That's the motto of the 8-Track Heaven http://www.8trackheaven.com Web site. Yes, 8-Tracks. Those boxy cartridges of magnetically-recorded tunes that went out with mirrored sunglasses, disco, and bell-bottoms. (The first time around.) 8-Tracks--the CD of the 1970s!

And 8-Track Heaven is, well, heaven for the self-proclaimed "trackers" who not only collect odd 8-tracks like "Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band as performed by the Atlanta Connection" or "Buick Presents... The Sound Around You," but repair old 8-track gear, study the history of this curious audio component, and generally share their wisdom on this gone-but-not-erased dead media.

So if you're in search of pre-recorded tapes of "Big Band Moog" or "Enchanted Island: The Now Sounds of Hawaii" on 8-track, 8-Track Heaven is the place to be. Created by Malcolm Riviera, the late Abigail Lavine, Russ Forster, and Chip Rowe, 8-Track Heaven went online more than three years ago. Here you'll find classifieds, lists of dealers, repair tips, 8-track computer icons (!), and information about Forster's quarterly 8-Track Mind 'zine and his documentary on Trackers called "So Wrong They're Right."

The first question that must be asked of these self-proclaimed "Trackers" is, of course, WHY?

"The format is not so important as the information within it, so the plan of corporations to make you re-buy the same music over and over again on different formats is, as one tracker puts it, 'backwards thinking,'" the Web site reveals. "Commit an act of consumer disobedience with us and reject the unjust laws of a marketplace ruled by greed."

The 8-track cartridge system was invented in the mid-1960s by William Powell Lear, of Lear Jet fame. Lear's innovation was really based on a method to reduce tape tangling which was a problem on the previous 4-track units. (Don't be fooled though--tangled tape is still a common annoyance to Trackers.) In 1965, Ford Motors offered 8-track players as an option in  their new line of cars with prerecorded tapes sold in auto supply shops; home players hit the market shortly after.

Between 1970-74, 8-tracks were the hip way to have Boston and Aerosmith blaring from your Buick. Still, improvements in cassette quality were quick to nudge that smaller and cheaper format into the mainstream marketplace. The major labels stopped stocking store shelves with 8-tracks by 1983, while record and tape clubs kept the format alive for a few extra years.
Soon after, 8-track boom boxes that looked like dynamite plungers (a classic model) were put out to pasture in garages and flea markets.

According to the 8-Track FAQ, a Tennessee country music label called Cindy Lou Records is still cranking out cartridges [Not true - Malcolm] , but you won't find Radiohead on 8-track unless you tape it yourself. So forget about modern rock, MiniDiscs and DATs for awhile. Surf 8-Track Heaven, slam in the rare 8-Track release of Lou Reed's Metal Machine Music, and ponder the "8 Noble Truths of the 8-Track Mind."

Here are two to get you started: "State of the art is in the eye of the beholder... and 'new' and 'improved' don't necessarily mean the samething."

David Pescovitz (david@pesco.net) is the co-author of Reality Check (HardWired, 1996) and a contributing editor to Wired and I.D. Magazine.

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