Did Home Taping Ever Really Kill Music?

It's kinda funny when you think that record companies used to be so concerned about home taping destroying music, I guess back then it would've been hard to forecast what was to come with the ease of burning CDs and file sharing and the HUGE effect it would have on the industry.

In hindsight making a cheeky mixtape at home, whether it be for that girl/boy you were trying to impress or for a friend to show them how amazing your taste in music was doesn't seem so bad and in my opinion did more good than harm as it helped spread the word and made people aware of what was out there in a world where the internet didn't exist.

On a side note it saddens me to see just how disposable music has become, with entire generations not knowing what it's like to own a complete LP, cassette or even CD album that you cherish and listen to so many times you know it word for word.

Nowadays you only have to go as far as the iTunes store or worse yet, an illegal file sharing site and with a simple click of the mouse you've got your ears on whatever it is you wanted, but that's the problem for me, it's just your ears and not your hands.

An album becomes so much more in the physical format, first of all you get the whole artwork as it was intended, you know the front and back and not just some shitty low res jpeg, then there's the liner notes which i've always loved reading to check the production credits and better yet the thank you's as I always found it a good way of finding out about other artists, for example say you bought a De La Soul album and saw that they thanked A Tribe Called Quest so you pick up one of their albums and notice a shout out to Black Sheep so back to the record store you'd go and so on and so on.

Getting back to the mixtape topic, I have no doubt the world would be a better place if we all took the time to make a mix for someone so I challenge you to do just that and in the spirit of this blog it would be great for it to be love themed especially considering Valentine's Day is just around the corner.

You get bonus points for using a cassette (link provided just in case you're not familiar with the concept) but if it's gotta be a CD i guess that'll have to do or I guess you can keep it kinda sorta real with this USB Mixtape !

Get your finger on the pause button/right clicker and feel free to post your track lists in the comments section.