Comments on: Mixtapes vs. playlists

Mixtapes and playlists differ only in the technology that made them, or do they?

[soundman45]

I owned a Teac 3 head Cassette Deck in the late seventies/early eighties. Making mix tapes was simple with a 3 head deck. Unlike a two head deck you could listen to playback then toggle to input while you adjusted levels. It was all a matter of timing and practice.

[one_flat_monkey]

in the Seventies, i bought a Tascam Model 3 mixer and two Technics SL-1700 turntables, and made mix tapes that have segues just like FM radio in those days. i still have some of the tapes i made then. i had an Akai GXC -570D cassette deck. the list price was $850. it was sweet.

take a look: http://www.vintagecassette.com/Akai/GXC-570D.

i bought a Casio watch with a countdown timer. a 45 minute cassette tape actually has about 46:30, if you bought good Maxell tape. i set the timer and started recording/mixing. i could finish a complete two sided tape in less than two hours. normally, i would spend about 10 or 15 minutes picking out records before i started recording.

that was huge fun.

[Native5280]

In the '80s, I made mix tapes from CDs using my Pioneer 6-disc changer (remember the one that had cartridges?). I could program up 6 tracks with a pause between each track and record them to my Yamaha cassette deck (an "auto-reverse" model with a remote). In the late 1990s, I started making Minidiscs. MDs were way-cooler than cassettes because of the editing capabilities (moving tracks around, deleting tracks, inserting new ones, all in post-production on the disc itself!). I don't make mix tapes any more (I still have the Yamaha but I don't know if it's hooked up and the Sony MD deck died years ago), but I still make mix CDs.

The thing I didn't like about making CDs vs. making mix tapes (or mix MDs) was *where* the experience took place: in front of my computer instead of sitting down on the floor in front of the stereo. These days, I just use the built-in Superdrive on my Mac. True, it's much, much more convenient to program an iTunes playlist and click "Burn disc", but there's something, um..."human" missing from the process. Also, because the computer burns the CD at high speed, you don't get the pleasure of listening to the music as it's being recorded.

Every mix CD is a production. I buy ink-jet printable CDs and I create designs for the disc (I recently discovered "hub printable CDs" -- Whoohoo!). Sometimes I even create the CD case artwork. I suppose that makes up for the by-hand effort that went into the mix tape.

I don't make playlists for the sake of it being only a playlist. Every playlist I start is with the CD in mind, even if it doesn't end up on a CD. Making a CD is taking the music and committing it to physical media. You're telling the world "This is the album I created." Making a playlist is just making a list of songs. There's nothing keeping me from changing the list on a day to day basis. While that's find for casual listening, there collection of tracks is not enduring, not indelible.

And you really can't design artwork for a playlist.

[one_flat_monkey]

You can design artwork for a playlist. It's not necessarily original artwork: i've taken an image of a viking helmet and merged it with a pineapple in a photo editing program. Voila: Viking Pineapple. That's the name of my fake"production company". I've invented band names galore, and I've got a dumb DJ program that makes "dance" tracks. I'm really a novice, so the "music" is plagued by a degree of torpor rarely experienced in "music". As an aside, my nephew is in a band -- in Finland -- and he is a Sonic Forge genius. It's all diversion with varying degrees of obsessiveness. I can see your level of commitment to the creative process goes in a different direction from mine, but the levels aren't far apart, at least to my narrow view.

[tomsoundman]

Just talking the other day to a local recording studio owner about Mini Discs. That was a great medium for the time.
A few years ago, those players were used by a lot of Southern Gospel groups in Appalachia because of the ease of making "mix tapes" for playback of soundtracks to sing with.

Did have a friend with a small time video business that tried them out for recording audio feeds but he could never get the copyright stuff correct on his Sony player so he still reminds me of that time to time...

Good story, I got a little off track but I sure used to spend a lot of time in the 80's laboring over mix cassette tapes. My Pioneer system got a workout!

[Freeradical79]

"I made mix tapes from CDs using my Pioneer 6-disc changer (remember the one that had cartridges?"

Hahaha! Me too =) My folks bought a complete Pioneer system circa 1990 with CD-Synchro so you program away and then leave the deck to it. Combined with auto-sound leveling on the tape deck and auto-reverse. AND REMOTE! I remember it seemed like pure magic after the previous HiFi which was a manual mongrel system.

But I have such fond memories of sitting on the floor in the dining room (this was in the day when the TV and HiFi were very separate entities) with CDs and Vinyls all over the floor, balancing the recording levels and carefully cueing up tracks etc =)

I was still an avid mix-CD maker up until 2005. I would quite commonly make a mix-CD for friends of new music, or old tunes, or whatever =) I made one last week for a friends birthday (he is the only guy I know with no iPod etc) and he was thrilled. Now, the iPod/iTunes is so ubiquitous that we share playlists, via yousendit or something similar.

[one_flat_monkey]

Oh, by the way...did anyone buy those lousy Sony cassettes? I bought the best Maxell.

[pubmat]

Me too. Maxell, or the other guys....what was their name?

[Native5280]

I bought Sony tapes, including the obscure Type III (FeCr or something like that). As I recall, they were Type I (normal bias), Type II (Chrome, or high bias), Type III (FeCr?) and Type IV (metal).

I bought TDK tapes, too. And BASF. And Maxell. And Memorex. The most aesthetically pleasing (well, to my eye) were the the blue Memorex high bias tapes, but in in the end I stuck with TDK with the really wide clear tape-viewing-window. I'm sure there were other brands I tried, but I don't recall now. I bought "bricks" of cassettes for the best price. Always Type II (Chrom/high bias) for best quality.

I bought 90 minute tapes because you could put a whole album (vinyl, that is) on one side, plus one or two singles. 120 minute tapes were too thin (I once bought a 160 minute tape that broke).

[unimportant]

I swore by TDK tapes back in the day, but during college, friends held an intervention to ask me to never, never make a mixtape again. It turns out I was the only one who appreciated mixing African Soukous, thrash metal, and bebop/hiphop mashups on the same tape... I've lost the habit of making them now and imposing my odd sensibilities on friends seems rude to me these days. I've offered let people browse my iTunes and burn samples of whatever they want, but they just get nonplussed by the diversity and size of the collection. My days of friendly, fair-use sharing seem to be over.

[Native5280]

BTW, Thanks Steve for writing this article. It got me thinking about old mix tapes I made as a kid and this afternoon I searched around and found a few tapes that I mixed 30[!!] years ago. Not on Memorex, Sony or even TDK, but "Scotch". These were tapes from the decadent year of 1978 (and I was 15). Unfortunately, my 7 year old daughter told me she isn't interested in listening to the Bee Gees cover the Beatles, so I'll have to listen to them some other time.

One thing about mix tapes that probably doesn't apply to playlists is that tapes become time capsules for music. I was hoping to find a tape that actually had my voice on it (bonus points if it was one where I was playing DJ and introducing songs) but unfortunately I couldn't find one--I'm sure my daughter would have loved to hear what I sounded like when I was a kid.

[TheTurntableFactory]

I used to make "mixed tapes" for myself and my friends in the 80's. Yes, it was labour intensive, and I got sick of hearing the same songs over and over. But it was our way of sharing our interest in music at the time. I was still doing it in to the 90's, but by that time, it was easier for me to do as I was a DJ at a local radio station and would just tape my show off the air. I made a "mixed CD" for a DJ friend last Friday after MJ passed, it was several remixed MJ songs that I know are difficult to come by, plus one from Obsure FM. I still have my "mixed tape" collection, most of which have been transfered onto CDs so that I can listen to them in my car.

[Freeradical79]

Favourite tape? My Dad and I backed up all our high rotation LPs to TDK SA90s, and those tapes were strictly for playing on the "good" tape deck on the HiFi, not allowed in portables etc. They were usurped in 2001 when all the vinyls got backed up to mp3. Some of those tapes are still being played in my Mums decade old car.

For the boomboxes and car players we bought a box of Sony "walkman" brand tapes which were supposed to be more durable, heat resistant etc. But I remember finally reverting to Maxell tapes that you could buy in the local supermarket.

[minimalist]

I used to love mixed tapes. Its how my family and friends and I shared new music and became acquainted with new bands. There was something nice about the love and care that went into one of these that a shared playlist or a mixed CD just can't duplicate.

I don't have that kind of free time anymore. So even if I were to go back to the mix tape I'm not sure I'd get many of them made now. But they were certainly fun while they lasted.


Now I just find out about music in different ways (music review sites and good web radio stations being the primary methods).

[SprkJonz]

I make playlists and mix CDs, but I miss the mix tape medium and what it offered that playlists don't, including:
1) On a mix tape, I could easily fade out songs that ran too long. For a playlist, I'd have to copy the track, edit the file and then add it to the playlist
2) Mix tapes allowed for varied crossfades, depending on the need. Sure you can crossfade with some mp3 players, etc., but not with the freedom tapes offered
3) Mix tapes had A side and B side. This allowed for one mix tape theme with two completely separate song flows - kinda like two personalities on the same music story.
4) Mix tapes engaged the audience. For one thing, people recognized the hard work in creating a tape and would give it the deserved attention. Second, it was harder to skip songs on a tape so the audience would be captive, listening to the entire mix and appreciating the flow between songs.
5) Despite digital capabilities, back-ups, etc., it almost seems easier to lose or corrupt a playlist file than losing or destroying an audio cassette!
6) It's easier to hand a non-techie a mix tape than it is to copy digital tracks and a playlist and hope they can transfer it to their computer, walkman, etc.

[STARWOBBLE]

My old 1995 cirrus that I drove when I first turned 16 had a tape deck. I was too cheap to buy a tape deck converter for my 128 megabyte rio I had at the time, so I would build a playlist on my computer and run the audio out from the computer to the audio in on my sony boombox and record mp3 mix cd's that way.

[amfx22000]

Playlists are better. Mixtapes have the same inherent flaw that vinyl and cassette have: they need to be REALLY good. I'm never in the mood to cue up a vinyl I don't like front-to-back, and fast-forwarding through cassettes can be really annoying. With playlists, you can jump to the best song or two on your friend's ****** playlist. A mixtape from someone with bad taste... would be pure torture.