Old sound of music

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Digital music has definitely taken over the world, but remnants of the humble audio cassette still survive; their music scratchy, but memories golden

The world may have moved on to CDs, mp3s and mp4s but if you look around you’ll still find a handful of people that grew up between the 70s and 90s who still cling on to the rare audio cassette.

To the rest of us it may seem that these good old plastic cases of music have blended into oblivion, (they have for the most part), but there are still stores that sell cassettes of films and independent music and public places that play them even.
Latika Cherian, who frequents Pecos, a pub in Bengaluru, says, “This is a one of a kind haunt for music lovers, as it plays only tapes. In fact, most cassettes in their collection are so old that they don’t even feature assorted music cassettes, which came by in the late 90s. So one has to listen to The Best of Doors playing for an hour or so. The sound may be a little scratchy, but in times when medleys and remixes rule the roost, it’s refreshing to revive the good old days.” Latika’s personal collection has a few tapes from the 80s and 90s. “Most of them don’t play properly, but I have retained them for sentimental purposes. The jackets especially are too good to throw away,” she adds.
Actress Rajeshwari Sachdev confesses that she used to listen the maximum amount of music during the age of audio cassettes. “I am not an earphones person at all. So for me, it has to be music played through speakers. I still have a few tapes of old Geeta Dutt songs. My father takes pains to maintain an old Sony tape recorder on which we listen to these songs occasionally. It’s a family bonding time for us,” she says. “We also used to have a lot of home recordings in cassettes but unfortunately they got stolen. Those were the best days of my growing up years,” she adds.
VJ-turned actor Cyrus Sahukar is the proud owner of rare classic compilations such as Anand clubbed with Umrao Jaan. “I remember using a pencil or a ballpoint pen at times to rewind them, when they got stuck in the tape recorder. I recorded my first imaginary radio show on a double deck called the Powerhouse. I have a small box of six or seven cassettes that I can never let go of,” he says.