Adieu, Audiocassette.

Someone is actually saying that cassettes are on the way out. Yesterday. Not 10 years ago. In 2006. Really. I think we have all seen this coming for a long while, yet oh, the memories. My first cassette was Michael Jackson’s Thriller in 1984. My last cassette was Duran Duran 2 (The Wedding Album) in 1993. Not quite 10 years, but the formative years of my independent developing music tastes. Bon Jovi, Keith Sweat, De La Soul, Anthrax, King's X, Seal, Stevie Ray Vaughan, Stanley Jordan, Fugazi, the Chili Peppers…

Oh, the memories and the eaten tapes: The dull, warbled sound and magnetized heads.

Long before I worked at Allsop, I owned several of our audio headcleaners. I only used them when it was too late, for example: after my Subaru stereo ate my Queen Night at the Opera tape. But I used them. And you should, too. I’m sure like me, you have a library of old cassettes. Mine is some 300 tapes strong. They are in these great wall-hanging wood shelves, stuck together, wrapped I duct tape and stuffed in the back of a closet. But they cover a very important time in my musical development. Keep your tapes. And keep a cassette deck cleaner with them. Because when treated correctly, your tapes will always sound just as dull and warbled, but they won’t get eaten by your wretched cassette player.