great article on cassettes

npr article on tapes

got sent this link. great article. new stuff to forage through. have fun.

recent LA trip

so i went to LA to make a new record at my friend's place at the village.
article about the studio
it was a great place and we had fun. however, i kinda wanted to put my mixes on cassette.  and they weren't able to find a working deck in the place and no one had one.  last time i make a record without taking my own jambox, haha.  anyways.  so they had this room, where all the old tape machines went to die i guess, and i got to walk around in there.  i shot a movie on my phone, if you ever run into me somewhere i'll show it to you.  it's amazing. i did find this panasonic deck in there.  here's  a pic.

which was a pretty cool looking unit.  it was on a shelf in a storage room. all across the world there are stacks of cool gear like this waiting to be repurposed. let me know what you find.

scotch tapes

link to scotch tapes

this is a pretty cool site to poke around on.

if you needed a cool jam box, this is one.

decent jam box to buy

this would probably be a pretty good one. i just found it on etsy. it's a good price, and that's a pretty cool unit. i have a few of that series and they are pretty nice. it's not super-collectable or anything, but they are built pretty good and they'll crank. battery life is pretty good and they make kind of cool live recordings as well. someone should snatch this one up.

boombox project segment on cbs sunday morning

video

some cool boxes. not so sure about the narrative. but cool units.

sanyo ms 560 jam box

i got this for 85 bucks including shipping from this guy i know in nyc. it's a really cool balance between size and sound. small, but jukes pretty good. one thing i really like about this unit is the switches are all real nice and solid feeling. the five band graphic is pretty handy.  rca ins. real solid little design and sounds good. it sounds crisp and tight. full range except for the super low, on account of the speaker surface area, but still a really nice unit. it's a three piece but i never use that feature i like the focused sound of just the box itself. tape transport works perfectly. obviously you can see the soft touch buttons. only thing is the receptor plug for the wall wart is loose, so i'm just running it on batteries right now. i'm thinking that i have a different plug somewhere that might have a slightly larger barrel and would hold in there better. may have to replace that, just jamming on batteries now. also, the dude sent this badass mixtape with the unit, the first song is planet rock that old song, and then a whole tape of stuff like that, haha!
great car, hotel unit.

list of 101 cassette labels and assorted other cool links

101 cassette lables


"In the age of GarageBand, Myspace, and file sharing, it may come as a surprise to some that cassette labels are still very much in operation. Tapes now function as a basic form of patronage between musicians and their audience; since a physical format is no longer necessary to send or receive music, these objects become a gesture of support. Tapes act to make tangible the connection between a creator and their listeners, and the attentive and often handmade packaging speaks to this exchange."


this will take you hours to go through.  there is more cool new music being done right now than a person can even keep up with.  and it's not expensive to get.  what else can a music lover do but simply dive in, find cool stuff, and inform their friends of the best stuff?  music is badass. 

free gift for you

the first five folks that write to me on danny barnes will get a free mixtape.  thank you for reading this blog and thank you for being interested in tapes. include your physical address, domestic only.
danny barnes

article about a new cassette label in pitchfork

link to article

there are some pretty interesting links buried in that article.
and some pretty hep tracks to stream.
link to the label discussed here

an article about plustapes

link to article about plustapes


"Listening to a tape is different than listening to a CD. Big time. ‘Cause you can’t really fast forward. So listening to a tape is an all or nothing sort of experience. I find a lot of times when I’m listening to tapes, I actually have a walkman input in my car now. I would just leave the tape on and let it flip, and keep listening to it. So you get this kind of circular listening experience. And it’s the same thing with vinyl where you have to get up, flip a side, and you’re not just gonna listen to one track and get up again. No, you just listen to a side. The same thing with tape, where you can give pp - it’s almost like a mini show. They’re listening to a whole side, whereas CDs, 'No, I don’t like this song, this song blows, blip blip blip, OK I’ll listen to this song again. 'You don’t do that with tapes. Yeah you may not like the middle part, but you’re still there and you’re in it, and that’s awesome," Drase concluded.