i.e. turning down the record button to fade out a last track that goes on too long.

Turning the cassette case inside out only to find there are not enough lines for all your tracks

Deciding whether to use the side A and B stickers or be be more creative as to how you label your cassettes sides.

It may be a lost art but I'm glad this is something I'll never have to do again. For me, missing it is like mourning the passing of rationing.

I was going to post a similar thing but you beat me to it !

I'm gearing up for the annual contest with Graham at work - the Best of Year compilation. We put them together, swap, listen and then hurl abuse at each other's choices (or as he likes to put it "this is how many you got right").

It struck me how a lot of the challenge of compiling it has been almost wiped out by the iPod - after all, create a new playlist, add the songs, maybe move the order around a bit and you're done in minutes. Instead of - make list, find CDs, set aside afternoon, work through each track one by one with finger poised over the pause button and hope that you timed it right so that the last track fits before the tape runs out.

And there's no time limit any more either - you're no longer restricted by the limitations of your chosen media. Graham remains heroically committed to the C90 cassette so he still has that challenge of getting his choices onto two 45 minute sides. At least the CD burner tells you that a track won't fit before you've started.

Another thing changed forever by the march of technology ?

the art of knowing a few really short songs to fit the little gap at the end. There's a dear little Jewel song about catching a cold that comes in at about 1m 12s.

I would look at the gap, set the counter to 0, play it to the end, check the counter to see how long I had and then find a song that counted the same to fit the gap. Apparently gurls always split songs over 2 sides - not me!

And I have been known to make thematic mixes - I have one called Catharsis which was made after I was dumped. It is chock full of heartbreak.

Then there's the one I made to win over a gentleman of my acquaintance...

I do still love making compilations and play lists!

A really good trick for making seamless party-mix cassettes used the fact that the erase head and record head were set about an inch apart. After recording each track, I found if I stopped the tape at the precise moment the track ended, then manually rewound the tape an inch or so, and hit Record at the precise moment the next track started, it was possible to get a half-second or so of crossfade from one track to the next. Lost art? Not 'alf!

Here's a site that is dedicated to this pursuit. They've appended "and CDs" to their mission statement but I think their heart is in tape (possibly old tapes with sellotape put over the corners to enable re-recording) and they're particularly hot on the "road trip" tape, possibly because they come from the land of preposterously long distances and no good speech radio. Bear in mind also that single women regard the presentation of a mixtape as as good as a proposal of marriage.

How about the early days when you would borrow your mate's album to tape it at home, with a cassette recorder and mic, or the inbuilt mic. I've long lost my recordings of Keith Moon as stand-in on John Peel's show in the 60's. (highlight - the spoof DJ named Dave O'Leary Tompkins, or DOLT).

My wife has a tape copy somewhere of Tea For The Tillerman, recorded dutifully in this way with complete background silence in her bedroom. Unfortunately spoilt by my mother-in-law opening the door & asking if she'd like a cup of tea, halfway through side two. She couldn't be bothered to start again.

I used to design my own cover art, with a set of felt-tip pens. In my heart, even I knew that they were shite.

There's a great gallery of blanks here...

http://www.tapedeck.org/

Fors ...
Making a comp that became legendary amongst your mates.

The thrill of making your own muscial moonshine, and knowing you were part of the 'home taping is killing music' underground.

Compiling a sonic scrap book by filling the spare space with B sides, 12"s etc

Against....
Writing the track listing, then it going all smudgy the minute the card hits the plastic.

The tape (usually TDK) unravel nightmare. Embedding itself in loops and reef knots around the cassette head.

Sodding around with a biro to reel it all back in again.

mix-tapes or mix-CDs, I always found mine to have an inspired beginning, a downbeat middle following by a couple of frantic thrashes and then a perfunctory ending. Perhaps I sghould have planned better. or even taken a break. The requisite odd cover versions or obscure B-sides were always the highlights, though. Plus Chrimbo never began for me until I started dutifully taping the Festive 50 - always trying to ensure i turned the C90 over in time.

A friend and I used to exchange c15 computer tapes. Sure, the quality wasn't great, but I've still got a great collection of compilation E.Ps. Some were themed, some played a little fast on my tape deck (now when I play Graceland, Gumboots always seems a little slow)and all were great.

In fact, when I look back, Tim Hudson really did make the best compilations. If you ever meet him, ask him to put you a tape together. You won't be disappointed.

Elastica - Connection
The Beatles - Her Majesty
Warren Zevon - If You Don't Leave Me I'll Find Somebody Who Will

Apparently there's a middle section in the live version of "Dazed and Confused" that I've never heard. It lasts about the length of time it takes for a C90 cassette leader tape to run out, the tape to be turned over and 'record' to be hit again. Am I missing anything?

It is only about three years ago since I stopped making tape compilations. I really miss the old tapes, but don't miss carrying a bad full of tapes around with me, whenever I go on holiday. I still use tapes to record stuff off the radio though as I don't know how to do it onto a CD. My dad's car only jas a tape player, so it's nice to play me old tapes whenever my car is knackered (which is quite often).

I look back with fondness to nights in, preparing tape comps for an ex-girlfriend. Sadly, it's just not the same burning CD compilations, which I am doing at the moment.

That's tapes were the best I'm sure, they just seemed so better designed, better stickers.

I remember, not too long ago, there was a shop in Cambridge (Mill Road area I think) that sold just blank tapes. Music tapes, video cassettes, Mini DV's everything..........did I dream it, or was it real....is it still there?

or were mini discs quite good fun? You could edit them to your heart's content.

Here's a good one, from Art Brut's latest album. Further evidence that the art is not yet lost...
----
All through the night
They begin to take shape
From the crackle of the vinyl
To the hiss of the tape

Play and record
Held down together
Tabs pushed off
So you can't tape over it ever

Just a couple of friends
Hanging out with each other
We started to swap tapes
To soundtrack our summer

Tapes that are full
Of the things we can't say
To each other
During the day

All through the night
They begin to take shape
From the crackle of the vinyl
To the hiss of the tape

Play and record
Held down together
Tabs pushed off
So you can't tape over it ever

It can't be just me
That's working it out
These songs that we've chosen
And what they're about

Are we after the same thing?
Am I crossing a line?
I'm checking the lyrics
I'm pressing rewind

All through the night
They begin to take shape
From the crackle of the vinyl
To the hiss of the tape

These songs won't see the sun
Any time soon
Under the cover of headphones
And for the privacy of bedrooms

All the best pop songs
Are girl meets boy
And there wasn't one song
That I didn't enjoy

But I lacked confidence
When I was young
So things didn't work out
The way they get sung

Play and record
Held down together
Tabs pushed off
So you can't tape over it ever

A couple of friends
Hanging out with each other
Just swapping songs
To soundtrack our summer
---

Any more songs about mixtapes?

mighty On Tape by the Pooh Sticks, where the protaganist possesses all kinds of rare and beautiful music - but only 'on tgape', natch.

Once upon a time I was that ponce!

often meant you got the start of the next track, that then for you became part of the original song you were taping. When hearing the 'real' version I was often wondered why it didn't end like my 'special version'.

"Love Is A Mix Tape: Life And Loss, One Song At A Time" by Rob Sheffield. Good book on looking back on your life by mix-tapes made. Well worth a read.

Always Sony tapes
Always a C90 - you can get much more on.
Kick off with something that either shouts at you (Ain't Too Proud To Beg, Nutbush City Limits, or builds nicely (A Hard Rain's A Gonna Fall [Ferry version], She Sells Sanctuary, Yesterday Has Gone, etc), then keep it going.
End of side one must usually be short, so all short songs on standby (Did You Ever Have To Make Up Your Mind?, From A Window, Kinky Boots, B-52's Downtown, etc.)
Side two can start of mellow (Suburban Berlin, The Trees They Do Grow High, Atlantis) and then it doesn't really matter from there.
End on a short one.
Write the song names down as you go along, across the insert card, never down like a list. You can get more on that way.
Think of a name for it.
You are done.

There was nothing, and I mean nothing I liked more than making a mix tape, especially for friends but, as Fraser says earlier, it's actually quite nice never to have to do this again. itunes libraries are so much more fun.

Was always a good one for those end-of-side moments. All ninety seconds of it. I liked making covers too, usually out of cut-out bits of Select magazine.

Ahhh, mix tapes. My other half still does them for the car - he's a precision act, must work out song lengths before hand & beats himself up if he doesn't get it right.

And as for romance - who says its dead? He did me a mini disc of 'bands we'd seen the last 12 months' - excellent apart from The Killers song which I thought was cheating as they were a support act (U2). Possibly resulted in the weirdest compilation ever. Anything from Eagles of Death Metal to Midlake.

Driving along in my old red Toyota Carolla, when the mix tape, that my old mate Nick had made, came to an end with an Earth, Wind & Fire track.
Rather than find a short song to fill out the C90, he'd left on the cassette a part of a Jasper Carrott concert.
After listening in silence for 30 seconds, my companion, the delightful Susan, exclaimed 'Is this still Earth, Wind & Fire ?'
Nick from the back seat 'No, it's Earth, Wind & Carrot'

I asked my current partner out by giving her a tape because I was too feart to do it in person. No track-listing to create prejudices, just lots of relatively obscure romantic songs. It made her cry - in a good way. Almost eight years on we're stil together. (This is heading in a dangerously Simon-Batesian direction.) Of course, being a chap, I then wrote copious sleeve-notes in a read-too-much-Melody Maker-when-a-teenager style.

Short ones: there's a very atmospheric track on Ride's 'Carnival of Light' called 'Rolling Thunder' which works beautifully. There's even a short version called 'Rolling Thunder #2' which is a splendid fade out. Also, the 'Get Carter' soundtrack has the theme in short bursts here and there. Worked for me.

Technique: I tended to hope for the best on timing, with a lot of re-editing if things didn't fit, but a very good friend of mine would select his tracks, time them, have another think, and only then proceed to the tape deck.

History: Oh, the bright new dawn that rose when tape-to-tape stereos came on the market. Suddenly all that stuff I'd taped off the radio could be clumsily segued into the mix.

Once I'd got the VHS running through the amp I got very dab handed at dropping in film dialogue clips. I clearly remember a C90 ominously titled "The Greatest Records Ever Made" which started side 1 with the "Eggs" monologue which closes 'Annie Hall', and kicked off side 2 with Jeff Goldblum and Harry Shearer on their way to meet Chuck Yeager in 'The Right Stuff'. Also recall dovetailing Morgan Freeman's opening speech from 'Shawshank' into the John Barry-lite of Mansun's 'The Chad Who Loved Me'.

I have a couple of cassettes somewhere from the early 70s that my brother and I taped with a mic held up to the radio. Believe it or not youngsters, radio-cassette recorders were quite expensive in those days. Just hearing Tom Browne's voice (was that his name, anyone?) before Devil Gate Drive is a joy.

I have at least a couple where I taped songs from the top 40.

Only here would you find:

Is it a dream by Classix Nouveau
Take my heart (you can have it if you want it) by Kool And the Gang
Have you ever been in love by Leo Sayer

Mmmm!

What about Mix Tape Memory Syndrome? You hear a mix tape so often when you hear a track elsewhere you expect to hear it's compilation companion.
Everytime I hear Another Girl, Another Planet I expect it go into Non-Alignment Pact by Pere Ubu,
Radar Love into Pool Hall Richard and Regulate by Warren G into It's The End of The World as we know it by REM.

Invariably I'd always have about 90 seconds left over at the end of each side of a c90 and hate leaving that space unfilled. I'd often rely on musical haikus by Sylvian, Eno, Budd or someone of that ilk to fill up those precious last few seconds of magnetic tape before the wheels of the tape machine stopped turning and the tape came to a clunking halt. The whirring wheels would always stop their rotation a couple of seconds before the auto record button flew back up into its regular off position with a horrible cheap plastic sound.

Why when hi-fi's were fitted with a fade out device for home-taping, were they so poor, with the fade lasting all of about three seconds? And were c120s really worse quality than c90s and more prone to stretch or was this a myth?

Finally, I used to feel guilty about taping over individual tracks on cassettes that friends gave me, the guilt never stopped me doing it though, even though it took ages to find tracks of exactly the same length to replace the rubbish ones with!

It's a nice night in, making someone a tape.

However, the pre-selection idea is a spoiler for me. It's all about mood and flow, which is not always easy to organise on paper. If it was, making a compilation CD on your PC for someone would be exactly the same (make list, make order...). The beauty is going in blind, you might have a good opener and a few ideas, but beyond that it's like painting a picture and reaching for the different colours. And if one doesn't work, go back and paint over it, maybe it'll fit better later. I've sometimes made tapes and realized Side B would make a better Side A, so found as many labels as I could to cover the fact that is was originally the other way! The beauty of the tape is the organic process involved in it's creation, the care, the hand made artwork, and of course... the title.

I'll be back, this is a subject very close to my heart and like a mix tape, I need to get the running order of my reply in the right order

I remember doing a double mix tape (2xC90) for the car journey down to glastonbury 2003. The rules: Every artist on the tape had to be appearing at glastonbury that year, and every artist could only appear once. Can't remember too much about the tracklisting, but I do recall it kicked off with Primal Scream's 'Loaded' which set the mood perfectly. I also remember that by the time I'd go to side D, I was running out of artists I could include, so I was choosing the longest possible songs to pad it out a bit...

I made a cd - not the same I know, but I did have to individually load each song onto my PC as I don't have all my music loaded - that was themed around New York.

Every song had to mention New York or an area of New York in the lyrics of title, the only exception being a song by Radio 4 who are from New York.

Walking Down Madison by Kirst MacColl
Brooklyn by Jesse Malin
P!ss Factory by Patti Smith
New York Minute by Don Henley

I still love it and it reminds me of a great long weekend there some years ago.

I signed up to this a year or so ago after an article appeared in the Observer on the theme of mixtaping. You send a tape (well, CD) to one member whilst another one is making a mixtape for you. Works well - obviously, the quality depends on how well the sender (or me) decides to heed or ignore the information you can glean about the recipient's tastes.

http://www.internationalmixtapeproject.com/

I worked as a security guard at a radio station, where I had overnight access to the studios and the record library. I did what any self-respecting music fan would do under the circumstances: abused my position and made a mix tape every few nights. In addition to being able to mix tracks and time the thing to near perfection, I would usually do a reel-to-reel first (late eighties, early ninties, this was) and then do an audio mix on the tape while switching to cassette, making sure the levels were all sound and indulging in the fantasy of being "a producer". Wound up making tapes for a number of friends who realised I had access to this stuff and no scruples about deriliction of duty.

Nice work if you can get it... of course after a while I got fired. Did quite nicely for a fair while, though.

... I would literaly sweat over the running order. Many on TDK-AD 90s or if I really liked you a TDK-SA 90. Dolby 'C' - check, levels checked - check, Chrom Dioxid - checked when applicable.
Lists were written down in my head and then on paper before I began. Being a designer, I would try to make a cover, but back in the 80s it wasn't as easy as now, what with all this Apple Macintosh thingey.I resorted to interesting titles, let me give you a sample:
Thrashin' Mental vol. I-II - Peel Show thrash metalists and daftness from The Stupids (nice hand drawn graffitti covers, each one a continuation of the last)
Big Breasted Girls with Machine Guns (featured a large chested maiden, buff naked with gun pic taken from a porn mag "I found") - Anthrax/Megadeth/Testament/Dark Angel etc.
Crucial Stuff vol. I-IV (it was the 80s, crucial was a very cool word then) various SKA!, Theatre of Hate and very strange indie bands
English Based Guitar Music - now this one's a curiosity, done in the 90s all from CDs, featured bands: Mansun/Suede/Ride
Perpetual Darkness vol. I-IV - The Sisters Of Mercy 12" singles, shame there's no vol.V
Now That's What I Call A Transplant! - a very strange bod. Psychic TV/ZZ Top/clips from Apocalypse Now!, I forget the rest
The Act of Being Polite - Lee Scratch Perry/Laibach/The Barmy Army/Holger Czukay/Glenn Branca/The Residents

tip of an iceberg really