How many baby boomers here never owned a 8 track player or tapes, I never did.

[texanwitch]

I knew 8 track players would never last.

[MilesColtrane]

1. Me neither.

A cassette the size of a brick that ends up cutting off songs in the middle to switch tracks?

Worst technology ever!

[TrogL]

2. I didn't like them for technical reasons

I stuck with cassette or reel-to-reel.

[doc03]

3. I owned a four track player! n/t

[jellen]

23. Did you have any WILLIE 8 tracks?

[tonysam]

31. I had both four and eight-track. n/t

[HopeHoops]

4. I still have at least 3 working units - and as for "technical reasons (post #2)...

NOBODY liked them for "technical reasons". The tape stretched, they jammed easily, and that annoying track change click was nasty with the volume way up. It also seemed like every other cassette either had a track change in the middle of a song or a REALLY long dead space on one or more tracks. They also moved songs around to make them fit. That wasn't a problem for some albums, but for albums like The Wall or The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway, it really fucked up the sequence.

[elocs]

5. I not only had an 3 track player, but an 8 track recorder.

It used to drive me up a wall in trying to get all of a song on to a track only to have it "ker-chunk" and switch tracks before the song was finished.

Here is more info about the 8 track and its inventor, Bill Lear: http://www.8trackheaven.com/early.html

I had 8 tracks in the early 70s because as the above states:

"Eight-track tapes were with us for quite a long time. 8-track was the preeminent portable and car audio format of the 1970s. Record clubs like Columbia House offered 8-track tapes well into the 1980s (Madonna's early albums, for example, as well as Michael Jackson's "Thriller," were offered to club members on 8-track). Although there are reports that brand-new tapes are still coming out of Nashville with truckers as the intended audience, these sightings have not been confirmed."

[Mari333]

6. I have my husbands 8 track and all his huge tapes

I am giving them to my son Mike . it will mean a lot to him.

[bikebloke]

7. Not here.

Cassettes, but never vinyl, then on to CD's. Wait a minute, were 8 tracks only for cars. That's where I always saw them. If so then it was radio, the cassettes. I gave up cars before CD's.

[CBHagman]

8. Definitely no eight-track tapes or player.

It was well into the '80s before I got a cassette player/radio, which I am using at this very moment to listen to a classical station.

[MorningGlow]

9. I inherited mine from my older brother

I was in the single digits at the time and so didn't know any better. So the player was my brother's...but the Osmonds 8-tracks were indeed mine... :blush:

[Lydia Leftcoast]

10. I never did, because they couldn't record

I wanted a radio-cassette player so that I could record my favorite songs off the radio and make up my own dance tapes for parties.

[elocs]

12. Well I know for sure that I had an 8 track recorder deck.

Here's one on eBay: http://cgi.ebay.com/BRADFORD-8-TRACK-RECORDER-PLAYER-HOME-AUDIO-STEREO_W0QQitemZ110474057742QQcmdZViewItemQQptZVintage_Electronics_R2?hash=item19b8c4580e

THIS IS A TECH CLEANED AND TESTED AND FULLY WORKING BRADFORD 8 TRACK PLAYER AND RECORDER, MODEL 53736 KH207298. HAS FAST FOWARD, CONTINOUS PLAY OR AUTO STOP, 2- VU METERS, RECORD LEVEL METERS, JUST RAN THRU OUR PRO AUDIO SHOP, GOT NEW BELT, AND LUBED AND CLEANED, WORKS GREAT, NICE COSMETICS. SEE PICTURES.

You simply input what you wanted to record, turntable or radio.

[BuelahWitch]

11. I didn't. Vinyl then cassettes

Made the switch to CDs but still have lots of cassette players, including one in my car.

[Kansas Wyatt]

13. I remember 8 tracks when I was a kid....

But by the time I got interested in music, they had already passed.

[femmocrat]

14. Never owned one. nt

[av8rdave]

15. I never did

I was SO not cool. That hasn't changed over the years.

[Kat45]

16. Nope. Never had an 8 track.

A couple of my friends had them. They pretty much sucked because of the way they'd stop in the middle of the song to switch over.

[TommyO]

17. I'm just barely a boomer (according to the US Census Bureau)

and I never had an 8 track player or tapes. My older cousins who used to take us to the shore, definitely had them.

[tigereye]

18. nope, my brothers did, but not me.

[Tuvok Obama]

19. I had a 4-track that I bought at a flea market

The cartridges were like miniature 8-track cartridges. They had 2 tracks (like "sides" only you didn't turn the cartridge over like you would with a vinyl record or cassette tape), and the stereo aspect (2x2) made them "4-tracks."

One of the cartridges was by Dino, Desi, and Billy, another by Herman's Hermits, and I've forgotten the rest. But they're in a box around here somewhere. (The player is long gone.)

[kentauros]

20. I'm on the tail end of the 'boom'

and no one in my family had them, either. It was either albums or cassettes; we bypassed 8-tracks.

I knew people that had them though, and remember thinking "What's the point? Just get a cassette deck and record your own!" :D

[Captain Hilts]

21. Me neither. nt

[jellen]

22. I've owned the 8 track and all the tapes, some I still have.

Now how do I play the tapes? Anyone remember a quadraphonic system?

[Blue_In_AK]

24. I didn't either.

Went straight from records to cassette tapes.

[Amerigo Vespucci]

25. That means you missed the thrill of wedging matchbooks between the player and the tape

"Bleed-through" from the neighboring channel was always a problem. The only way to stop it (if you could at all) was to wedge a matchbook between the tape and the player, like you'd even out a wobbly table leg.

Also, the record labels thought that the best way to come up with evenly-timed "programs" on the tape was to SPLIT CERTAIN SONGS IN THE MIDDLE.

Nothing like listening to one of your favorite songs and hearing <PAUSE>, CLICK! <PAUSE> before it starts playing again.

:rofl:

[enigmatic]

26. I own/ed one and also a Play-Tape machine

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PlayTape

Still wish I had this one:



I used my allowance to buy one when I was 8; I can't remember what happened to it..

[texanwitch]

30. That is a nice looking machine.

An early walkman.

I wish I still had some of my old things like that.

Looks expensive for the time.

[murielm99]

27. No.

I didn't have enough money for all that. I listened to the radio.

[applegrove]

28. My first access to rock and roll was an 8 track tape. It had "I feel the earth, move, under

my feet" on it. I played it over and over again.

[struggle4progress]

29. Nope. Never.

[rebel with a cause]

32. I never did either.

I kept my little cassette tape player/recorder and when I couldn't get the recorded tapes, taped the songs from the radio. They don't call me stubborn for nothing. ;)

Edited to add: I forgot, I was born two weeks too soon to be a boomer. December 18, 1945.

[OhioBlue]

33. I fell in love with Jim Croce's music on an 8-track

If I really think back, I could probably remember all the songs in order along with the clicks of changing to the next track.

I'm official a gen-x. the 8-track and stereo were my dad's... but I played his tapes over and over. Even made up dances to the songs.

My cousin's husband had a van - with carpeting on the inside and an 8-track stereo with tons of tapes. We thought he was THE coolest!!! lol!

I actually liked the simplicity of it as a kid. turn it on, plug it in and dance...

[zanana1]

34. I still have many, many tapes.

I have an old tape player that only plays on "forward", but I still use it when I'm in the mood to hear something old, but good.