How did you first learn of cassette tapes?

[Ammagamalin Crew]

It was in the early seventies riding with my older sister's boyfriend, Rob Kandell, in his VW bug, freezing of course, and he was playing Jethro Tull. It fascinated me that he was playing these ripping songs without having to rely on the radio selections. Good old Jethro Tull is some of my most favorite heart felt music. The cassettes were like a magic potion that brought in new, unheard music to my world, especially fun while in a car whipping around town.

[DesertDead]

Walking through Venture, also in the 70’s.

 

Good times….

[2muchfun]

Circa 1976…Roomate’s friend selling acid @ StonyBrook brought bunch of GD bootlegs. Think of all the tasty tapes…all pre 1976.

[Greg from Chestertown]

My first car, ‘72 Chevelle, I put in an eight track stereo. I’m not even sure if cassettes were around then or only the rich kids had cassette stereos.   my second car, I put in a Cassette stereo. After a couple years, it was pretty much all Dead bootlegs being played in that car. I still rock dead tapes in my truck now. CD player is broken. Don’t need to get it fixed. The console is full of a grab bag of cassettes. Volume knob is broken on high. I keep the windows down. 
….Let there be songs to fill the air. 

[Captain Zap]

Friends ... very good friends. I had an 8 track player in my 1970 MGB and that was quickly replaced with a cassette player when I was given a number of cassettes from shows I'd been to ... and many I hadn't.

Once I had the cassette player the music truly, never stopped.

[sandflea]

Wait, we can REWIND SONGS?!?!

[Tea]

 

Ow - my brain

[Milehighjoel.]

The maxell commercial. Then Tshirt on tour.  The one with roses coming out of speaker.  Guy in chair.   JK.  Tbh it was a mind blow to see dude w rows and rows of boots.  I'd never even thought about one band that many releases  etc.   

[John A]

Cassettes already existed when I came of musical age in the early 80s.  My parents had a little player to record speech with in the late 70s, perhaps my first interaction with the format.

 

In the mid/late 80s I had a Nak deck in my car.  Definitely my cassette high point. I remember visiting Boston and going to a friend of my girlfriend's apartment. He had a sweet bootleg collection and we were going to be driving somewhere in my car. I asked if we could take the tape we'd been listening to with us and he got all tweaky about bringing it into the car. No big deal - I value my collection too... when we got to the car he saw I had a Nak car deck and decided to run back in the apartment to grab the tape after all.  Street cred! 😆

[gr8fulpair]

To get a cherished show on a Maxell Gold was like a gift from heaven. I’d craft a special insert for it!!

[GoingBackTo Where....]

I don't recall.  My parents, younger.....had 8tracks and records.    They had kids, had less money for updated equipment for equipment now dominated by 2 little kids.  Most parents know kids take over parents time and stuff.  Dont buy anything new and nice unless you hide it from kids.  I took electronics apart all the time...since I knew the beauty of screw driver and the possibility of doing what those two kids did in the movie "Weird Science".   

 

The transition from 8track and vinyl to cassettes.   We had full vinyl of Grease, with the double inset.  We had Micheal Jackson's Thriller with similar double vinyl and inset of the album. Then it was just radio and church music as parents dropped me off at Treasure Island....Jerry Falwell's summer camp for poor southern baptist who needed cheap day/overnight care during summer while for their children while Jerry got to enlist young converts.  Oddly, it was not a few years later I found a piece of paper and listening to the Grateful Dead was the most religious experience to date. 

 

I guess the first cassette I received was from a girl who made me a mix tape in 5th grade.   Used my sisters player and she flipped--so mom bought me my own player.  6th grade, I hooked up with this older crowd.  6ft tall, I lied about my age from 11 to 15.  11 year olds are always surprised to see people do the things Nancy Reagan told us was horrible.  Well...Nancy, I found those Maxwell XL's and WOW------wow---I spent so much money on those tapes after finding a taper. 

 

My transition was hard and immediate.  Between girls making tapes, WOW, and finding the music that it works with----I found my musical destiny around 87---which would also be when I really found the magnetic lengths of the most expensive musical endeavor of me life. 

[GoingBackTo Where....]

On 9/6/2021 at 12:52 AM, John A said:

Cassettes already existed when I came of musical age in the early 80s.  My parents had a little player to record speech with in the late 70s, perhaps my first interaction with the format.

 

In the mid/late 80s I had a Nak deck in my car.  Definitely my cassette high point. I remember visiting Boston and going to a friend of my girlfriend's apartment. He had a sweet bootleg collection and we were going to be driving somewhere in my car. I asked if we could take the tape we'd been listening to with us and he got all tweaky about bringing it into the car. No big deal - I value my collection too... when we got to the car he saw I had a Nak car deck and decided to run back in the apartment to grab the tape after all.  Street cred! 😆

Damn---a Nak?   That was and maybe still is high tech.  Nak's were what my taper friend used.  Those decks were like shining gold in my eyes as a little rat.   Did not know they made them for cars back then.  I could see your friends reaction John.   You knew what his reaction would be when he declined your request to bring music.   I bet you had some anticipation about letting that guy into your car to see your system.  If you had a Nak, you spared the expense for quality speakers.   Assumption, but knowing your post and rep over the years---plus, you had a Nak in your car-----My guess you giggled inside when that guy saw your system and in a split second------felt embarrassed by turning your request down, and immediately forgot that embarrassment with excitement to see how his precious recordings would sound in your top end system.    I bet he got up to his apartment faster than he got down!!!!

 

Thanks for sharing that story----visualizing the story and human emotional reaction of your friend---i laughed my ass off-----

 

[Mango]

Nope. But i remember cds coming out.  It was like,  "wow you can skip tracks". Early sounds of a generation that will never be satisfied. And then the cds got scratched....

[Rude]

1st time I was at a buddys and his friends were in the other room listening to an audience show on tape. I thought it was so boring and how can you listen to low sound quality like that. I’d listened to Europe 72, live dead and skeletons from the closet 200x at this point but didn’t understand why anyone would listen to tapes like that. 

[Tom Banjo]

I think for later day heads like myself or whatever you want to call the star head generation it was archive.org that changed everything like the cassette tapes did for you guys.  I had some dick picks and some other live CDs and albums on CD but then someone told me about archive and I was like wow I can listen to pretty much every show they ever played for free.  I've since moved on the Relisten app but wow that was a game changer.

[Ammagamalin Crew]

sugarmegs.org is another great site for seeing original tapers of bands like The Doors, Rick Derringer, Pink Floyd and other non dead music and fun for keeping up with current bands repertories at shows. These connections to the original tapers was nearly impossible during tape trading days; however, today we are at an extremely pleasant place to listen to concert recordings of all genres

[Rude]

I used to download shows from there and burn them to CDs. That site was great. 

[Greg from Chestertown]

Back in the day, my buddy used to tend bar. A regular would drop tapes of shows on him. Usually shows they just played. I used to run a marina with a super busy boat ramp. A regular customer used to pay for his boat launch fee with a couple of cassettes of a recent show. I loved it when he came down to the river to go out on the water. He would walk up to me with his arm outstretched, a show in his hand, drop it in my hand. 

[Hardpan]

I caught the tail end of Grateful Dead cassette trading when I got into the music in 1997. I found rec.music.gdead, and people would offer up copies of shows for blanks and postage. My tapes are long gone, but those shows are among my most treasured and best known to this day, from back when the lightning was beginning to strike me. 

[Vic81]

It was fun to wait to hear your favorite song on the radio and hit record on a cassette. You  either caught bits and pieces of it or the radio disc jockey talking for 30 seconds before the song even came on and sometimes your jam wasn’t up next and you had to wait by the radio. My Walkman was always with me

Manhattan always had cool little tape places all over the city, if radio shack, Sam goody or tower records didn’t have it. 
 I have memories of older kids who put me on to the dead having tapes from trading, they would play in their cars or at parties And that’s where it all began for me…but for me from the 80s I remembering buying Guns and roses-appetite for destruction, some motley crew, beastie boys and I think def leapord. Cool times. 
 

I had alotta of music on cassette but now I take huge pride in my Dicks and Dave’s picks, road trips and  All the box sets and special releases that have come out on CD for the dead, It’s def my little hobby. We got slammed with water here in NYC with hurricane ida 2 weeks ago, my basement  got flooded really bad but you bet your ass my first priority was getting my bins of music to safe dry ground! Even my girl knew that was of major importance to get upstairs first. 
 

I need a fall east coast DSO tour…badly