Can cassette tapes be cool again?

Photos: How we've listened to music
How we've listened to music – Today is Cassette Store Day, which its organizers hope will attract you back to the format popular in the '70s and '80s. Sure, it had its frustrations -- unspooling or twisting tape, occasionally muffled sound -- but there was also the mix tape, staple of budding romances,and now a culty coolness as bands like the Flaming Lips and Grape Soda issue their music on cassettes.
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Photos: How we've listened to music
How we've listened to music – Like cassettes, vinyl records offer tactile pleasure and better sound and dominated music sales before cassettes-- and then CDs and MP3 files --came along. But even old vinyl has continued to sell, helped by a new surge in fondness for the format. The Beatles' "Abbey Road," for example, was the top-selling record in 2010 and 2011.
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Photos: How we've listened to music
How we've listened to music – Hard to imagine, but there was a time everyone thought they wanted clunky 8-track cassettes. In the '60s, Ford started putting 8-track tape decks in its cars, and soon, sales of this format left cassettes in the dust. But this was bound to end ...
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Photos: How we've listened to music
How we've listened to music – With the arrival of the boom box, cassettes came back into vogue in the '80s. This hulking music delivery system was considered "portable" and helped propel cassette sales.
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Photos: How we've listened to music
How we've listened to music – The Walkman made listening to music truly portable -- and personal -- and in the '80s helped cassette sales outstrip vinyl for the first time. The ability to record one's own tapes was always a huge part of the cassette's appeal.
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Photos: How we've listened to music
How we've listened to music – Cassettes and LPs faded from the scene in the early '90s, when compact discs appeared and music went digital.
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Photos: How we've listened to music
How we've listened to music – But vinyl has returned on a wave of hipster chic and nostalgia, not to mention audiophiles' conviction that records just sound better. Most new releases today -- like this double-sided record from the Stooges and the Black Keys -- come out in vinyl, too.
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Photos: How we've listened to music
How we've listened to music – An increasing number of bands, such as MGMT, have released new music on cassette, and Cassette Store Day organizers promise release of a Fair Ohs double cassette and a Los Campesinos! live album on tape, among others. Can the trend catch up to vinyl's resurgence? It's still early.
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