It’s amazing what we take for granted that was unheard of just a few years ago.
The younger generation has no idea what rotary phones or party lines are. They are as foreign to them as 8-track tapes and black-and-white TV.
Most young people do not write letters. Instead they text, email or make a phone call on their cell phone.
Letter writing is a dying art. It started to go downhill during my generation and is almost unheard of.
I ran across an old letter the other day that had no zip code and no numeric street address. It was sent with 2-cents worth of postage. Imagine getting anything through the mail today without a specific street address or zip code.
Time marches on. What is new today will more than likely be replaced within a few years.
Take the music business for example. It’s gone from long-playing records to downloadable tunes over a period of 100 years, with most innovations occurring over the past 50 years.  I grew up listening to long-playing (LP) and 45-rpm records, and when 8-track tapes came out in my teen years, I thought nothing could be better. Not long after, cassette tapes made the bulky 8-track tapes obsolete.
Actually, the compact audiocassette, invented in 1962, was around before the 8-track tape, which was introduced for cars in 1964 and home players in 1968. Eventually the cassette overtook 8-track tapes in popularity and by 1988, no record clubs offered 8-track tapes.
Cassette tapes were around for many years before the next innovation, CDs (compact discs), came along. Nothing had revolutionized music as much, at least that’s what I thought.
CDs were actually invented way back in 1982 in Japan and not introduced in the U.S. until the following year. By 1985, LP sales had dropped 25 percent and in one more year, CD sales surpassed LP sales.
It’s becoming harder and harder to find a record player or record store.
The digital versatile disc (DVD) was introduced in 1996 and by 1999, its sound rivaled that of CDs. Another major innovation, the Motion Picture Expert Group Audio Layer III, or MP3 player, appeared on shelves in 1999.
In 2001, music DVDs were in record stores. That same year Apple Computer began selling its upgraded MP3 player, the iPod, which would change the music business once again.
When Apple introduced iTunes, the downloadable music market exploded. On Feb. 22, 2006, Apple sold its one-billionth song.
Most people born since 1985 have never played a record, an 8-track tape or even a cassette tape. CDs are still around, but most people in the younger generation prefer MP3 players with iPod at the top of the list.
A lot has happened in the world of music over the past 50 years, which is pale in comparison to what has happened in the world of television over the same time period.
Many things that we think are irreplaceable and indispensable will become obsolete before we actually figure out how to use them.

My German friend recently sent me an intriguingly wrapped tape, as I am the Kassettemädchen – Cassette Girl. (My boyfriend has referred to me thusly more or less since we met.)

And inside?!

Tracks from Kraftwerk, Rheingold, Fehlfarben, Profil, Spider Murphy Gang, Grauzone, and Bernward Büker Bande.

Rheingold – “Computerbeat”

Rheingold – Computerbeat

Hello all! Today is Thursday and we have only 1 day until TGIF! I know a lot of you were happy at that thought! So here we go with today’s question.  When my generation was growing up, we listened to mostly records and cassette tapes. Originally we would get that favorite album out put it on the record turntable set the needle, sometimes placing a quarter on the needle so it wouldn’t skip and listen to good music.   Then came the advent of the cassette tape. Man, we’d get some blank tapes and sometimes tape the radio because we wanted to hear our favorite songs over and over again or a certain mix from DJ Red Alert or DJ Kid Capri especially if we didn’t have our own copies of the songs. Exclusives were really exclusive back then also because we couldn’t go and download them back then. As a matter of fact the internet was almost never heard of during those times. There even was a trend amongst people in the hood who used to put tissue or tape over the top corners of a cassette to dub over a tape that they no longer wanted to listen to or just simply didn’t like. LOL We sure can be creative! LOL As in the words of the late great Notorious B.I.G. “we let our tapes rock until our tapes popped!”. Then came the internet takeover, we no longer had to wait for songs to come out because with a certain file sharing program we could simply download the song if we had the right search string and even more so with the invention of the MP3 player, such as the Ipod, Zune and many others, we no longer had to have a physical copy of the song.  This has led to lower record sales and tightened the profit margin of many record companies, publishing companies and royalty management companies . This trend has affected artists both new and old. So my question for you today is do you think with the state of technology and its potential for advancement, that we will eventually wipe out the need for record companies because of insatiable appetite for new music?  As always comments are deeply appreciated.

What music was available on my recent Icelandair flight? Yes, under a logo of the great Moz, you could click to listen to Morrissey himself, of course, Björk, Sigur Ros, or some other stuff – Akon or whatever. Damn, budget airlines, way to be unintentionally (sort of) hip!

“America Is Not the World”

“We Hate It When Our Friends Become Successful”

(Apologies if you see this twice; it won’t happen often.)

I’ve been making what I call a Christmas mix — that is, not holiday songs but a mix made at the holidays — since 1997; first they were tapes, then for a few years cds, and finally, in the digital age, the last five years have been downloadable zip files, and this year is no exception. These are songs — not primarily but not necessarily released in 2009 — that meant something to me this year, for various reasons, and they are for you. The whole shebang is available as a zip file [here] (90MB, .zip).

Happy holidays, happy 2009, happy music sharing — whatever floats your boat. This is from me to you. 2009 was basically a year of one step forward, two enormous punches in the face back, but despite all that, I was pretty fucking happy. So.

1. [The Duke & the King -- "If You Ever Get Famous"] if you ever get famous, don’t forget about me
2. [AA Bondy -- "Among The Pines"] and every time i leave the south/a word it stumbles from my mouth/amen, amen
3. [Fall Out Boy -- "Disloyal Order Of Water Buffaloes"] so boycott love/detox just to retox
4. [Jason Isbell & the 400 Unit -- "Good"] i can’t make myself be good/i wish i could
5. [The Whitlams -- "I Was Alive"] the night i met you, you were a fucking disgrace/tripping over people, falling flat on your face/i thought i’d dance with you ‘cause you wouldn’t remember/a year ago now yeah that was the end of december
6. [The Old Ceremony -- "Til My Voice Is Gone"] and i will sing my tune until my voice is gone
7. [Frightened Rabbit -- "My Backwards Walk"] i’m working on my faults and cracks/filling in the blanks and gaps/and when i write them out they don’t make sense/i need you to pencil in the rest
8. [Great Lake Swimmers -- "Still"] i’m still loaded and waiting with anticipation to fly/i’m still studying the patterns in the night sky
9. [Sea Wolf -- "I Made A Resolution"] well i woke up this morning/and i made a resolution/i said “never going to sing another sad song again.”
10. [Micah Schnabel -- "Throwing Rocks At the Sun"] i’d like to stay until your party is over/til the drinks and the girls are all done/but i stayed up too late in every town and every state/and i’ve thrown all my rocks at the sun
11. [M. Ward -- "Stars Of Leo"] so i tried to surround myself with real love/you know, the kind that make them wheels go ’round/i get so low i need a little pick-me-up/i get so high i need a bring-me-down
12. [Lost In The Trees -- "Love On My Side"] i got love songs, i got songs that make you cry
13. [the Avett Brothers -- "Kick Drum Heart"] my my heart like a kick drum
14. [Red Collar -- "Used Guitars"] i used to reach for stars/now i sell these used guitars
15. [Jones Street Station -- "Front Door"] leave the front door ’cause i’m comin’ over with stories to tell
16. [John Paul Keith & the One Four Fives -- "Rock And Roll Will Break Your Heart"] but rock and roll will break your heart
17. [Slobberbone -- "Back"] when i find my way back, no one will deny/how much i care for them and how hard that i’ve tried/when i find my way back, you will know it by and by/that all the hype was justified

MP3s are for sampling purposes only; if you enjoy what you hear, please support the artists by purchasing their music. Files are available for a limited time only. If you represent an artist or a label and would prefer that I remove a link to an mp3, please email me at asdonkar at gmail dot com and I will immediately remove the file.

Liz was either REALLY into Radiohead when she made this tape or really angry. She can’t remember.

“Everything In Its Right Place”

In high school, when everyone was going through a hardcore Radiohead phase (I graduated in 2001 and had cut my teeth on OK Computer my freshman year, Kid A came out in 2000 and Amnesiac in 2001), some friends of mine had a discussion about what the “two colors” in Tom’s head might be. Teenagers are strange.

Memory Tapes’ Remix of Yeasayer’s “Ambling Alp”

The word that Mrs. Bronson is unable to put into the hot, still, sodden air is “doomed,” because the people you’ve just seen have been handed a death sentence.

One month ago, the Earth suddenly changed its elliptical orbit and in doing so began to follow a path which gradually, moment by moment, day by day, took it closer to the sun. And all of man’s little devices to stir up the air are now no longer luxuries – they happen to be pitiful and panicky keys to survival. The time is five minutes to twelve, midnight. There is no more darkness. The place is New York City and this is the eve of the end, because even at midnight it’s high noon, the hottest day in history, and you’re about to spend it in the Twilight Zone.

I think a giant kid with a magnifying glass came and melted my Sly and the Family Stone tape – it was the only one in the car that suffered. Or maybe the sun is just racist.

“Hot Fun in the Summertime” (I know it’s not from “Stand!” but I can’t help myself.)

“Everyday People”

This is just my favorite tape of all. It was a present, and while $2.99 is a ridiculous price for a tape, it was worth every penny. One of the best concept albums ever made. The Rabelaisian “Singapore “… hints of Thomas Pynchonian drug journeys on boats, makes me want to blow lines of sea salt and dance a jig with Captain Ahab.

“Singapore”

Annie Lennox’s album “Medusa” was the first CD I ever owned – I bought it around 13 or so after I had given up my long love for country. (I met Garth Brooks! Yeeha!) Her version of Procol Harem’s “Whiter Shade of Pale” is great. If found this tape at Savers and it’s mostly been a recent listen in my car, over the summer when I was driving back and forth to Maryland and feeling sad about my college years in Baltimore. Driving past the Ottobar, shedding a single tear, etc. etc. I thought about nights getting wasted on rail gin and tonics upstairs and playing pool with old townies, while the DJ played The Rapture. Sigh.

“A Whiter Shade of Pale”

Back in the early 90s, we were introduced to the magical world of “cyberspace,” a place where you could chat with friends, check “electronic mail,” and even talk to strangers.  “Going on cyberspace” was like copulating with a pack of unicorns — no one had ever done it before, so everyone wanted to know what it was like:  How does it feel?  How does it work?  How can I get a screechy dial-up modem too?

But once cyberspace became mainstream, its better half decided that it would take on a whole new meaning.  In the seedy dark corners of AOL chatrooms, “cyber” lost its innocence.  With this transformation, thousands of curious 13-year olds were lured into predatory situations with creeps who wanted to “cyber”… Yes, like any rogue prefix-turned-slutty-verb, “cyber” became a term of virtual copulation.

So, forgive me for not embracing “Cyber Monday” as a new retail holiday.  To me, it’s as if retailers decided to name a random day “Boom Boom Tuesday” or “Bang Me Wednesday,” then offer 30% off all items in stock.  Sorry, but that doesn’t make me want to buy Ginsu knives, even if they’re 43% off on Amazon.  In fact, I feel less inclined to shop on Cyber Monday, and more inclined to join shady chatroom discussions about Grady Sizemore.

I am surprised that conservative watchdog groups haven’t boycotted “Cyber Monday” yet for its underlying sexual innuendo.  Perhaps they’re too busy snapping up Sarah Palin’s book on eBay… or maybe these “teabaggers” just don’t get the reference.

In the end, there are so many words in the English language that we’ve allowed to die an honorable death, like “beeswax” and “cassette tapes” and “groovy” (although this may still be used to describe Hideki Matsui’s face).  Had it not been for this inane Monday, “cyber” would be with them now.  I would like to call for an end to using this word (though, really, it’s a prefix), and retire “cyber” to Cyberia (apologies).  Let’s just call “Cyber Monday” for what it really is: “Virtual Deals… Monday.”

The A5 bag cassettes that Slaughter Prod. released in the 90’s were such a pleasure.  It’s a simple, but interesting, presentation, and I was always really fond of them. The fact that there were very few (if any) disappointments in the ones I got my hands on doesn’t hurt.

I found a stash of these in a couple of crates I haven’t dipped into in ages.  Tonight I got  “Fac-Totum” and “Omega” from Die Sonne Satan and “Exile” from Drift burned into the computer. I had forgotten about Drift entirely, it was a Dark Ambient side project of the man behind Dead Body Love and Discordance. Good stuff. I don’t think that project ever had CD release or collection from any of the cassettes come out.

Slaughter Prod. was a label I had hoped to do something for at some point. These cassette releases, and  “Death Odors” series were among some of my favorite releases back then. There is a tone and mood that is captured in a lot of that material that is so definitive for how I view Dark Ambient and Death Industrial. It was a special label, and Marco Corbelli was always a good person to deal with. He’s gone now unfortunately, but aside from his own music in Atrax Morgue and Morder Machine etc. he left a brilliant capsule of dark electronics with the releases on Slaughter Prod.

I never liked the cassette tape.  I thought it sounded inferior to vinyl, I hated the artwork and tiny liner notes, I hated how the print on the cassette would smear and smudge, I hated how repeated listens would create flat spots in the sound, and I hated the re-winding and fast- forwarding.  However, I loved the ability to make a mix of songs known and unknown for friends.  I can remember spending hours putting together the collection of songs to approximate 45 min. per side and the need to improvise when there was 1 minute and 25 sec. at the end of side one.  (Pigs on the Wing by Pink Floyd was the perfect ending song and ended up on many tapes.)  Receiving a mix tape from someone implied a kind of intimacy, care and concern and is something I cherished.  Seeing the individual’s handwriting or cut and paste artwork each time I listened to the tape reminded me that they had spent time carefully selecting and creating the listening experience just for me.  CD’s eventually replaced cassettes but retained the possibility to create a mix of songs with intent for the listener and thought for the push and pull of songs.

With the rise of the ipod has come the rise of the playlist.  I have begun to adjust to how the ipod shifts my attention to the single.  However, putting together a playlist maintains neither the permanence or the intimacy of the mix tape.  With upwards of 10,000 songs on an ipod I find too often that songs get lost or that I do not listen as carefully as I used to.

Posted in this entry is a 30 minute podcast.  It is a “mix-tape”.  I have chosen a handful of songs to listen to carefully.  My selection process was arbitrary; I liked they way these songs fit together.  I will post other mix tapes in the future and will try to build them around themes and sounds.  They will be short so that you too will be able to listen to them in a single sitting.

Listen:

Download: Education of the Bored

The Dead Weather

Treat Me Like Your Mother

Jack White can do no wrong.  This is his most recent band and it is another barn burner.  It sounds like the ’70’s hard rock that I first heard from KISW in Seattle and KGON in Portland.

The Frogs

I’ve Got Drugs

Took this off an old mix-tape that a friend gave to me to digitize.  They’re weird.

Romantica

The National Side

I don’t remember how I stumbled upon these guys, but this is a beautiful song from an unbelievably strong album.  It is cohesive, mysterious, and works its way deep into your consciousness.

The Hold Steady

Massive Nights

Rock-n-Roll still lives.  A couple of guys, some beer, some sweat, and some attitude combine to create something transcendent.

Paul Westerberg

Bored of Edukation

Speaking of rock and roll transcendence, Paul Westerberg and the Replacements were a group of guys that combined beer and attitude in the ’80’s.  Today Westerberg remains one of America’s best songwriters.  He records his songs in a basement in Minneapolis and releases them from time to time on the internet.

The Hold Steady

Stuck Between Stations (Acoustic Version)

She was a real cool kisser and she wasn’t that strict of a Christian/She was a damn good dancer but she wasn’t that great of a Girlfriend

That is one of my favorite lines from a rock song.  I remember her.

Eric Bachmann

Man ‘O War

I have seen this man perform twice.  He was terrible.  Twice.  However, he played several songs that would not leave my head for several days after the show.  This is one of them.  It might make you cry.

Star Wars Movie Poster

Today there is only one first run movie theatre chain in the whole of Canada, so even the most successful movies only play for a matter of weeks.

But back in the 1970’s there was still competition among Canadian movie theatres so Star Wars actually played on Canadian movie screens for over a year. When the first Star Wars movie was released I was so caught up in it that I ended up going out to see it in a variety of movie theatres thirteen times during that first year.

I am a huge Star Wars fan.

I bought all the Star Wars merchandise that I could afford. In those days there were no DVDs or downloads. VCRs had just come on the market and they were prohibitively expensive.

So at first those of us who were not indescribably wealthy had to content ourselves with purchasing vinyl record albums that ran at 33 1/3rd rpm on an old fashioned machine called a record player. I bought the music in the form of the John Williams Star Wars soundtrack album, as well as a record called “The Story of Star Wars”, a synopsis of the story narrated by C3PO with audio clips from the film. To this day any time I hear the 20th Century Fox music tag I flash on the “real” Star Wars opening.

And today the George Lucas’s Star Wars empire continues to make money in new ways. I don’t have a problem with that. It is a business after all.

I still love Star Wars, particularly the first one. And this article in no way intends any disrespect. I’m telling you about my connection with Star Wars because the incredible success that Star Wars had makes it a good example. That, and because Star Wars was the very first videotape movie I saw played on a VCR in a private home.

What I really want to do today (besides procrastinate from working on my NaNoWriMo novel) is to look at personal use copying as a copyright infringement issue.

The Copyright Lobby makes no distinction between commercial bootleggers who distribute illegal copies for profit and legal purchasers who seek to make a back-up copy or digital format shift for personal use. Because they insist it is all the same thing, the Copyright Lobby has been pressuring governments the world over in an attempt to criminalize personal use copying.

I think there is a problem with the terminology here because calling both things by the same name is horribly misleading. Both activities involve digital copying, but that is where the similarity ends. Just as apples and oranges are both fruit but they are really not the same at all.

apples and oranges

One thing the Copyright Lobby calls “piracy” would be more accurately called “Bootlegging”. Bootleg music recordings have been around as long as audio recording technology has existed. People have smuggled recording devices into concerts and made copies which they have then sold around the world. There have also been professional bootleggers who have copied recorded music and repackaged it to sell illegally. These activities have resulted in lost revenue for music distributors, and in fact should be illegal.

The other thing the Copyright Lobby calls “piracy” is what I call “Personal use copying”. This covers a much wider range of activities, but the chief defining factor of personal use copying is the fact that this digital copying is not for profit. Rather than resulting in lost revenue for distributors, personal use copying relieves the burden of format shifting from the manufacturer to the consumer. When shared through p2p networks personal use copying serves as a means of promoting these commercial products in the same way that radio and television broadcasts have done under the traditional business model. This type of copying should be legal.

The Copyright Lobby’s effort to criminalize this type of copying simply alienates the customer base. Like DRM or SOC methods, it does absolutely nothing to stem the flow of bootlegging.

When did the idea of ownership change?

It used to be that when you bought something you owned it. You were free to do with it what you liked. Even if it was something covered under copyright law… like a book, you were entitled to read that book as many times as you wanted to.

• You could loan it to a friend.
• You could quote from it in an essay
• You could read it aloud to your blind grandmother.

And at the end of the day it was still your book. Unless you decided you no longer wanted it, at which time you could legally sell it to a used book store.

Now lets look at what’s been happening so far in the information age. Manufacturers of recorded music and movies have their materials covered under copyright. They want us to not make copies for our own personal use, even though we have paid them the price they ask.

Personal use copying is not the same thing as bootlegging for commercial gain.

The Problem

Original Star Wars Betamax videotape

If you purchased Star Wars in the Sony Betamax version back then, you would have found yourself out of luck a few short years later when Sony stopped making Betamax VCRs. When your Betamax machine became inoperable, you could no longer buy a new one, which of course rendered the tape you purchased in good faith unplayable. No one warned the unfortunate consumers that invested in Betamax tapes and Betamax equipment. I never heard of anyone getting refunds from the movie companies. Or the MPAA. Or Sony. Etc.

Star Wars on VHS

But.

Now you can’t. So what do you do if you really loved Star Wars?

You go out and buy it again. This time on VHS.

The rest of your life, eh? I know that’s what I thought. Didn’t you?

Did Twentieth Century Fox ever offer to reimburse you for the useless hunk of plastic and tape (that you have now purchased twice for your own use) that is now deteriorating? And suddenly it’s near impossible to buy a new VHS machine because there is yet another new technology– now movies are on DVD. Even if you can find a new VHS machine, we’ve all learned that a VCR will be lucky to last for five years anyway. And of course the VCRs you can find now are far more expensive than DVD players. So what’s a fan to do. Oh right.

You go out and buy Star Wars again on DVD.

Star Wars on DVD

[Of course, this particular example is extra irritating because George Lucas hasn't stopped tinkering with the thing, and since he's vowed to never release the REAL version (the one that actually played in theatres in 1977) on DVD, so I will never have the version I want no matter how many times I've paid for it. *sigh*]

But you’re a fan.

So you go out and buy the movie AGAIN on DVD.

At least you have it in a form that will last.

Now HD is gone too.

Or not.

Because then along came HD DVD.  The media manufacturers were a little surprised that we didn’t all rush out and buy HD machines.

Replacing our entire video library. AGAIN.

Oh… you were one of those suckers who got conned into converting to bought into HD? Ooooops!  Didn’t anyone tell you that the technology you were supposed to back was Blu-Ray?

I could go through the same process to look at the parallels in the music industry: piano rolls, gramophone cylinders, ’78’s, LPs, 8 track tapes, cassette tapes and CDS… all over the course of a single century.

Funny, I have a working gramophone older than I am which will play ’78’s. Yet our modern day electronic equipment will be doing well to work after a decade.

I don’t know about you but I am tired of buying the same movies over and over again.

Copyright is an agreement between the creator/manufacturer and the consumer.

The media distributors have NOT kept their part of the bargain, expecting consumers to pay for the same material over and over again. It should be legal to be able to watch the movie you have purchased in good faith as many times as we want to, for the rest of our lives.

Consumers have not been given any protection by governments the world over.

At the very minimum customers need to be given the right to copy the products they have purchased onto the piece of technology needed to play it.

We believe we own what we have purchased.
They want us to believe that we don’t.

Fortunately our government representatives are in an excellent position to look out for the Canadian consumer interests as they redraft our copyright law for the benefit of Canadians.

Add-2 hails outta Chi Town to bring us a remembrance record on the days before compact discs. Production by Mydus from MIA.

Click to listen or download track

I fell a little late on this but Add-2 dropped a new joint last week titled Cassette Tapes produced by Mydus.  I don’t think I need to say anything but this is definitely a real cool joint.  I can’t say enough about how nice Add is.  Every joint he just progressing and raising the bar.  Check out Cassette Tapes.  There are too many quotables in this shit.  Real smooth beat too.  Shout out to Mydus

Add-2-Cassette Tapes

Intricate, upcycled sculptures using altered, twisted cassette tapes.

Created by Atlanta-based artist Brian Dettmer.

via

A trip 2 back when cassette walkman’s ruled. Aussie artist’s Andrew Smart and Jared Schmidt have created large scale hand-made wooden cassette tapes, routed, sanded, bogged, primed, and painted with quality a paint finish. check out their site HERE.

More looks after the jump.

Remember the 8 Track?  This box of tapes in the trash caught my eye.  Does anyone listen to cassette tapes anymore?

Wonder who owned these and just pitched them on the street?

Whats better than helping the environment, and helping you look fly as fuck? not much… Sonic Fabric with the help of her trusty designer friend Julio Cesar have created this wonderful idea using 0% recorded audio cassette tape and 50% colored thread and is meant to actually play audio if a tape-head is run over it (sample of the audio it will play?) all that aside they look pretty fly and come in three color options being brown, black and grey grab one today from HERE.

Hit the jump below to see some cats wearing them.

(not actual cats, ya digg?)

Now why didn’t I think of turning my old tapes into cool art? Hmm…well no worries, I think i just got an idea as to what I can do with my mountain of magazines back home! Ahh i love it, Imagine a giant paper  skeleton left standing in the recycling bin! I would love to see the reaction of the recycling truck man who by the way for some reason left all those magazine bags i left for them to pick up during this past hot summer.  Was it because it got too heavy for you? or because I broke some recycling bin code when i put 5 bags instead of 2 or what?   I’m just saying I haven’t forgotten that episode and I’m still upset!  It was a lot of hard work slaving away in the garage and getting tortured by spiders and other nasty insects that seemed to be all into reading all of a sudden okay.  And seriously spiders, what’s wrong with you?  Do you think I’m Little Miss Muffet and you will just frighten me away? Okay I was frightened a little bit when one of you decided to read along with me while I had the pile of magazine in my lap. Man, all those magazines up in the air was a huge mess, so thanks a lot spiders!

Going back to the old tapes, here is an example of the cool cassette tape art from artist Brian Dettmer.

Brian Dettmer: Cassette Tape Skeletons

You can check out the whole series at the following designboom’s site link

Brian Dettmer: Cassette Tape Skeletons

What do you guys think?

My tea for the moment:  I normally enjoy floral flavored teas but today I’m trying out Wild Raspberry (Caffeine Free) herbal tea from STASH. Wow this is a perfect mix, skeletons and red color tea! How nice, but seriously I don’t think I care for berry flavor teas, it’s a little too sour for me. But I’m not giving up yet or at least until I finish this whole sampler box I just got!

Yesterday, one of my friends on Facebook mentioned having an album of music by a certain performer.  She explained that she was talking about an LP (Long Playing) record.  I commented that my wife’s kindergarten kids saw her use them in class a while back and called them “big black CDs.”  I don’t think she’s used one of those big black CDs in her classroom for several years.  Later in the day, I was picking up a few things at a drug store and walked by the aisle that has blank CDs and such.  It occurred to me to wonder if you can now buy a blank cassette tape.  The drug store sure didn’t have any.  I’ve still got tons of them around the house and a couple of machines that will still play them, although we rarely do.

All that made me recall when was the first time I saw some technology out in the wild that began the evolution away from records.  I remember when I was in high school at South Iredell (or was it Troutman?) one of the kids turned up with a little bitty battery powered reel- to- reel tape recorder.  He had recorded music off of the radio so he could carry the “little” machine (about the size of a hard back book) around and impress his friends with it.  It really did impress his friends!  For a little while, these little recorders were somewhat popular.  Then came 8 track tapes in the big cassettes that would play a whole album.  I even knew a guy who had an 8 track player installed in his car.  Talk about a babe magnet! 

Eventually the tape technology morphed into cassette tapes that could hold a considerable amount of music, at least until the tape started stretching or the little rubber bands inside the tape players started slipping.  Now we’ve got tiny memory chips that hold hundreds of songs and have no moving parts.  Amazing!   Back in my youth, putting that sound on tape and making it portable was amazing.  We wouldn’t even imagine the technology we’ve got today.

If you ever think something can’t be done as far as the gadget world goes, just take a bit of time to think of what’s happened just in your lifetime, not to mention your parents’ or grandparents’ lifetime.  Amazing!

I lament the demise of cassette tapes as an acceptable form of music-listening and the subsequent obsolescence of car tape decks. And while I don’t condone melting your tapes, if there’s a coolest way to do it, this guy Brian Dettmer has got it down. Not only is this awesome skull sculpted from old cassettes, it includes recordings from such hard rock luminaries as Motley Crüe and Judas Priest.

Dettmer also seems to appreciate encyclopedias and science reference books as much as I do, if much more creatively. How dope is this “altered book” piece entitled Science in the Twentieth Century:

Click the photo above for more tome-manipulations, and check out Designboom for more awesome cassette tape artifacts, including a ram skull and a full skeleton.

[via Apartment Therapy New York]

Brian Dettmer’s concept for dead media came to him as he walked down the street and saw a dead bird in the road. He thought about how it used to fly and live, he made the association to dead media today. With the dying trend of cassette tapes he wanted to combine the ideas. Here’s what he came up with… pretty dead on (bad pun). You can find more of his work on website.