please bring back 8-track and cassette players into production
 

HI,

My name Is Chris. I am a new member of this forum I Like 8 track and cassette players. In the future, I would like to see new consumer and professional 8 track recorders, 8 track players, portable 8 track players, and recorders come back into production, priced between $20 to more than than $30,000 brand new. Also, I would like to see consumer and professional cassette players and recorders, portable cassette players and huge cassette boomboxes 1980s style, and come back into production priced between $5 to $30,000 or more brand new. Also In the future I would like to see professional exotic cassette players, and 8 track players and recorders prices at $40,000 and up brand new.

Thanks for taking your time to read this,

Your friend

Chris :yeah:

Prices aside, I can respect the homage you pay to the mediums long gone. It would be cool to see it here and there, a sort of retro flashback. But current and future endeavors into media should be of the digital variety.

But...why?

I used to have tons of cassettes; I won't say they were too impractical for me (because I maintain a lovely vinyl collection) but there's nothing special about them. I've used 8-track tapes before; depending on the maintenance of your player, they sometimes switch channels on you (and scare the living **** out of you). They're quite bulky and an 8-track unit is difficult to find these days.

Cassettes and 8-tracks don't need to go back into production. They can be found used just about anywhere (but buyer beware, they warp like crazy).

Why would you like to see audio equipment that costs tens of thousands of dollars? Wouldn't in be preferable if it were less expensive?

^wow....my thoughts exactly

as for 8 track...eh

cassettes are coming back in underground music...last year at least two bands i can think of released their albums on cassette....both The Cosmic Dead and Hepa/Titus released their stuff only on cassette and download....so far this year i have seen at least 6 bands offer their new albums early on cassette

I don't completely hate tape labels and a number of local bands use them and issue some of their releases on cassette. It can be pretty cool, as you don't usually find this anymore. I also still have a tape deck on my stereo and so its nice to occasionally get some use out of it.

However, that being said, I don't share the same desire to see cassette players come back into production. If you really want one it is still possible to get one and despite what I have just said about tape labels...you really think I'm gonna choose cassette over LP or CD should I be given the option?

Cassettes are outdated, weak, have a shorter lifespan compared to other formats should you actually take care of your CDs and LPs and given that its easier to rewind and fast forward even on vinyl, I cant see much of a practical argument for tapes going forward. What I would miss, if the facility was to be taken from me completely is the ability to use tapes to make mixes for people. This is, in my opinion, by far the best and most personal way to make a mixtape. That is one big advantage of a tape, but I struggle to find any others.

I say let cassettes rot on the scrap heap of null, void, out dated and unnecessary audio formats alongside the gramophone, Betamax, Laser Disc and MiniDisc.

i agree 100% man

the only thing i miss about cassettes is making people mix tapes.....there is just something much more personal about mix tapes....

Absolutely. I made a mix very recently. Nothing special, just odd tracks from a bands albums filed into a specific order. I made it on Spotify and even though it was easy, quick and got the job done its just not the same as when I used to use cassettes.

Making a mix with a cassette was something very special and personal. For example I once made one for a girl, for her 18th birthday. I chose one track released in each year of her life, in chronological order, and also managed to make the mix play with some degree of fluidity from track to track. For various reasons I was never able to give it to her, but it took a long, long time to select tracks and make it and to get it right. When you put effort into the track selection, order and the fact that you have to play each one while simultaneously recording it, stopping the tape at just the right moment and leaving small gaps in between each song, it is blatantly obvious to the recipient that you have invested a lot of time and effort and put a lot of thought into it to personalise it to the individual.

Making a playlist is so much easier but it just lacks a real connection and seems so much more impersonal.

exactly

and what a great idea! i may have to steal that in the future :)

i used to plug my stereo system into my tv and add blips of shit i found on tv or specific movie quotes in between songs....and i loved having a real time limit....45 minutes with as little silence at the end

Thats a really cool idea, putting quotes and things on it too.

The silence at the end was always important to me. It bugged me too much if I had too much of it. Looking back I dont know how I had the patience because that moment when you had filled most of one side and then were either left with too much tape at the end or just not enough for that final track of Side A, the track you absolutely didn't want to cut....so you had to cut a different track and start all over again.

i cannot tell you how many "i love you" tapes ended with a Charles Bronson or Spazz song....just because i can't leave 38 seconds! :)

lots of "i really loved the tape you made me....but...."

honestly one liners from Airplane! where my savior :)

i like cassettes

i like the flutter, the clicking noises as the tape runs

i also like the flat EQ

call me another cassette freak as well

Cassettes are having their day again (finally). I've been waiting for this forever. I still make lots of mixtapes and listen to them daily in my car. So much safer than flipping through my phone for different music.

That said, why wouldn't want to see 40k worth of equipment.

I too used to make selection tapes, hundreds of 'em. In fact, once I got into an artist I'd make a best of or even series of best of their music. Used to use different coloured pens, make up little covers and everything. Very therapeutic.

However...

LOTS of cons. If you ****ed up a tape you were either going to have to do it all over again, or hope that the original mix didn't peek out at the end once you'd recorded over it. Who remembers hearing the last few milliseconds of a guitar fadeout or a drumroll, or a snatch of fading vocal when the tape was supposed to be over? :rolleyes: Plus, you had that little bit at the beginning, the leader tape, that you had to spool on with your finger to get past, and if you didn't then your carefully-planned opening track just jumped into life, like a record when you dropped the needle in the wrong place? Man that was annoying, though you got used to it.

Then of course there were dropouts (for anyone not understanding any of these terms, or born after 1980, here's a guide http://www.musicbanter.com/members-j...ml#post1087614), tape tangling, tapes getting stood on, accidental erasure, the many blank and caseless tapes which we all had and wondered what was on them but were too lazy to find out, having to turn the tape over at the end of side A, and if you didn't have an auto-reverse deck, having to spool forward or back to get to the music on the second side, and the eternal ritual of "holding down the play and record key with the pause key ready to let the pause key up as SOON as the music starts OH **** I MISSED IT TRY AGAIN!"

Other than that, cassettes were fine. Oh yeah, and the crappy sound reproduction, no matter how good your deck was. Unless you used metal tapes, and man were they expensive!

Never used an eight-track though, I have to say...

I still have my 8-Track player. It's a record player/radio/8-Track player/recorder all in one from the 70's. I used to make mix 8-Tracks for my player in my car. Then when casettes got popular, I had to use one of those casette to 8-Track plug-in dealies until I could afford a car stero with one built in.

Kinda reminds me of those "Kids got it good these days" commercials.

i used to do a lot of illegal taping back in the day

my best friend was a pretty rich bastard and he has a large collection of imported vinyl, which weren't available here

i taped a lot of Japan, OMD, New Order

also another friend was trying to get me into thrash (I was only into Megadeth then) so he taped for me the first four Metallica and some Anthrax

Metallica I dug, but Anthrax was so so

to show my appreciation, I gave him my Pearl Jam's Ten - which in retrospect wasn't a very good trade, he lost

Why don't we bring back lead based paint while we're at it.

If one were so inclined, I'm sure they could record their music library onto cassette tapes and drag a backpack full of them around with you, whist shouldering a boombox, but an iPod is just more convenient for most.

that's what I used to do in the late 80s/early 90s

only I used a Walkman

Ah, my favorite snack.

Thing is, with a walkman there were only so many tapes you could stuff into your pockets/bag, so you invariably had to make a choice as to what you were going to listen to while you were out, and you were stuck with that choice. With even a basic ipod now, you can decide you're in the mood for something else after all and change to that. Also, with many of them you can watch videos, if you so desire.

Not to mention that though at the time we thought they were the ultimate in compact portable music players, even the slimmest walkman could be no smaller than the tape it ran, so they were all relatively large. I remember I had a lovely silver Sanyo I think, thin and smooth, like a little cigarette case, the absolute epitome of cool. But nowadays, even the crappiest ipod or mp3 player is smaller, and certainly more functional.

I think an electronics company could create a good niche for itself making quality cassette decks. Many people still have cassettes in their collections. Often those cassettes contain songs that are no longer available in any high-quality format. It's getting harder and harder to repair old cassette decks or find decent used ones for sale - I know from experience.

Please bring back quality cassette decks
 

I like cassettes so much, I like the hiss, and the sounds of my cassettes playing in a cassette deck. Please bring back quality cassette decks and boomboxes to the production line. :)

would be awesome