Cassette culture.

When my neighborhood bar played ‘The Immortal Otis Redding’ and ‘Astral Weeks’ on vinyl recently, it reminded me that all of the songs from my past still have a place in current day.   The songs reminded me that when I was younger, I would capture those songs and share them with friends.  The songs even motivated me to dig through my attic and find a box of mix tapes that have survived my multiple moves.   ‘Jams from Joppa’, ‘They Might Not Have a Hockey Team in Minneapolis, but They Have Good Music, were just a couple of titles that jumped out at me.

Rob Sheffield wrote in "Love is a Mix Tape": “The times you lived through, the people you shared those times with — nothing brings it all to life like an old mix tape. It does a better job of storing up memories than actual brain tissue can do. Every mix tape tells a story. Put them together, and they can add up to the story of a life.”  These days, most people think of hip-hop when they hear the term mix tapes, but when I reference a mix tapes, I am not talking about 2002's "50 Cent Is the Future", but of a moment in time like hearing BRAD's "The Day Brings" on my way to work.  In fact, I believe at some point in time I will hear every song that I ever placed on a mix tape in a different setting.

But do people still make mix tapes to capture those moments?  Or has the word mix tape been replaced by playlist?  DJs in certain instances are no longer using vinyl, but I know that bands are putting time and energy into the track listings of their albums.  In fact, according an interview with Billboard, Coldplay (who has countless popular singles) views itself as an “album act”.  What was once an obsession for the LP generation, sequencing, for the iPod generation is a dying art form.  Think of all the time put into selecting a wedding song or the mix tape you made for your girlfriend in 1999?


My co-worker Sean O once told me that he no longer has time to listen to new music, let alone seek it out.  However in my life, I am still finding new music or putting myself in a place to hear it.  So if I was making a mix tape in 2015 (on a 90 minute Maxell tape of course), I believe I have my first 45 minutes:

When We Were On Fire – James Bay

All the Pretty Girls - Kaleo

We Don’t Eat - James Vincent McMorrow

Comrade - Volcano Choir

Old Pine – Ben Howard

The Wolf - Mumford & Sons

Travis County - Gary Clark Jr.

From Eden - Hozier

Houston Train - Houndmouth

Rich Girl - Lake Street Dive

Hero - Family of the Year

*AUTHOR'S NOTE from June 25, 2015* - I am excited to read that the cassette is not lost on musicians either.  Not even 3 weeks after writing this entry, I read about Martin Sexton's new album - Mixtape of the Open Road!  I highly recommend starting with the song "Pine Away".