Yet another unhelpful pitchfork op-ed piece. Bands release new material on cassette for the same reason they release material on vinyl, as many have done consistently for well over a decade now. (Don't call it a comeback.) A tape, like a 45, is something to have on the merch table: quantifiable, limited, promotional, and a great way to get a visual message across alongside a musical one. It's impossible to set release dates for vinyl because pressing plants are backed up for months. An eager enough band could whip up a batch of good-to-ok sounding tapes to bring on tour at something resembling a moment's notice, and at reasonable costs. It might be instructive to add that tapes have a healthy price mark-up, whereas a band or label will likely do no better than break even on a 45. (And after 6 months of pressing plant delays.) I would have a hard time explaining the origin or "cassettes over CD-Rs", but many bands do release CD-Rs as well as or instead of cassettes. If I had to guess I would place the origins in Columbus, Ohio-area lo-fi/garage in the mid-00's, given that sounding really crappy was of no concern to groups like Times New Viking, Psychedelic Horseshit, the Homostupids, probably taking cues from their area-forefathers Guided by Voices. (Who themselves probably adopted lo-fi from the Swell Maps in the UK.) TNV, for one, 'mastered' their recordings onto VHS tape. Tape is really part of the aesthetic for a number of bands like this. A cleaned up version of 'Bee Thousand' doesn't make any sense to my ears. -Tim On Wed, Nov 11, 2015 at 3:18 PM, Tom Fine <[log in to unmask]> wrote: > This is a really good point, Frank. I didn't mean a person shouldn't > obtain, enjoy and dub cassettes with material unavailable on other media. > Your Vietnamese cassette is a good example. Also the African pop music > chronicled on this blog: > http://www.awesometapes.com/ > Some of this material is not available on other media, as I understand it. > > Plus there are "board tapes" made by bands, and other live recordings > (legal and not). > > So, to be clear, what I was saying I think is a fool's errand is making a > NEW cassette recording, for a girl or anyone else. It's silly, because > there are better ways to do the same thing with modern technology, but it's > harmless so c'est la vie. > > -- Tom Fine > > ----- Original Message ----- From: "Franz Kunst" <[log in to unmask]> > To: <[log in to unmask]> > Sent: Wednesday, November 11, 2015 2:37 PM > Subject: Re: [ARSCLIST] AW: [ARSCLIST] AW: [ARSCLIST] What Your Music > Format Says About You > > > The tone of this discussion is (as usual I'm afraid) skewed towards an > engineer/audiophile point of view, and from people who lived most of their > lives with physical formats. Even the original article managed to ignore > the fact that for collectors and other more assertive music lovers, there > simply isn't a choice of media for some recordings. Nobody is taken to task > for collecting acoustic 78s because they're not on CD or iTunes, but, as > was Francesco's point, there are thousands of cassettes out there that are > only available on that (admittedly flawed) medium. Just last month I picked > up a great 1970s Vietnamese tape for 5 cents in Chinatown while shopping > for a tea kettle. I'd gladly purchase a non-warbly reissue, if it were to > exist. > Now as for producing new recordings, I can hardly speak for the youth but > it's my impression that both CDs and CD-Rs are about as clunky and unsexy > to them as cassettes and 8-tracks are to some of us. But we're still only > talking about a minute percentage of today's music consumption. > > Franz > > On Wed, Nov 11, 2015 at 11:12 AM, David Breneman <[log in to unmask]> > wrote: > > Von: "Francesco Martinelli" <[log in to unmask]> >> > On 11/11/2015 12:20, Tom Fine wrote: >> >> >> Very few girls here have cassette players! ;) >> >> I still don't see why not do a Mix CDR. Many more CD players still out >> >> there, easier to compile, much easier to duplicate. >> >> > And, I repeat, for that very reason so much less relevant. >> >> I guess I don't understand your use of the term "relevant". If what >> you're after is novelty value, I'm sure your sweetheart would really >> appreciate a cylinder record! :-) >> >> I recently bought a barn-find Edison Triumph Model B (circa 1906) >> along with a recorder and recording horn. It's going to take some >> work getting it back to the condition to record with it again (I've had an >> Edison Standard Model B for decades, but the single-spring motor >> isn't strong enough for recording) but it will be a lot of fun when I >> can finally make records with it. And yes, you can still buy new blanks. >> But I'd never put it forth as a viable alternative to my Ampex ATR-800 >> when it comes to capturing high-fidelity sound. >> >> And I'm with Tom in that a CDR is simply easier to make, even if you >> have to digitize the selections first. I'm all for esoteric formats. I >> still take a lot of pictures with my Stereo Realist on slide film. But >> I've never been able to get past my impression that the Compact >> Cassette is first and foremost a convenience and cost driven >> substitute for the couple-hundred-dollar 7" reel tape decks that >> were so popular in the 50s, 60s and early 70s. When I finally bought >> my first cassette deck, a Sankyo, around 1978 (the year after I graduated >> from high school), for about $180, it sounded *almost* as good as the >> Realistic TR-88 7" deck I bought from Radio Shack (in the 6th grade) >> for $129. >> >> I finally took the Realistic to the dump because the heads were shot, >> as were the bearings in the motor. I still have the Sankyo, even though >> it needs new belts. Maybe in the end it is an emotional thing. That deck >> provided music for a lot of parties where I wouldn't let friends touch my >> turntable because we were all too drunk and/or stoned. >> >> >> >> ---------------------------------------------------------------- >> Profitieren Sie von der sicheren E-Mail-Übertragung Ihrer Daten mit einer >> kostenlosen E-Mail-Adresse der Telekom. >> www.t-online.de/email-kostenlos >> >>