Thursday, May 10, 2007

The Demise of the Cassette Tape


Take me back to 1994: I'm 11 years old and I'm going through a shoebox of cassette tapes my siblings have for me to rummage through in our play room. That was all I needed on an afternoon indoors, a box of tapes and a cassette player (our beloved Robo-Disco) and I was set. My fingers were imprinted with little square shapes from pressing the rewind-stop-play buttons so many times and I didn't mind - this was music to me. This was how it was supposed to be, you and your cassettes.

Tapes were all we had, stacked in neat little piles with their boxes and tiny pictures of the artists whose music they blared on our players - they were cool. As school kids, we'd hop into whatever car and pull out our tapes from our book bags and pass them to the front seat. "Side A, first song" - I laugh now when I remember how many times I must have said "press play press play! I'll miss the song!" Oh my...

Then there were the cherished Mix-Tapes. Mix tapes were the coolest - if you got a mix-tape from someone, well, we all knew what that meant... I remember sticking stickers on mine to my girlfriends, spending hours trying to make the perfect tape with the perfect pauses between songs and well timed to fill a whole tape and not over run (such amateurs, whoever overran with their mix-tapes). Telling someone you'd make them a tape was a commitment, hours dedicated to producing something the perfect tape for someone. There was no imaginary database filled with music and a cutesy little program let you click all your choices onto a list and ta da, it all happened... oh no Sir, there was a shoebox filled with cassettes that you had to rummage though. If you were organized (which you never were), you'd have them all laid out infront of you, with a list of songs... Then you'd go through them, listening to each whole song before pausing, putting in another tape, pressing record & play and then rummaging for another... Kids nowadays probably laugh at our ghetto ways, but ghetto is that who does not know the tape, I say... Ghet-to...

But Alas, no more... No more tapes, we then took on MD players and CDs... and from CDs we moved on to the electronic age where mp3s and iPods and compact nice BOSE speakers for our MP3 players came about... and now no one punches "stop" or "play" on a stubborn button, we all pull out our super flash, super small and super sexy gadgets and twirl our fingers around to play 18 hours of non-stop music. Sorry Maxwell, your 90 minutes mean nothing anymore...

When was the last time anyone bought a tape? I can shamelessly tell you now that the last tape I bought was Norah Jones in the summer of 2003 from Dubai for my car (which did not have a CD player, "Ghetto" I hear you kids taunting!)... I don't know if that's what's funny or that I had to explain to a friend why I was buying a tape and not a CD (not so shamelessly, I tell ya)...

The last mix-tape I received? Now this I know for a FACT: Summer of 2001 from my good friend Mai - a tape that had Side A filled with cool music at the time (whatever dance/R&B was big) and then Side B which was filled with more geeky acoustic stuff for me (shameless, I am shameless!). The tape was, again, for my car when I first got my licence and the only tape I not only took with me to college, but I listened to that Side B for 3 years... Thanks Mimi, that tape you made for the Opel was far more valued than you thought it was...!

Last Tape I heard? Funny enough, walking around my flat a couple of weeks ago, I stopped when I heard a familiar click I haven't heard in a while... I turned to look at my flatmate, who was lounging on the couch reading a book, and asked her what it was... She merely muttered "Music", nodding her head towards the stereo system.


"Are you listening to a Tape?" I asked, astonished, as the music continued (It's one of those "smart" systems, as my flatmate calls it... the type that has a car-style 6-CD changer and flips tapes when it gets to the end of the side). I stopped in my tracks and in my fluffy house socks.

"Yup" nose still buried in her book.

"Really??!?!!" She put her book down and turned to me

"Yeah, really? Why?" She was confused and so was I. I shook my head and walked away... Who still listens to tapes?

Find out how to revive your old tapes here.

14 comments:

S said...

Yeh the death of the cassette tape is very nigh. I do miss the 'mix tape', spending all the time and effort trying to get that perfect mix.

You didn't want to put a wrong song in because you couldn't just swap it for another one like you can on modern playlists.

Still rewinding and fast forwarding did suck

Hasan said...

seroo,

I just KNEW this entry was bound to show up on your blog sooner or later. The last time I heard a cassette was in an OKINAWAN restaurant in Tokyo, two years ago. When I walked into the restaurant, the head-waitress (in her late 50s) said, "Hey! You look Portuguese! Just a second". She ran into the restroom and came out wearing belly dancing clothes and started dancing to a tape from the 80s of Amr Diab. When she realized that she "missed a step" in her routine, she apologized and RE-WINDED the tape to the beginning of the song only to do the whole routine again - this time with "no mistakes".

On the other hand, I do remember how the meaning of tapes in the ride to and from school with you changed over time in our highschool years. It was good in the first couple of years, where we tried to listen to what we thought was "cool" and acoustically "rebellious" music, but, when my sister joined the gang, and you two teamed up again me when you started going through that "CAN YOU PAY MY TELEPHONE BILLS!?" phase - and making us drive the LONG way - that was when I began to secretly wish for the demise of the cassette tape.

Woh. Hasan is one with the dark side in this comment ;)

Take care!

Anonymous said...

I miss the B-sides. They always had the stuff that I found so... personal.H

Munther said...

Interesting ! :) I have never thought of the last time I've bought, made or played a cassette, until now !

hmmm, last played would be 2001, got it from a friend as a special mix :) last tape I bought would be 1998 just before I graduated from high school :P

I can't believe that you bought a Nora Jones cassette ! Her 1st was produced in the mp3 age :D

Good post, cheers for the "Kickback to the 90s"

Seroo said...

BJ - a little bit of me does miss the time and effort put in trying to get that "perfect mix"... I used to bug my brother endlessly to make me mix-tapes with all the new cool music, which he never made me.. lucky for me, soon after I stopped whining he started making me CDs which I still listen to - some of them are even 5 years old at this point ("Classically Remembered" from The Boston Mixes 2002)... Rewinding and forwarding did suck, but I do miss carrying around a clunky walkman...

Hasan - I just thought of something: those 15 minutes in the car going home must have been torture for you... not only becuase you'd have to listen to that fantastic destiny's child tape your sister carried around with her like a vital organ, but because you probably had to go home and hear that tape over, and over again, blasting from her stereo at home...! no wonder I never minded it, all I ever got were 15 minutes!! :)

The story of the "belly dancer" is too funny, I think a Amr Diab tape from the 80's is a classic, did she play "Ice Cream fi December" by any chance...?

H - the B-Sides will always have the more personal stuff, high five for noting that done.

Munther - I'm proud of my Norah Jones purchase! I only remembered after reading that article on the BBC, I was surprised people actually were recycling tapes... I should try and do that when I'm back in Bahrain, if I can part with all my old chunky plastic tapes...

Hasan said...

seroo,

I don't think it was that "ice cream fi december" song (didn't that song come out in the 90s?); it was one of those Amr Diab songs before he hit puberty or something.. hehehe.. AH the HORROR.

Oh, and didn't the whole "torture by destiny's child" fiasco last LONGER than 15 minutes every time because of us having to go the "LONG" way back home?! ;)

You're right; what seemed an eternity to me (which may or may not have been longer than 15 minutes) during that drive back home listening to that stuff was torture! I still don't like that kind of music. :) hehehhehehe.. Every time I do accidentally hear some of that type of music blasting out of some store-front speakers in Tokyo (trying to attract young girls to shop in whatever store it was blasting out of), I can't help remember the "cassette tape" era.

Anonymous said...

i used to have a new tape in my boom box and whenever i'd hear a song i liked on the radio i'd hit record. is that weird?

Seroo said...

Hasoon - I don't remember when the Amr Diab song came out, although it must have been late 80's/early 90's - I know this only because it came out in his movie, Ice Cream fi December, and I went to the cinema in Cairo to watch it when it first came out. FACT: Ice Cream fi December was the first movie I ever saw in the cinema. Oh, and the "long way" only added an extra 3-4 minutes to our journey (enough time for one DC track!), but I'm sure those couple of minutes felt like a LIFETIME... =)

Faceless - Not weird, we all did it... worst thing was trying not to record Sami The Whammy or rewind even farther to Ahmed Al Khanna reading out a cheesy dedication. We all did it, we're all part of the same ashamed group of radio-bahrain-song-recorders. FACT: Ahmed Al Khanna now owns an arabic restaurant in England.

Aren't you guys learning so much from me today?! =)

SoulSearch said...

You guys just brought back a washload of memories. I loved that era, I loved my tapes. I still have them in an old shoebox in my apartment. It was amazing. My husband gave me a mixed tape before we got married, and that's how I knew he was the man I wanted to marry! And now we have 2 kids together!!!! Thats my love story, and all thanks to the wonderful idea of putting together a mixed tape.
Thanks for this wonderful post!

Love,
SoulSearch

Mo said...

Speaking of Ice Cream fi December, when he used to sing "Ice Cream fi December, Ice Cream fi Gleem".. did or does anyone what Gleem actually is? Is it like slime? Is it arabic slime?

Anonymous said...

Seroo: "Side A-first song" hahahhahahaah, i am still laughing! however, not sure if im laughing at the memory or its cheesyness!!

Hasan: I am so sorry about that dancer incident..my poor cousin traumatized

Mo: not only do i remember that song, but i remember going to the cinema in cairo to watch!!! and i think Gleem is supposed to be the name of the town in the movie :)

Reem said...

seroo.. such a great post!

got another idea for u...well.. one i got from one of ur replies... how about a post on ppl's first cinema experience? i remember mine was robin hood.. and the brian adams era :) oh the filipinas never let us hear the end of that... i swear.. his music was always on in the kitchen... he's now a SYMBOL of my childhood...

Seroo said...

soulsearch - your husband is very sweet, I hope you still have the tape somewhere (for sentimental value if nothing else!)... My fiancee has very random taste in music but he did make one particular CD that when I heard I went "hey, he's not so bad" =) He knows what I'm talking about, I bet he's eternally grateful for that CD!!!

Mo - Gleam, Gl-ee-m , (1) Town in the Nort Egyptian Coast, (2) Egyptian version of the common urban phrase "Bling". Hee! Why are we even debating this, let's ask Fadi!

Yarz - you remember that trip to Cairo with the two toothed man and the mangoes! Ah! You've got to love family vacations!

Reemee - you don't know how much that song is a symbol of my childhood, I named my toy mouse after Brian Adams and I still have him... :) I'll write about the cinema soon enough :) :) :)

Seroo said...

CONFIRMED: GLEAM IS A PLACE IN ALEXANDRIA THAT WAS FAMOUS FOR ITS ICE CREAM

 
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