This is the kind of tape they should be showing kids in mixtape school. Beach Boys, followed by the Supremes, followed by Beyonce. And then JANELLE MONAE!, for crying out loud. Although I can't get past rewinding back to the start of "Home" by Edward Sharp and the Magnetic Zeros. And oh the artwork, the artwork.

Some mixtapes that won't get lost in the mail

Micromix 25 by Bradford Cox - If this doesn't make you want to quit your job to be a chinese-food delivery boy, tell me what will.
http://deerhuntertheband.blogspot.com/2010/02/micromix-25.html

Summer Mix by The Morning Benders - features a stupidly beautiful cassette version of Twin Sister's Lady Daydream. More summer than pine lime Splice.
http://saymayday.com/2010/07/the-morning-benders-echomix1/

Fabulous Diamonds mixtape
http://www.threethousand.com.au/hear/fabulous-diamonds-mixtape/

Jens Mixing times

Summer in 3/4 time. Next level mix.

http://www.jenslekman.com/a%20summe%20in%203-4%20time.mp3

Another 'un

Flooding the market. Because who can be blessed waiting for a turn?

The Avalanches - Run DNA (Live - Recovery)

1997!!

Why 1997? Well that was the year I got seriously into music and became a sullen angsty teenager that is why.
I had very few friends in the town of Woy Woy on the NSW Central Coast and would watch Recovery every Saturday morning and sit by the radio every night listening to triple J with my fingers at the ready to record the latest track I was into onto a cassette.
I had a very crude catalogue system for each tape. They were all numbered and I had the corresponding track listings typed and printed and filed into a folder.
Sigh. If only I still had that folder.....
A comment on the 1997 musical number above
The Avalanches - El Producto came out in 1997. I only saw them live once at a Sydney Big Day Out and the sound was really bad and they kept on having major technical difficulties. After a few tracks they had to stop the show because nothing was working. Sad times.

on the topic of musical responses...

Once upon a time, circa 2007, I thought it healthy to feed myself almost exclusively on a diet of Bill Callahan/Smog. Evidently I made a mix for a friend (...either to express myself or to enforce my own good taste down his throat) I can't remember exactly what was on that mix or why, although "Sunday Morning Coming Down" hints that I must've included Bill's "Drinking at the Dam". And probably entertained fantasies of becoming an all-American whursky soaked man. Helll yes, potent late night music.

The one thing better than a mix-tape is a thoughtful response. Put that on a bumper sticker.

More sights and sounds

I took a sick day from work and made this tape for Abbra's amazing exhibition.

Sounds and pictures

A playlist inspired by the paintings of Abbra Kotlarczyk, who last night opened her exhibition Igneous Faux Pas (Rock World). Staggering genius. Have a look at her artworks at http://abbrakotlarczyk.wordpress.com/