Sonic Youth – Sister Audio Cassette (UK (1987)

You get a perfect sense of what sort of album this is going to be from the fact that the labels are stuck on the wrong sides of the tape. Side 2’s label is on Side 1, and vice versa. I’ve often wondered whether this was deliberate, given Sonic Youth’s approach, but even if not, it’s entirely in keeping with with the chaotic and contradictory attitude of the music.

Belinda Carlisle – Heaven on Earth Audio Cassette (1987)

For some reason, the solo career of ex-Go-Gos singer Belinda Carlisle always made me think of Feargal Sharkey – the ex-Undertones singer whose solo work had taken off slightly earlier in the decade. They were both characters from the late ’70s alternative (punk-orientated) rock scene, with a similar rapid vibrato in their voices, who turned to the mainstream in the middle of the 1980s and stormed the UK charts in major fashion.

1987 BASF Chromdioxid Extra II 60 Audio Cassette

The BASF CR-E II audio cassette (or Chromdioxid Extra II, as it was identified on the outer packaging), filled the space in the range previously occupied by the Chromdioxid II. Despite the ‘Extra’, this tape was still BASF’s standard CrO2 offering, and I couldn’t really tell any difference between this and the previous Chromdioxid II. The CR-E II arrived in 1985, even sporting the same basic colour scheme as its predecessor, although the grey label on this cassette had a sort of metallic effect which changed the shade of grey as the shell was moved in the light.