Way Back When: Explaining 8-Track Tapes

These kids today and their music!

Kids today can just speak the name of a song into a small, handheld device, and that device will instantly sift through thousands and thousands of songs and immediately start playing the song that was requested.

When I was a kid, we listened to music via 8-track tapes.

A few weeks ago, I wrote a story about 8-track tapes and how aerodynamic they are when flung through the windows of moving cars. (See: Ka-chunk! Fwing!) But, most people not old enough to remember the Jimmy Carter administration still don't understand what it was like with 8-track tapes as the main source for music.

An 8-track tape could contain one album, or about 12 songs. An 8-track tape is slightly longer, twice as wide, and four times as thick as my iPod. My iPod contains about 12,000 songs. That's a bit of a difference.

iPod vs. 8-track

There were two main types of 8-track tape players. Many cars came with 8-track tape players installed in their stereo system. Or, there were portable 8-track tape players, which were about the size of a toaster and were powered either by battery or a plug-in power cord.

8-track tapes were tough and macho. To play an 8-track tape you would literally shove the top end of the 8-track cartridge into a corresponding rectangular hole in the 8-track tape player. You would slam the tape into the player as far as it would go, and the player would make a loud "ka-chunk" sound, similar to the sound of a car door shutting. About half of the cartridge would still be sticking out of the tape player, but once you heard the "ka-chunk," the tape player would engage and your 8-track tape would start playing music.

A clunky old 8-track tape.

And when you were done with the 8-track tape, you would yank it out of the tape player. It would "ka-chunk" again on its way out.

But, that's not the only time an 8-track would "ka-chunk." Sometimes it would "ka-chunk" right in the middle of a song!

Most people are familiar enough with vinyl records or cassette tapes, which have a "Side 1" and Side 2" of an album. That wasn't the case with 8-track tapes. Instead of being divided into sides, 8-tracks were divided into four programs. (Program 1, Program 2, Program 3, Program 4.) Each program contained one-fourth of the album. And, each time the 8-track made the switch from one program to another, it would make a loud "ka-chunk" sound. (Personally, I never understood why they called it an "8-track." With the four programs, I thought it would have made more sense to call it a "4-track." But, as usual, no one consulted me.)

The problem with dividing an album into four equal parts is that it's usually not feasible to divide a bunch of songs into four sections that are exactly the same length. As a result, one of three things would usually happen. 1) Right in the middle of a song the tape would switch from one program to another, causing a loud "ka-chunk" to interrupt the song. 2) One of the four programs would have a bunch of blank space at the end of it. Or 3) The artist would put part of a song in the blank space at the end of a program so that music would play continually and there would be no blank space. (That's what ELO did here with the "Sweet Talkin' Woman (reprise)" at the end of Program 4.)

"Sweet Talkin' Woman" is at the beginning of Program 3, but then they added a small section of the song (a reprise) at the end of Program 4 to fill the blank space created from trying to divide all the songs into four programs.

Also, there was no fast forward or rewind with 8-track tapes. The closest thing 8-tracks had to fast forward was a button that would switch the tape between any of the four programs. For example, if you had just listened to "Mr. Blue Sky" on Program 4 and wanted to hear it again you would have to push the button to change programs until it landed you again into Program 4, but you would have to listen to all the other songs in that program before you could get to the one you wanted.

It all sounds very confusing, and at times it was. Today's music listeners can never understand how jarring it was to be listening to a song and have a loud "ka-chunk" appear right in the middle of it. (I guess the closest comparison would be listening to a song on your phone and then having a phone call cut the song off.)

Nostalgia is a pretty big thing these days. Vinyl record albums are making a bit of a comeback. Some of the crazy fashions and hairstyles from the 70s are on the rebound, too. But, I don't think we ever have to worry about the return of 8-track tapes. They were always a bit too clunky and "ka-chunk-y" for anyone to ever want a reprise.

Once again, I would like to give a big, super, awesome thanks to my neighbor Cathy for providing the 8-track tape for the photographs.