There's very little need to record music onto tapes anymore (unless, say you're in an older car that only has a tape deck). With CDRs and Ipods, I've done it considerably less since 2002 or '03, but I still llike the old-schoolness of it, and do it from time to time.

I think its imperfections are part of the appeal, really. The recording quality of different boomboxes vary a little bit, same with kinds of tape. I also like that you can edit much easier. For instance, when I was younger, I used to really be into song endings/fadeouts. So, whenever my parents made a mixtape (this was before I did it myself by age 12 or 13), I often asked them to tape the very end of the previous song, lol. You can also do things like slow it down or speed it up, which are harder with recording digitally.

I guess it feels more "personal". Same of course, for VHS compared to DVD.

I sometimes have done it to record off the radio, though rarely.

I still do audio cassette recording.  With only a radio and tape deck in the car, I often make a mix tape to listen to whilst I drive

I sometimes have done it to record off the radio, though rarely.


Yeah, radio recordings are like a time capsule. I'm glad I have some mid-late '90s announcements and commercials saved up. For instance Casey Kasem on American Top 20 announcing "Every Breath You Take" as "the number one song in the USA 14 years ago this week" in 1997. 8)

I still make mixtapes and listen to them time to time  :D

Yeah, radio recordings are like a time capsule. I'm glad I have some mid-late '90s announcements and commercials saved up. For instance Casey Kasem on American Top 20 announcing "Every Breath You Take" as "the number one song in the USA 14 years ago this week" in 1997. 8)

Heh heh!  I was listening to Casey Kasem when "Every Breath You Take" was #1 on AT40 for the better part of the summer of '83.  Whenever I hear that song I'm like,
"Hey, summer of '83, remember?"
"We weren't even born yet, you old fart."
So much for living in a college town.
:-\\

In 2002 I had over 500 cassettes, mostly stuff I boosted from my radio station.  In 2003, I converted to CD-R.  I logged many hours burning the same CDs onto CD-R that I had spent the previous eight years recording on tape.  I couldn't give away all those cassettes.  Obsolete technology.   Most of them were really nice Maxells and TDKs too.  Just zap them with the bulk eraser and they're as good as new!  That was one advantage of cassettes.  You could erase them and start again.  Can't do that with CD-Rs.    You can get rewritables, but they're far more expensive and a nuisance to format.  It's easier to just buy a 50 pack of CD-Rs.  If you screw up, just toss it and grab another off the spool. 

I would never go back to cassettes.  I'm no audiophile, but the fidelity of CD is significantly better.  It's also quicker.  I generally dub at x4 speed.  With tape it had to be in real time.  Now whenever I get a CD for my program, I copy it right away.  You know, just in case it goes missing from the library, you know.  ; )  Now they're starting to release recordings on DVD alone, which really grinds my gears.  Why are you sending promo copies of a DVD to a radio station?  You can't see through the radio!  I tell 'em it's up to them to send me a CD-R if they want me to broadcast it.  I'm not going to run around trying to convert DVDs to CD-R just because your record company thinks it's chic to turn all music into frikkin' soundtrack!

I'm starting sound like Rob Gordon here (John Cusack, "High Fidelity"), and it gets worse.

I've made some great CD mixes, but it's just not the same as making mix tapes (as in "Boogie Nights," My Awesome Mix Tape #6).  When you made a mix tape, you had to listen to every selection all the way through.  This was more conducive to composition as opposed to mere compilation.  For a 90-minute mix tape, if you were going to do a good job, you had to put a minimum of 150 minutes of your life into it.  There was just more soul inherent in such a creation.
http://www.inthe00s.com/smile/10/znaika.gif

Heh heh!  I was listening to Casey Kasem when "Every Breath You Take" was #1 on AT40 for the better part of the summer of '83.  Whenever I hear that song I'm like,
"Hey, summer of '83, remember?"
"We weren't even born yet, you old fart."
So much for living in a college town.
:-\\

In 2002 I had over 500 cassettes, mostly stuff I boosted from my radio station.  In 2003, I converted to CD-R.  I logged many hours burning the same CDs onto CD-R that I had spent the previous eight years recording on tape.  I couldn't give away all those cassettes.  Obsolete technology.   Most of them were really nice Maxells and TDKs too.  Just zap them with the bulk eraser and they're as good as new!  That was one advantage of cassettes.  You could erase them and start again.  Can't do that with CD-Rs.    You can get rewritables, but they're far more expensive and a nuisance to format.  It's easier to just buy a 50 pack of CD-Rs.  If you screw up, just toss it and grab another off the spool. 

I would never go back to cassettes.  I'm no audiophile, but the fidelity of CD is significantly better.  It's also quicker.  I generally dub at x4 speed.  With tape it had to be in real time.  Now whenever I get a CD for my program, I copy it right away.  You know, just in case it goes missing from the library, you know.  ; )  Now they're starting to release recordings on DVD alone, which really grinds my gears.  Why are you sending promo copies of a DVD to a radio station?  You can't see through the radio!  I tell 'em it's up to them to send me a CD-R if they want me to broadcast it.  I'm not going to run around trying to convert DVDs to CD-R just because your record company thinks it's chic to turn all music into frikkin' soundtrack!

I'm starting sound like Rob Gordon here (John Cusack, "High Fidelity"), and it gets worse.

I've made some great CD mixes, but it's just not the same as making mix tapes (as in "Boogie Nights," My Awesome Mix Tape #6).  When you made a mix tape, you had to listen to every selection all the way through.  This was more conducive to composition as opposed to mere compilation.  For a 90-minute mix tape, if you were going to do a good job, you had to put a minimum of 150 minutes of your life into it.  There was just more soul inherent in such a creation.
http://www.inthe00s.com/smile/10/znaika.gif


I'm somewhere in the middle I guess. I heard alot of '80s songs when they were "sorta new", but anything before 1987 is vague in terms of what I was doing.

Anyway, I personally like the co-existance of having both. Although for cassettes it's just as much old-school sentimental value from the late '80s and '90s, as it is for conveinence. They're also reusable, as you said.

Not sure who's ever noticed this, but the more expensive High Bias tapes are usually better in recording quality (slightly cleaner and louder). Yet not all boomboxes record them quite right - sometimes they don't totally erase the old recording, or the beats will be kinda distorted. Most machines do copy at pretty much the same quality of the source, or only a teeny bit less, though.