CASSETTE REVIEW: Bel Argosy “Let’s Hear It For Bel Argosy”

                I’m beginning to realize, as I write this review, that a lot of listening to and reviewing these cassettes is more about nostalgia for me.   It’s not nostalgia in the strictest sense because if I wanted that I’d go back and review an album that came out on cassette because CDs hadn’t been mainstreamed yet.

                Just being able to listen to music on a cassette though brings me back to a time when I used to record songs off of the radio.   Where has that passion gone?  Is the new equivalent of that trying to download music illegally?  Because on my tapes I’d always have DJs talking over the beginning or ends of the songs I liked so much.

                Bel Argosy is a band that could have been around in the time of cassettes.  They have that indie rock sound that goes with GBV, Fugazi, TMBG, Replacements, etc., but then they also draw a certain sense of high energy into the rock that gives them a sort of Green Day edge.

                I’d say that around the time that the Refreshments were big and had that one song on the radio, Bel Argosy could have fit in wonderfully.   I would have bought their album on cassette initially (probably through a music club where you get 13 for a penny and you literally taped the penny to the order form) and eventually bought it on CD in my later years just because I liked it so much.

                The timeless quality of music is ever present on this tape though because much like the way bands can sound great on cassette twenty years ago or now, this is the case with Bel Argosy because even though they could get a band out of their time, the music speaks for itself and remains relevant all these seeming years later. 

http://belargosy.com/
http://belargosy.com/album/lets-hear-it-for-bel-argosy