The Silver Mystery Tape

"Mysterious cassette tape of area band found in hollow log."

WITH AUDIO!

Every once in a great while, an adult is given the rare chance in life to tap into their fast fading childhood curiosity. To solve a mystery, to gather clues, or at least to do something more intellectually stimulating than pouring liquor down your throat and watching television. Earlier this spring, as I was jogging at the Asylum Lake preserve in Kalamazoo's Winchill neighborhood, I happened across one of these moments.

As I trudged along trying, perhaps in vain, to get rid of the flour sack hanging off of my abdomen; I glanced down to my left when my eye caught a bright metallic object on the inside of a hollowed-out tree trunk. There it was, a real-world mystery in front of my face. Thinking it might be a hallucination, I stopped to investigate. I reached inside the log, and picked up a silver spray-painted cassette tape in a case. Once taped to the upper-side of the log, it had fallen into view - presumably just before I chanced upon it.

As I held it in my hand, the tape instantly reminded me of all the bands I've been in throughout the years, and all the cassette tapes I've recorded past bands' practice sessions on. There's something about holding a cassette tape in your hand that makes music more tangible . The single cassette tape was larger than the iPod I was listening to as I jogged. I'm beginning to wonder if kids my youngest brother's age would even be able to recognize it for what it was. Recording mix tapes, both of my own music and songs I recorded from the radio, was my favorite pastime before our family got the internet in the mid-1990's. The first cassette recording I ever made was recorded in the summer of 1994, shortly after school got out. My best friend Jon and I recorded two songs titled "Christian - Bold and Fat," and "The Tomato Soup man mines for Oyster Crackers." They were a capella tunes, accompanied by beating on pots and pans with my mother's wooden cooking spoons.

Then there's my high school punk band's rehearsal cassettes. There's the tapes I made when I got my hands on my first four-track, and even mixtapes my high school girlfriends made me. There's a giant box of cassette tapes in my closet, longing to be listened to after such long last. I'm sure you might have a few, too. There's a warmth captured on the magnetic tracks of a cassette tape, a familiarity of childhood. At least to me. To most audiophiles, the musical coloration of a cassette tape is like a pillow over the speakers. I like to listen to music on it's intended media. There was a period of time where music was made with the intent of it being listened to on a cassette deck, or with radio compression. Now we have these digital artifact-ridden, poorly-ripped, variable bit-rate, and multi-generational digital files we trade amongst each other all with the hopes we had from the beginning: to find the new sound that moves us. To grab a hold of an Artist's mind - just for those three fleeting minutes. If you're anything like me, music drives your existence. It's the sounds and the feelings and the emotion. The memories you associate with those sounds, and the feelings you work all week to chase for those weekends of freedom.

Well, someone made that music. Someone put it on that tape. Someone walked a half-mile into the woods to put it inside a hollowed-out log, and someone walked into those very same woods to find it. Someday, I'd like to find who made the music on this tape. I'd like to shake their hands for the good story, and I'd like to encourage them to live their dreams.

I made a digital copy of the entire tape, and I tried my best to clean up the quality of the audio. It was clearly recorded hastily, and without much knowledge or equipment. There's a big misconception that music is bad, or amateur, just because it isn't professionally recorded. If that's true, I should just give up right now. You have to make it from playing in your parents' garage to MTV somehow. There's a road that you take from point "A" to point "B," and that road is a long one.

So, instead of bore you with my personal story any longer, I'll give you a few highlights of the contents of the tape (I know you're all dying to know.) I'll host a few tracks on my SoundCloud account for as long as I can; and I'll update the streams if I find a better place to host from. I named the tracks myself, since I have no idea what they're called.

Here we go:

This first track is a low-key vocal track accompanied by a staccato-strummed acoustic guitar. The singer seems to be on the verge of finding his own voice in the crowd.

"Crown Set Down"

Silver Mystery Tape 01 Crown Set Down by DigiTHC

The Second track is a little more complete, with a keyboard thrown in the mix along with a drummer to tighten things up a bit.

"Cool Kids Clap"

Silver Mystery Tape 02 Cool Kids Clap by DigiTHC

The third track is probably the most polished, with a funny little skit on the intro.

"Huge Moustache"

Silver Mystery Tape 03 Huge Moustache by DigiTHC

The Silver Mystery tape was filled completely on both sides with music, most likely recorded over the course of several days. If anyone wants a digital copy of the tapes, I will be more than happy to provide them; and I should have a copy on Archive.ORG as soon as I figure out the Intellectual Property situation.

*If you, or anyone you know, lives in the Kalamazoo area and has any idea who this music was created by, please drop me a line at TheNewScumProductions@Gmail.Com. I'd love to give credit where credit is due, and I'd love even more to thank them personally for such a good story. Not to mention a peek at some music no one else has ever heard before.

Drop me a line, it's always good to hear from people.

-Zachus