitting unobtrusively at the back of the stadium, and there was a power outlet right where I was sitting. If only.......  :no:

 

And that is probably about as misspent as my youth ever got!

 

 

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On 23/03/2021 at 2:39 PM, YCC said:

Back in the day, pirated tapes were easily available in the night markets, vinyl too. The record shops also offered a service of recording LPs onto cassette of your choice, some producing quite good sounds too as they were done on quality gear. The original products were no match.

 

I still have a few pirates and some of the record store recorded tapes, from when I was in Malaysia, in the early 80's The pirated ones varied considerably in sound quality, some bad, some excellent but for the equivalent of about AU$1.00 or less, at the time. Most of the record store recordings were pretty good though, if you specified the brand of cassette you wanted them to use. And they even typed up tracklists and a spine label..

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Hi All,

 

You only have to look on Bandcamp to see the number of artists releasing their songs on cassettes https://bandcamp.com/?g=all&s=top&p=0&gn=0&f=cassette&w=0

 

Over 1600 from my count and from vaguely remembering from about a year ago the number was around 400.

 

 

Edited by Janjuc
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I don't have any cassette tapes, and agree back in the day I only had them for the car, but its not just Hipsters rediscovering tapes. My wife had boxes of them stored away, mostly all pre-recorded and some even signed by artists she had seen in concert, so she had a sentimental attachment and did not want to get rid of them but she had nothing to play them on. I actually got her a vintage deck, cleaned the heads and fitted new belts for her to use in a secondary system - she is now very happily listening to these again.

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I am still traumatised from Cassette Tapes from when I was kid - with them breaking and having to use sticky tape to re-join them and then rewind them on the spool again using a Bic Pen ?

 

Come to think of it - remember doing that with VHS tapes too........................LOL.

 

Does anyone here remember making mix tapes from the Top 40 on the Radio? Trying to stop the recording before the announcer spoke? Nearly every song was cut off on the end..................... but hey, was a fun thing to do as a kid who had no pocket money.

 

I was pretty excited when CDs came out ? thankfully I only had about 4 or 5 cassettes.

 

 

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2 minutes ago, April Snow said:

I am still traumatised from Cassette Tapes from when I was kid - with them breaking and having to use sticky tape to re-join them and then rewind them on the spool again using a Bic Pen ?

 

Come to think of it - remember doing that with VHS tapes too........................LOL.

 

Does anyone here remember making mix tapes from the Top 40 on the Radio? Trying to stop the recording before the announcer spoke? Nearly every song was cut off on the end..................... but hey, was a fun thing to do as a kid who had no pocket money.

 

I was pretty excited when CDs came out ? thankfully I only had about 4 or 5 cassettes.

 

 

 

Yep and i still have a few mix tapes from Casey Kasem's American Top 40 from the 80's that i'll cherish forever.

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4 minutes ago, Tubularbells said:

 

Yep and i still have a few mix tapes from Casey Kasem's American Top 40 from the 80's that i'll cherish forever.

Wow they would be amazing to hear - I know that you can get those on Vinyl too - but they are expensive.

Have seen sellers on Ebay selling CD copies though ...............thought about getting them from time time ?

 

Casey was awesome.

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So before the digital world (yes we did exist in this prehistoric times) the idea was to have a good quality cassette deck and record your vinyl so you could put them away and not damage them and also have portable music. If my failing memory serves me correctly, metal tapes recorded on my Nakamichi sounded pretty damn good! 

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