Fortunately I skipped the ridiculous 8-track and went straight to cassette. I loved it when the tape started winding around the capstan and you frantically ran for the machine to stop the self-destruction and see if you could salvage the tape.
What an abomination these things were.
I had a Sony TC-640 reel-to-reel tape recorder before the cassette and it was wonderful in the home stereo system. It had an absolutely bullet-proof tape transport. But to make a mix back then was such a huge pain in the next — queueing up your songs on the albums, starting the tape at the right instant, repeating that process all in real time. Ugh.
I thought CDs were an absolute Godsend with superb sound quality and instant changing to any song. Then MP3 — wow.
For a good 15 to 20 years I ripped my entire CD collection to MP3, then continued buying used CDs and borrowing them from the public library to build up my home digital library. It wasn’t that long ago I finally settled on Spotify and use it almost exclusively now. My hearing is declining in my late 60s now, so Spotify sound quality is all I need. No interest in Tidal.
As a live music guy I can say CDs weren't that great. If you listened to a first or second generation of a concert track recording and compared it to the CD digitization there really was no comparison!
I have 19k+ tunes in my mp3 library. Most of these are from ripped CDs. I have a bunch of old stuff that we got from my late wife's uncle who had been a DJ for a long time during the big band era. Had a turntable set up to burn to a CD writer. That was sweet! Unfortunately, we had issues getting all the titles cataloged correctly, so I don't know who some of the bands are.
MP3 blows
I always thought CDs were a step back, yes you can skip around to whatever song vs FF & Rewinding a Cassette.
And yes, Tapes did tangle but they were still much stronger than the fragile CDs. Instead of the pops and skips of a LP you got annoying chirps & skips and mysterious pauses when playing a CD.
And Yes again, tapes did sound better. The white noise just gave the song life, especially with Classic Rock. CDs are like caffeine free soda, sure it basically taste the same, but you can tell something is missing which makes it blander.
My Atari and Nintendo cartilages from the 80's and 90's still work, while none of the CDs from my son's Wii from 5-10 years ago do. MP3's are great though
A few years ago I brought back from my mom’s house my Panasonic stereo with Thrusters speakers.
It has a built in 8track.
The 8track no longer works, but the radio still does.
It now sits on the bench in my garage with the speakers mounted on the walls.