Cassettes….why ?

HiFiMART Newsletter
sandeepss said:
Most of my cassettes used to warp and disintegrate very fast. I don’t know if it was due to the fact I was staying close to beaches all the time during that period (Goa, Lakshawdeep, Mangalore etc)
Click to expand...
Some of my cassettes (the tape inside) warped because I used to play them too much :p.
 
skroderider said:
Some of my cassettes (the tape inside) warped because I used to play them too much :p.
Click to expand...
:D That's true. There was one track on "Sadma" cassette (the one with the silly lyrics :) ) which I used to fast forward, and never used to play. After a few years, that was the only track playing in pristine quality :)
 
Music Freak said:
Hi!

I get your curiosity. You've rightly listed the usual factors that lead us to the Cassettes. Apart from that, there are a couple of cool things.

If you find your favorite digital music bright/harsh to your ears, then, you can record the same the way you prefer on a "quality" tape using a top quality tape deck having advance NR features., like S & C.

Also, if you ever run out of/end the subscription to your fav streaming sites, the recorded Cassettes come in handy! rather than just listening to low format MP3s/AACs.

Finding cool music & being happy with it, in any form, is just a great feeling. If not, we got to switch between the mediums/tweak our approach a bit to be happy, be it, goin back to Cassettes/Vinyls/Reels.
Click to expand...

Slightly unrelated to the topic, but since you mentioned ending of streaming subscriptions - I cannot help but mention that I always felt having your music on physical media, with you, matters a lot. Old school thinking? :p Maybe, but let me attempt to explain why I feel so. Streaming is a good and easy to use technology, but it's a service, not a product. It is dependent on so many external factors - paying for the subscription, paying for your internet service, depending on a company which is probably located in another country with different laws. If one of these stop or change in a way that is detrimental to you - your music stops.

That said, I am a big fan of Amazon's Echo - and use it everyday to stream from Amazon Music. But the point remains. I think the same point applies to physical books versus Kindle-like devices (I use both heavily).
 
After extensive cassette use, I must say that CDs are far superior. But I enjoy cassettes too, record on NAK and playback on Kenwood car cassette, while driving
 
Taking inspiration from the section on cassettes I picked up an Akai CS M01 cassette deck in Mumbai. It's a "made in Japan" kit, very old but working. It was great to access my old cassettes particularly old hindi film songs and recordings done from radio by parents. Some of these songs were no longer available in their original form. I could also play cassettes with my specific notes written on them as a kid. Just nostalgia. The cassettes seem to have survived Mumbai weather for 2 decades in a box remarkably well. I always thought that cassetes were crap but I was wrong.
 
preth30 said:
How is that deck the cs m 01?
Click to expand...
Pretty good. I don't have a reference point to check since I am listening to cassettes after about 2 decades but sounds quite sweet to me. It is a single door / bay contains Dolby NR and a recording function. The dealer gave me a 6 month warranty. A lot will depend on the recording though.
 
Is this debate any different from the vinyl vs CD debate, especially because the OP is focusing only on the sound quality and not on nostalgia or user experience factors? Isn’t it then simply the classic analogue vs digital medium/source debate? My two pennies on that: analogue recordings sound better on analogue medium/source and digital recordings sound better on digital medium/source. Exceptions could be proficiently digitally remastered (analogue) recordings, but that’s rare in the Indian context.

Not surprisingly most the TT/vinyl favouring users I know are mostly into the music from 50’s-70’s. The question to ask is why would some (if any) of them prefer the SQ of cassette over the vinyl? Another question I’d like to add to the mix: why most cassette vintage users today are South Indians (even if residing in other parts of the world today). Did the music labels there continue making cassettes well after they went out of vogue elsewhere in India? Or that South Indian Music world was relatively late to get into digital recordings?
 
SachinChavan said:
Is this debate any different from the vinyl vs CD debate, especially because the OP is focusing only on the sound quality and not on nostalgia or user experience factors? Isn’t it then simply the classic analogue vs digital medium/source debate? My two pennies on that: analogue recordings sound better on analogue medium/source and digital recordings sound better on digital medium/source. Exceptions could be proficiently digitally remastered (analogue) recordings, but that’s rare in the Indian context.

Not surprisingly most the TT/vinyl favouring users I know are mostly into the music from 50’s-70’s. The question to ask is why would some (if any) of them prefer the SQ of cassette over the vinyl? Another question I’d like to add to the mix: why most cassette vintage users today are South Indians (even if residing in other parts of the world today). Did the music labels there continue making cassettes well after they went out of vogue elsewhere in India? Or that South Indian Music world was relatively late to get into digital recordings?
Click to expand...
Thats interesting. Malayalam LPs were there for a shorter interval, i think late 60s to late 80s. Cassettes took over long before that since Yesudas’s Tharangini studios came out with it in 80. Due to their convenience and low cost of entry, cassettes stayed for long. In the mid 90s onwards most releases had both CD and cassettes, with master tapes I think were analog. But the digital mastering was excellent preserving the dynamics of the original.
 
sandeepss said:
Thats interesting. Malayalam LPs were there for a shorter interval, i think late 60s to late 80s. Cassettes took over long before that since Yesudas’s Tharangini studios came out with it in 80. Due to their convenience and low cost of entry, cassettes stayed for long. In the mid 90s onwards most releases had both CD and cassettes, with master tapes I think were analog. But the digital mastering was excellent preserving the dynamics of the original.
Click to expand...

I have one old Malayalam film (Gramophone) CD of Yesudas and some other singers and I like it (though don’t understand a bit). I felt the sound has a honey like flow in those songs. May be it’s a property of the language. Can there be connections between a language or kind of singing with what media it sounds better on? Just a thought.
 
SachinChavan said:
I have one old Malayalam film (Gramophone) CD of Yesudas and some other singers and I like it (though don’t understand a bit). I felt the sound has a honey like flow in those songs. May be it’s a property of the language. Can there be connections between a language or kind of singing with what media it sounds better on? Just a thought.
Click to expand...

Please post a photo of that CD
 
SachinChavan said:
I have one old Malayalam film (Gramophone) CD of Yesudas and some other singers and I like it (though don’t understand a bit). I felt the sound has a honey like flow in those songs. May be it’s a property of the language. Can there be connections between a language or kind of singing with what media it sounds better on? Just a thought.
Click to expand...
Malayalam composers and lyricists were excellent during 70-90s. Since it’s a regional language, they never caught the limelight like Khayyam or Burman. Compositions were simple, original with more focus on the poetry and I needn’t add that his voice is like velvet smooth :)
 
tape used to develop fungus due to humidity in mumbai....so had to regularly clean the deck head and pinch roller ....finally gave up on it when income improved and shifted to CD's ....
 
COOLDUDE7808 said:
tape used to develop fungus due to humidity in mumbai....so had to regularly clean the deck head and pinch roller ....finally gave up on it when income improved and shifted to CD's ....
Click to expand...

Perhaps none of us who wax eloquent about cassette (or even vinyl) sound today had a second thought on moving over to CD back then. :) Each one of us had some convincing reason to do so, most of which are listed in this thread. Most of us junked our cassette decks, Walkmans, turntables, and respective media while some with collector/hoarder (both are different) mindsets had boxed and kept them aside, but never used for years together. There’d be an exceptional one who continued listening to them in the intervening period. It’s only when the vinyl revival started few years ago, did some get back to dusting/refurbishing and trying out the older equipment and media and discovered an again-found love. Did any of those reasons to move to CD become inapplicable now? I don’t think so. We just found newer reasons to go back.

Just goes to say how human mind (individual as well as collective) is fluid and nothing can be taken for granted for ever. :)
 
Last edited by a moderator:
SachinChavan said:
Perhaps none of us who wax eloquent about cassette (or even vinyl) sound today had a second thought on moving over to CD back then. :) Each one of us had some convincing reason to do so, most of which are listed in this thread. Most of us junked our cassette decks, Walkmans, turntables, and respective media while some with collector/hoarder (both are different) mindsets had boxed and kept them aside, but never used for years together. There’d be an exceptional one who continued listening to them in the intervening period. It’s only when the vinyl revival started few years ago, did some get back to dusting/refurbishing and trying out the older equipment and media and discovered an again-found love. Did any of those reasons to move to CD become inapplicable now? I don’t think so. We just found newer reasons to go back.

Just goes to say how human mind as well as the collective mind is fluid and nothing can be taken for granted for ever. :)
Click to expand...
Now you need to armor up well! The brick bats will be coming in any minute from now :D
 
Rega Turntables & Amplifiers
Order your Rega Turntables & Amplifiers from HiFiMART.com - India's reputed online dealer.

Similar threads

kumarab
Cassette Deck 1: Part 2, Calibration
Replies
2
Views
11K
kumarab
kumarab
H
Kenwood x-92 Service
Replies
0
Views
12K
Han27net
H
mandeep
Help! Regarding import duty and IRP
Replies
0
Views
905
mandeep
mandeep
A
Panasonic RX-D55 tape sound goes intermittingly.
Replies
1
Views
7K
Audio_Freek
A
R
One more newcomer
Replies
2
Views
2K
Nikhil
Nikhil
Back
Top