Mar 16, 2010 |
This is for you. Just you.
Today’s idea is another music one – but it’s almost the reverse of yesterday’s. This one’s not about showing off. It’s private, and it’s very, very personal.
For some reason, people who make online mixtape services – sometimes very good ones – completely forget the reasons they used to make tapes for people back in the days of actual cassettes.
They think it’s about sharing their music taste with the world. Okay, perhaps sometimes it is – however, I don’t know about you – but the reason I used to make mixtapes on cassette was to communicate something personal with a specific individual.
Yes, it’s about displaying superior specialist knowledge in a world where most people are better than you at most other stuff – and yes, it’s about saving people you like from their own bad taste – but mostly, it was about getting that girl to like you.
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Mar 2, 2010 |
I’d like to send you one of these, please
Every day for the past 30 days, I’ve made a compilation cassette tape featuring music inspired by one UK city on side A, and one New Zealand city on Side B. I called it the Sister Cities of Sound project.
I’d make the tapes, then send them to people who’d requested them. Most of them complete strangers. Some people I’d met before and a couple were very good friends.
But I still have three of them ONE left, and I’d really like to send them to someone who might appreciate them.
That’s it – they’re all gone.
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Feb 12, 2010 |
Photo by Ani-Bee
I had a nice email today from the person who received my Sheffield/Tauranga ‘Sister Cities of Sound’ compilation cassette tape. It was the fifth in the series.
He writes:
Absolutely love the tape: listened all the way through back to back without the need to fast forward. Poured over the handwritten tracklist in a way that takes me back a few years!
Particularly loved the [Artist Name] track….. a real surprise. The [Another Artist Name] track, too.
Thanks again. It’ll live in my car and be treasured.
They’re one-offs. Originals. And they’re free. This is just a fun project on my part: 30 compilation tapes in 30 days. I’ve just made and sent Tape 11 – and I still have three left that are unallocated and will need good homes. They are:
14. Sunderland / Invercargill
24. Bath / Porirua
27. Wrexham / Levin
Jan 4, 2010 |
An art project using 30 cassette tapes
Photo by Status Frustration
As you may know, instead of making a New Year’s Resolution, I’m doing twelve different things for thirty days each in 2010.
My first 30 days, which started just a couple of days ago on January 2nd, is a 30 day detox.
My second 30 days will be quite different.
From the 1st of February for 30 days, I will make one C90 compilation cassette per day. The compilations will conceptually bring together two places: Britain, my adopted country – and New Zealand, my country of origin.
The idea is to create sister cities of sound – at least in the minds of the recipients of those tapes.
I have selected 30 cities and towns from each country, and have paired them up. Each tape will have a British town on one side, and a New Zealand town on the other.
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