When Taylor Swift’s releases her new album, “Life of a Showgirl,” in October, it can be heard on the usual places, including streaming, vinyl and…cassette tape?
The cassette tape was once one of the most common ways to listen to music, overtaking vinyl in the 1980s before being surpassed by CDs. But the physical audio format has become an artifact of a bygone era, giving way to the convenience of streaming.
Or, that’s what many thought.
In 2023, 436,400 cassettes were sold in the United States, according to the most recent data available from Luminate, an entertainment data firm. Although that’s a far cry from the 440 million cassettes sold in the 1980s, it’s a sharp increase from the 80,720 cassettes sold in 2015 and a notable revival for a format that had been all but written off.
Cassettes might not be experiencing the resurgence of vinyls or even CDs, but they are making a bit of a comeback, spurred by fans wanting an intimate experience with music and nostalgia, said Charlie Kaplan, owner of online store Tapehead City.
“People just like having something you can hold and keep, especially now when everything’s just a rented file on your phone,” Kaplan told CNN.
“Tapes provide a different type of listening experience — not perfect, but that’s part of it. Flip it over, look at the art and listen all the way through. You connect with the music with more of your senses,” he said.
I did a collaboration once where we were considering doing a limited release of a one-off song on an Edison cylinder recording.
Turns out that yes, there are firms that produce them, but those fuckers are expensive.
And notice that nobody wants to release on 8-track tape cartridges. Those things sucked.
Gen Z is an interesting bunch. Opting for blurry photos and bringing back JNCO jeans.
The 90’s are back.
I showed them all this stuff before and my kids thought it was lame. Their friends start to listen or wear said things and now it’s cool… Kids lol nothing changes.
don’t worry it’s still not cool.
I did all the trendy thing when I was a kid. Even made the mistake of wearing FUBU once as a white guy.
I burned a few CDs and put one of them in my car’s CD player
It worked but I got hit with “tray error” when I tried ejecting it.
It’s been stuck in there since april
That’s the authentic experience
The next level is getting one of those radio tuners, a discman, and explaining to your friends that you use the discman, because the car CD player is broken.
If the car has a cassette player, you can get this cassette with a 3.5 jack coming out of it, and then connect that to the discman to listen to CDs! The 90’s were fun.
Those worked pretty well by the end, tbh
Part of the car now.
Way she goes…
“Blurry photos”? Those are just photos with a shallow depth of field. That never went out of style.
I’m fuming at this too. Pictures with some amount of bokeh is the standard look unless you’re shooting landscape camera or using a telephone to snap pictures.
I’m a Millennial/GenZ cusper and I think its just the desire to go back to a simpler analogue lifestyle. I’ve also bought a few cassettes from concerts at times when I couldn’t carry around a full vinyl the rest of the night
They are just like every other generation before them. They think anything that’s 20-30 years old is ancient history and they want to ‘connect’ to a past they didn’t live through and it also makes them feel different than their parents who are all into streaming services and gave up physical media who lived through the progression of formats from analog, to digital, to non-physical.
I definitely prefer to purchase my music on CD when possible. As someone who grew up with Cassettes, it’s one tech I’m fine with being pushed into history. I’d rather have Minidiscs than cassettes.
Shit medium that inevitably ends up pulled by a faulty mechanism and destroyed. I remember patching broken tapes with adhesive tape all the time.
yeah. i wonder why they aren’t binging back VHS too. because it objectively sucks compared to what we have now.
VHS isn’t coming back because you simply can’t buy a CRT and VCR. These are no longer being made, the existing ones are degrading and overpriced.
Otherwise they’d absolutely be back, a lot of videos on YouTube and TikTok are specifically longing for VHS.
Ooooh so that’s why I saw a twenty something tryto buy a cassette player at the thrift store last weekend!
me. i am buying those.
fun nostalgia. it’s physical, tactile, the sounds that come along with a physical cassette. and yes, the audio is imperfect, but that’s part of the experience and charm.
i already have lossless digital files. this is a different experience.
Not Taylor Swift but my older kid is really into retro music devices. He has a Walkman, a separate tape recorder, a record player and a boom box, and buys vinyl and cassettes
Wow, my cars cassette player may finally seen some use!!!
nostalgic audiophiles
How about reel-to-reel? Unlike cassettes, it actually sounds good. Probably the best you’ll ever hear from an analog format.
Was reel-to-reel ever mainstream?
I always had the impression that it was too complicated and/or expensive for most.
It was always expensive and niche. Only a few commercial releases even at its peek. Most of the machines were used for mastering, not personal listening.
They’re not that complicated. They just look that way when you’re threading the reel through the mechanisms. There’s a logic to it, and it’s pretty easy once you understand that. Does have a little more maintenance than a record player or cassette deck. Stuff needs to be lubed right.
Edit: also, note that people aren’t necessarily buying cassettes or vinyl to listen to them. Lots of vinyl is purchased by people who don’t even own a turntable. It’s for the art and physicality.
I feel like tape fans were always there, just like vinyl fans. There are some special subcategories of them like Sony Walkman fans for example. Or those who like tape saturation/distortion. In music production it’s even used as an effect sometimes: people pass their whole audio output through tape record and immediate playback just to introduce some of that saturation. Also I’ve always seen niche cassette limited edition releases here and there.
This reminds me of Kung Fury, which has a very 80’s/90’s aesthetic. They tried a variety of ways to filter the final movie to give it the right feel for the time period. Finally, unsatisfied with digital methods, they ended up running it through an actual VCR.
You’d be surprised.
As a matter of fact, many well known and famous artists have been releasing dbrwnd new albums on old media for years and years.
For example I have a casset of 10000 days by tool.
I’m also an idiot audiophile with a stereo that’s way way too expensive for my own good. (I’m not rich but I am broke.)
I swear to God I can hear a difference and theres all kinds of warm fuzzy feelings when I put a casset in.
I’ve seen a lot of bands doing that at their merch table. I think for most bands, it’s just a keepsake like buying a T-shirt or sticker or whatever after a show. I’m sure there’s plenty of people who prefer cassettes (or at least the Walkman aesthetic) but for the most part, it’s just a souvenir.
I’ve never been into tapes but I collect vinyl. Part of the fun is all the extras tossed in. It’s like buying a boxed set or special edition DVD/Blu-Ray. Tapes don’t really have the same space for fun stuff but Taylor Swift probably has the budget to do something “extra” and make it a whole thing people put on Instagram.
Record collectors mostly and obsessed fans. Vinyls and CDs may have done a comeback back, still are expensive.
it’s actually super common for underground music. I have a collection of new music on cassette. it costs a lot of money to press vinyl, and a lot of bands just aren’t there.
There are a number of collectors and enthusiasts who enjoy alternative types of media. It was an experience listening to music on tape and hearing the hiss of the tape. It has a different sound to it, sort of like vinyl.
If there’s money to be made, they’ll find ways to get it. If that means selling tapes, they’ll sell tapes again. Records are still back in style and being mass produced again.
