Long Live Cassettes!

Today's vinyl revival is one that has been welcomed by music fans to an extraordinary degree, providing hip music fans with something physical amidst the file-sharing mayhem that has shaken the industry. My friend Chis Martins with the LA Weekly has started the Inches column dedicated solely to vinyl releases, and that he is able to fill his site with text and images of new records (as well as reissues) is a testament to a changing model of sales that feeds a strong niche very well. As the most basic and original format of physical recording there is nostalgia attached to purchases like these that has understandably led some to ask, What's next?

On the Pop Matters blog writer Sean McCarthy recently stated the same nostalgia movement that has launched the success of vinyl will not do the same for cassette tapes. And when put simply like I just did, I agree with this assertion. But that does not mean that cassettes are gone for good, as McCarthy goes on to suggest. And what strikes me as even more far-fetched is that he goes on to say basically any format stands a better chance for revival (CDs included) than tapes.

The return of vinyl makes sense because it's in essence the square one of music. There is style to the this format unlike any other. But as my friend, "Tina Weymouth," owner and operator of Los Angeles pirate radio station Hobo FM, recently wrote, vinyl never actually died:

"Things that appear antiquated like 7-inches, 70’s clothes or even moped scooters have, in fact, been scratching at the surface of mainstream for decades. These are not items which society has cast out, only cast aside."

But the real reason we need vinyl now more than ever is to offer an ultimate substitute to the mp3. As they are not mobile, vinyls are for the home while mp3s are for the road. It's as simple as that and the experience that surrounds these formats.

So then, what about the cassette? Our small rectangular friend with whom we've shared so many memories (depending on your age, of course). The originator of the "mix tape," which Nick Hornby and Rob Sheffield have memorialized through literature. The ones we used to put in boom boxes, walkmen and car stereos. Those things.

The cassette does not fit into the vinyl + mp3 equation but it does exist elsewhere and that is as a replacement to vinyl 10 years ago when no one wanted vinyl. Today people like McCarthy are throwing out their cassettes because they feel they are useless wastes of space. They can be bought and sold for cents, just as vinyl was once upon a time. Consider the countless releases which have not been reissued to CD or digital formats, consider the sound quality that gives you warm analog fuzz over your favorite songs, the underground circles where cassettes are still passed around. Like vinyl, a cassette takes added effort to listen to, and like mp3s you can take them with you. They are the middle ground, replaceable by either but only if you choose for it to be so. Tape decks, boom boxes, bargain shoppers, are these all outdated too? Perhaps, but our history builds upon itself like a landfill and there will always be dumpster divers. And we'll be the ones buying the collection of tapes at your next yard sale.

Go HERE to see a list of labels dedicated to keeping the cassette alive.

--Colin Stutz