The Cold Cut

Ashwin here.

So guys, this week I've been making a mixtape for a friend, and I figured a good way to introduce myself would be by posting it on here for you lovely people.

But first, let me extol the virtues of the cassette mixtape over a CD. I'm sure plenty of people think cassettes are obsolete these days, but in my opinion they serve a vital role.

Practically, in some ways they're more useful. You can only store 80 minutes of music on an audio CD, but 90 on a cassette. They're also more durable, it's hard to snap a tape in half by accident. Tapes are prettier too. Case in point: the first google image result for cassette, vs the first google image result for CD...





which would you rather stick in your stereo?

The most important thing though, and I cannot stress this enough, is this:

sequential access

i.e. to listen to a track you have to have listened to (or fast forwarded past) all of the tracks before it. This is the real magic of a mixtape. With a mixtape, you can tell a story, build up to crescendos, and make the listener expect and receive whatever you want. When you can instantly skip to any track you want, this power is lost. You've gone from a musical novel to simply a group of tracks. You've lost your power over the listener forever without sequential access.

Nevertheless, here is my mixtape in all of its digital, skippable glory. Hope you like electro.

Cut Copy- Going Nowhere (SebastiAn Remix) (Link 2)
Cut Copy- Hearts On Fire (Midnight Juggernauts Remix) (Link 2)
Cut Copy- Lights And Music (Link 2)
Cut Copy- So Haunted (Link 2)

Someone told me it would happen. Within a few days of listening to Cut Copy, I would be unconditionally in love with their brand of electropop. And they were correct.

The real draw here is the fact that Cut Copy can re-package 80's new-wave into something with a more modern facade. 'In Ghost Colours', their second album, is almost perfect, and easily one of the top 10 records of 2008. As vocalist Dan Whiford said:

"The album is a lot more realized than the first one. I think all of us, when we think of the first one, we agree we sort of got half way there."

Visit Cut Copy's website for some nice bios and videos. Buy 'In Ghost Colours' here!