How to get in the Holiday mood

[Transistorized]

Well Thanksgiving & Christmas time are just around the corner. I needed a break from all this negatively in the world recently so I decided to calm my nerves by creating & listening to some Holiday music. Yeah I know it's early but this whole process has been very therapeutic and relaxing.

A while back I purchased a cassette "Once upon a Christmas" by Dolly Parton and Kenny Rogers on eBay. It was advertised as working and it did play but smelled musty and the tape was dragging and had been chewed in one place. So I purchased the CD version. I popped the cassette open and removed the old tape. I then took a Type I TDK cassette and Biased it and EQ'd it until I was completely satisfied with the quality and level. I recorded and cut the 90 minute tape to length and patched a leader onto the end. I then transfered that tape to the original cassette.

This project was well worth it and the tape sounds better now than the original factory recording. For a type I tape using HX PRO I was able to push it all the way to +3 with no distortion at all. Not only that but it put me in the best of moods doing it.

So if your tired of all the negatively I encourage you to make a mixed tape and spend some time with your favorite boomer. It really does work...at least for me.

While my phone isn't known for making the best audio recordings, it is in stereo and I have provided a link to my Dropbox account below to allow anyone to listen to one of the songs of my rebuilt cassette tape. Headphones usually sound better but I'm moving the camera around so the sound changes during the video.

Enjoy and lets start gearing up to being with friends and family for these upcoming Holidays.

https://www.dropbox.com/s/ijpo63ar9ynyphr/20161112_115213.mp4?dl=0

 

[T-STER]

Thats such a great idea, I have a tape here that snapped and i have been meaning to patch it up, I might just do this instead!

 

[Transistorized]

Thanks. I like all kinds of music. This might not be everyones cup of tea (Country) but this recording was all about the challenge of getting my recording to sound better than the original. That's actually fairly difficult and I did it with a Normal Position tape. I'm stoked about that

 

[T-STER]

IT's a great idea actually, as i said i have a tape i need to fix up but it's pretty old. I thought about what you said and think i will record it to tape from cd and insert the tape in the original cassette shell. I'll then have a tape that sounds new but has original J-card and tape case.

I was interested in this bit you mentioned tho "I recorded and cut the 90 minute tape to length and patched a leader onto the end. I then transfered that tape to the original cassette."

Is there anything special involved there? I guess patching the leader on is the red bit of blank tape at the beginning, how do you patch the tape together?

 

[Transistorized]

IT's a great idea actually, as i said i have a tape i need to fix up but it's pretty old. I thought about what you said and think i will record it to tape from cd and insert the tape in the original cassette shell. I'll then have a tape that sounds new but has original J-card and tape case.

I was interested in this bit you mentioned tho "I recorded and cut the 90 minute tape to length and patched a leader onto the end. I then transfered that tape to the original cassette."

Is there anything special involved there? I guess patching the leader on is the red bit of blank tape at the beginning, how do you patch the tape together?

You are correct. The leader is the section of tape prior to the magnetic medium. I used scotch tape on the back side and then trimmed the edges very carefully to match the width of the tape. I've done this for years and it holds up well.

I recorded from CD and once the last track on side A was complete I flipped the 90 minute tape over and started side B recording. Once done I used my counter to go back to the "end" of the tape and then made my cut with scissors. The rest of the tape was discarded except the leader on the other spool which was then added to the cut end of the tape.