Cassettes for sale on the Urban Outfitters website

I think that (them seeming cool) is all they have going for them. They're much easier to deal with than LP's, but still give that retro/hipster cred. They look cool. They've got moving parts that you can see. Spinning records, spinning tape spindles. CD's don't offer any of that, sound be damned.

 

Of course it doesn't hurt me. It's just silly. Cassettes don't sound good. They can't and they don't. Some here will regale us with tails of their Nak Dragon with Dolby XYZ and HX-PRO, proclaim retail genius on the part of Urban Outfitters, and tell you that they sound great. They don't. They're good (great, really, back in the day) for portability and nothing else. Urban Outfitters is a "hipster" joint and always has been. They're selling them to appeal to their "hipster" crowd. They somehow imagine that just because LPs came back, cassettes will to. They're wrong. LP's have come back because of how incredible they can sound (...and because they're big and the cover art is cooler...I'll grant that). Cassettes, however, have nothing going for them. They can't sound good and they don't have pretty cover art. In short, no point.

Ed

 

I guess they'll have start putting tape decks back in cars.

 

Man, that thing lights up like s small city!

 

Which is more silly: the fashion-conscious twentysomething who's having fun exploring obsolete tech, or the middle-age loner who obsesses over a $15000 turntable and recoils at the thought of listening to anything digital-sourced because it "defeats the whole purpose"?

Listening to recorded music is by nature frivolous and silly. To believe that there are sensible and correct ways to do it (and silly, incorrect ways) is delusional.

 

This packaging is too meta for me. It's hurting my brain It's like System of a Down's Steal This Album!

 

I've been selling plenty of cassettes for the last year...some at very high prices. It's certainly more than a fad.

In general though, used players are cheap and plentiful, used cassettes are cheap and plentiful.

You get analog sound on budget when the average price of a record is creeping into the mid $20 range.

 

Couldn't disagree more. Cassettes have little going for them other than portability. When other portable better-sounding media showed up, cassettes went away. I'm not much on listening to old tech just for old tech's sake. If others are, so be it.

As for those who obsess over the $15,000 turntable, they're doing it because they sound good. Obsessing over cassettes makes zero sense because they don't. While I get where you're going, with all due respect, there are two different things at work here.

Ed

 

I have a cassette deck for two reasons. It can make excellent-sounding copies of LPs I want to hear but can't afford to keep (my CDR burner does, too.) and I can play certain titles that are difficult to find and/or too expensive on LP. One example is Dylan's Time Out Of Mind. To my ears that particular tape and some others sound better than the same titles on CD.

 

That soundtrack explains why the local Hits and Memories radio station has been playing Moonage Daydream for the last year. I thought they'd tracked the wrong song.

 

Love this. It really shows that the pursuit of audiophile nirvana is for the limited few. The physical medium, and the many experiences that accompany it, are just so much more pleasureable for most people, than the sterility of digital files. Pick your medium, and enjoy. That's the way it should be. Oh, and God bless hipsters, for helping old farts like me to see my favorite old mediums become viable again, for however long it may last. Their interest and buying power has played a part in the revival of some great technologies. We live in wonderful times, if you are a fan of music, and the mediums that they are delivered on. Bring it on!

 

No, cost more than a CD to make even in the 1990's per copy.

 

Discmakers: CDs 1,000 for $999
Rainbo Records: Cassettes 1,000 for $1,075
Basically the same price.

 

That is a small run of CD, can't compare to an average run of CD replication prices. Different here. Those discs are likely duplicated CD-R. Replication of 1,000 discs would be $.46 a copy done from a glass master. Replicate a 5,000 or 10,000 copy run and you'd get $.25-$.30 a copy prices. Cheaper to replicate in larger runs.

 

I have that model!!! I love it!

 

No way I'm being sucked into this format again. I got rid of all my pencils.

 

The blanks are Maxell UR90s.
Ugh.
Even 25 years ago, I only used those for taping an AM radio broadcast... like a baseball game that I wanted to listen to later.

 

There's one less likely, very small factor to possibly consider here when evaluating the inherent "coolness" of the cassette media.

Specifically when making a "mix tape" for yourself, a buddy or for your significant other.
Anyone who's ever made such a tape can easily recall how laborious, painstaking, and sometimes frustrating it can be... Especially from vinyl (either 45's or LP's).

One must precisely select the right tracks, that sound good in a certain sequence. (Remember, the final track list MUST sound 110% amazing, unlike a burned CD, wherein "weak" tracks can be easily skipped over during playback!)
In theory, if a "faulty" track "does not belong" , then the listener will tune out, and worse, EJECT the tape, and hesitate to play it again.
{Sadly, that exact moment of Rejected Eject-ion is captured in time - unless rewound. I'm sure I have tapes from the 80's that are snapshots of the exact moment when I pressed the "Stop" button. I probably had to go to class...)

So, I think that those familiar with the required effort to record a cassette tape with hand selected songs appreciate it more... Than an ITunes playlist burned onto a shiny CD. (Much too common & easy!)
Perhaps this new generation of cassette fans can identify with a hint of the slightly "romantic" notion that a "hand-crafted" product conveys....

I guess it's a quaint thought.

But, as a 16 year old I used to think recording a cassette tape with my favorite songs was the most ideal way to try to express certain thoughts and feelings to a girl that I had a crush on...

 

No wonder I can't hardly find any good prerecorded cassettes anymore at thrift stores. They're all being snatched up by the hipsters. Glad I stocked up on blank tape over the last 15 years as well as finding some good prerecorded gems when people were ditching their cassettes. Plus I have found some good tape decks over the years as well and they all work perfect and were very cheap. The tape decks still come into thrift stores these days but they look abused and are overpriced.

 

I've got a couple of JVCs in the closet, a heavily used KD10 from 1980 and a lightly used Dolby C machine from 1985, they worked the last time I used them 10+ years ago, I wonder if they are worth much?

 

A new cassette boombox for sale (modeled after the 80s models but updated to allow MP3 playback from an SD card or a jump drive): http://www.urbanoutfitters.com/urba...il.jsp?pid&id=34907022&catId=A_MUSIC_SPEAKERS

 

Cassettes are definitely a crapshoot, at this stage the pressure pads can fall off as the adhesive ages, but I do have some that sound amazingly good, considering what they are. Another problem is the old age squealing that can plague them. But I have a Van Morrison "Too Late To Stop Now" Warners cassette in the old slide out box that I bought new in the early 70's that still sounds wonderful.
Definitely not as reliable a format as vinyl or CD, but at lest it's analog!

 

Aww, they don't sound so bad!

 

Hah! You don't have to convince me about that!
Please play "Birds" and "Only Love Can Break Your Heart" LOUD for me....!

But, no need to Fast-Forward just for my sake...

 

They were designed as a portable medium, never an audiophile one. They tried to turn it into that over time and it failed...miserably. I agree about the pressure pad. I've had them fall off on me. Truly annoying. I've had shells betray me to the point where I've had to take the tape out and transfer it to a new shell. Oh, the nightmares I could share...LOL!

That it's analog means nothing if it doesn't sound good...and it doesn't...ever...

I have my nostalgic memories of various portable cassette players (Sony, Toshiba, Lennox, and the first - a G.E.) from way back. However, those memories aren't of sonic brilliance. They're of portability and freedom.

Ed