History will probably write off the days of the cassette tape as a useless transitional phase, analog’s last stand before digital music became all the rage. But there is one legacy that the cassette tape has left behind that will not soon disappear: the mix tape.
In my opinion, the mix tape is one of music’s greatest phenomena. It has become a means for people to communicate, to synthesize, to create ““ to take pre-existing music and arrange it in such a way that it speaks something personal to its creator. Even when cassette tapes were replaced by CDs and CDs were replaced by digital music players, mix tapes refused to die.
I still remember vividly making my very first mix tape at the age of 8. I spent nearly three hours in my mom’s bathroom with her old boom box, transferring my favorite songs from the “Lion King” soundtrack and my dad’s Phil Collins collection onto a blank tape I had found underneath the passenger seat of my family’s Nissan Maxima. I listened to that mix tape nonstop for months, until my stereo chewed it into a tangled, unmanageable mass.
In the twelve years since, mix tapes have become more and more important to me. I would record songs from the radio and distribute copies to my friends. When high school rolled around, I would make a mix tape for the car ride to school every morning (although if there were any Pixies songs on it, the carpool mom would refuse).
It was about this time that I, like Rob Gordon in “High Fidelity,” realized there were rules to the making of a mix tape. These rules differ from person to person, but they generally demand that songs are never repeated, that the same artist is rarely (if ever) used more than once, and that the transitions between songs are smooth and logical.
Soon after I established these rules, I also discovered the mix tape’s highest calling: confessing my feelings to girls. I remember recording The White Stripes’ “Apple Blossom” onto a mix for my first girlfriend, and how that later become “our song.” I remember how I used “Butterfly” by Weezer to apologize to another girlfriend when we were having problems.
Even as recently as last year, I remember putting Pavement’s “Gold Soundz” on a mix tape for a special woman and thinking how perfectly one of the verses (“You’re the kind of girl I like / because you’re empty and I’m empty / and you can never quarantine the past”) seemed to characterize our relationship. If it’s really the thought of a gift that counts, mix tapes have to be one of the best (and cheapest) presents ever.
These mix tapes were not only good collections of songs, but little documentaries about my life. I now know that I started listening to Nirvana at age 12, when I first heard “Smells Like Teen Spirit” on the radio. I remember how popular the song “Oblivion” by Eve 6 was in the sixth grade. I remember how I felt about each girl I made a mix tape for. I remember how cool the guitar solo from Pearl Jam’s “Alive” sounded when flying down Pacific Coast Highway.
The making of a mix tape is the ultimate expression for someone who loves music, an opportunity to share something meaningful and personal with another, as well as a way to commemorate a specific time of a life. For music junkies, mix tapes are love letters, symbols of friendship, artful collages, soundtracks of life and photo albums.
Even with iPods taking over the world, mix tapes are still important. After all, how else does an awkward music geek tell a girl that he likes her?
If you’re an awkward music geek in love with Duhamel, e-mail him your mix at dduhamel@media.ucla.edu.