I remember someone here got his son a boombox in the last year or so and was remarking about cassettes. I know I've still got a good many... and play them in the car from time to time, too.
Now it seems they're "in the news" or rather, in the music opinion columns, too...
Cassette tapes are having an unlikely moment
The cheap plastic. The unruly ribbon. Leave them on a car dashboard on a July afternoon and be prepared to come back to a warped, melted mess. To those who can remember loading a Walkman or boom box and taking in the warbled results, the recent reemergence of cassette tapes is a peculiar development. But it is a trend that some saw coming, even before the latest resurrection of vinyl, record players, and all things pre-iPhone.
Though quantifiable figures can be hard to come by — unlike vinyl, which reportedly took in $226 million in the first half of this year, tapes are still a relatively underground endeavor — there’s no denying the format’s increased visibility.
In the past few years alone, it has garnered its own holiday (Cassette Store Day, founded in 2013 by a group of labels hoping to draw attention to the virtues of the format), served as the subject of a feature-length documentary (“Cassette,” which is currently being submitted to various film festivals), and become the musical trend du jour for a slew of indie bands and enthusiasts.
Even major bands have gotten in on the action, with groups like Metallica, the Flaming Lips, and Dinosaur Jr. offering limited-release cassette formats in recent years.
“The interesting thing is they’re being put out by labels and being consumed by people who are not old enough to have had cassettes,” says Jem Aswad, senior editor at Billboard, which tracks the music industry. “So it’s a very confusing phenomenon to me.” More:
https://www.bostonglobe.com/arts/music/2015/11/27/cassette-tapes-are-having-unlikely-moment/krQpVmYAcSsMFGFJ8d6RUI/story.html
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Our Misplaced Nostalgia for Cassette Tapes
Los Angeles — EARLIER this month the Canadian singer Nelly Furtado, who has sold more than 20 million singles worldwide, released an album that almost no one could find, and even fewer could listen to. That’s because the recording, “Hadron Collider,” which she made with the musician Blood Orange, was presented in a format once thought long relegated to the trash heap of tech history: the cassette tape.
Many people over 30 remember cassettes, with nostalgia, if not some disdain. And yet, for a slice of music fandom, Ms. Furtado’s choice of medium makes perfect sense. Cassettes, somehow, are making a comeback.
Go to any indie show and inevitably, among the T-shirts and knickknacks, there will be tapes. Some record labels are now cassette-only. The National Audio Co., America’s largest manufacturer of audiocassettes, reported that 2014 was its best year yet.
But before the revisionists completely rewrite my adolescence, let’s be clear about something: As a format for recorded sound, the cassette tape is a terrible piece of technology. It’s a roll of tape in a box. It’s essentially an office supply.
The cassette is the embodiment of planned obsolescence. Each time you play one it degrades. Bad sound gets worse. Casings crack in winter, melt in summer. Inescapably, a cassette tape unspools: It’s only destiny. Fine, death comes to us all. But just because we can anthropomorphize a gadget doesn’t give it a soul. More:
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/12/24/opinion/our-misplaced-nostalgia-for-cassette-tapes.html?_r=0