In this age of popularized compact disc burners and mp3 players, it is rare to find people who still create mix tapes using those old-fashioned cassete players that went out of style with the onset of the digital age. However, the art of making mix tapes is still alive along with the eccentric people who do it.

What is a Mix Tape?

Mix tapes, also known as compilation tapes, are cassette tapes containing songs recorded from a variety of artists or albums. They are reasonably easy to create, although they have fallen into obscurity as of late, mostly because mix CDs take less work to make and have higher-quality sound. Despite the contemporary mainstream culture embracing this recent digital phenomenon, most music aficionados¹ see mix CDs as inferior in quality to mix tapes because of the thoughtless ease with which they can be created.

Making a Mix Tape

Making a mix tape is a very simple process. All you need is:

• A blank cassette tape: the longer the tape, the better.
• A cassete recorder, preferably attached to a CD player, record player, or another cassete player.
• Albums on CD, vinyl or cassette.

Once you have these, it is a good idea to figure out what songs you want to put on the tape. It is best to make a list of each song in order with its time; trying to 'wing it' will leave you with either a tape full of poorly arranged songs or a lack of space on the tape. It is also good to have a variety of artists; if one artist is repesented too heavily throughout the tape, their songs and the tape as a whole will become stale quickly. Be sure to know your tape recorder well by experimenting with it before starting to record the tape: neglecting its features may end up with the first few seonds cut off of each song, or too much space between songs. Make sure to check to make sure the tape is going well as you go along. Of course, you can start over without wasting the tape if all goes awry, but this can be very frustrating and disheartening.

Selecting Songs for the Tape

There are three main types of mix tape: general compilation, genre-based mix, and a one-artist mix.

General Compilation

This is, by far, the easiest sort of mix tape to make. Simply find songs that you like and arrange them to fit on the tape. Just as in every other type of mix tape, it is important to make good segues and ensure that each song flows into the next. As well, it is recommended to start louder and faster rather than mellow - a good starting song gives the rest of the tape momentum. Also note that putting many long songs or similar songs in a row will make the tape very boring. A well-arranged mix tape will flow like an album, the only difference being that the tape takes songs from different sources and melds them together.