Taping the charts off the radio has rather gone out of fashion…
However, following the much publicised shutdown of Megaupload, keen file sharers may find it trickier to download music files (aside from using the hundred or so copycat sites of course…).
With that in mind, here are my Top Ten Tips for Home Taping…(you have to imagine the year is 1983 for this to work effectively)
1. Do make sure the tape you are using to record Bow Wow Wow‘s latest smash hit does not contain your mum’s prized recording of Terry Wogan‘s last breakfast show (first time around) or (worse) one of your dad’s Goon Shows that he recorded in 1967 and is probably the last known copy after the BBC wiped over the original recordings in the seventies.
The defence of “if you wanted to keep it you should have pressed the tabs out” is ineffective, especially if they did, but you put Sellotape over the gap so it would record after all.
2. Do try not to lose concentration when taping. Finding out half an hour later that you have been “pausing” when you thought you were “taping” and vice versa can be extremely frustrating. NB this may be preferable if the songs you missed were by Wham!, Phil Collins or The Mighty Wah.
3. Do have lightning reflexes and the supernatural ability to anticipate when Tommy Vance is about to talk over the ending so as to make your tape as authentic as possible.
4. Don’t keep trying to update the track listing on the same insert in ever smaller letters when you tape over something. The crossings out look messy and you’ll probably never read the track listing anyway.
5. Do forget about noting the tape counter number next to the start of each track. You have probably forgotten to set it to zero before starting, and only people who file their record collection in alphabetical order write the number down, and you’re not like that are you…?
6. Don’t try to record a new song halfway through a mix tape just because you have got tired of the one you are recording over. The new song will always be ten seconds longer than the one being replaced (this phenomenon is known as Vance’s Law).
Just use the skip button if you tire of a song. Oh, hang on – they haven’t been invented yet have they?
7. Don’t worry if you mess up or cut off the ending of a particular song. There’s always next week’s show. Unless they skip that tune next week. (This will always happen).
8. Don’t imagine in your head that Tommy Vance is deliberately trying to catch you out by talking over the record two seconds before you press pause. That’ll only make you angry / paranoid. He is, though. And he thinks it’s funny.
9. Do remember that your mum will try to engage you in conversation or call you for tea only when you are recording a song and the song is about to end. Don’t tell your mum to “shut up a minute whilst this song finishes”. It won’t go down well.
10. Don’t play your mixtape at a party- it is for personal use only. Not for copyright reasons: but because nothing screams “cheapskate” at a party more than someone whacking on music that has a Radio 1 DJ’s aborted voice-over at the end of each track.
Record #5: Van Halen: Jump (I remember cutting the end off this one…)
Every record tells a story 
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