Cassette sales are up 17.5% year on year in the US and 53% in the UK, which is either a heartening story about physical media or a slightly baffling one, depending on how much time you spent rewinding tape with a pencil. Either way, We Are Rewind keeps finding new reasons to sell you a Walkman — and its latest is a good one.
The French brand has announced a Pink Floyd edition of its WE-001 cassette player, and the pitch isn’t really the paint job. The limited box set includes a specially remastered cassette of The Dark Side of the Moon that is exclusive to this bundle — and, notably, the only cassette version of the album’s 50th anniversary remaster that exists.
A Walkman that isn’t stuck in 1979
The WE-001 has always been the least nostalgic of retro products. It’s built from aluminium with metal buttons, runs a rechargeable battery good for around 12 hours, and includes a headphone amplifier designed specifically for cassette playback. Bluetooth 5.1 handles wireless headphones, speakers and soundbars; there’s a 3.5mm output for the purists, line-in recording so you can still make mixtapes, and a quoted frequency response of 30 Hz – 14,500 Hz ± 3 dB. There’s even a belt clip sold separately, if you want to commit to the bit fully.
It follows the Curtis boombox and the recent Freddie headphones, and continues the company’s habit of collaborating with artists who have a real link to cassette culture. Dark Side qualifies — it’s among the best-selling cassette releases ever pressed.
Nick Mason has thoughts
Pink Floyd’s drummer supplied the best line of the announcement: “I still have enormous affection for the cassette. It really was a major breakthrough — not only with the Sony Walkman but with some of the more up-market recorders. I still have my Nakamichi on the shelf and look forward to testing it with the new The Dark Side of the Moon cassette. Am I correct in assuming that the next major issue will be The Dark Side of the Moon in a large package consisting of the album divided up into 78 RPM discs?”
We Are Rewind founder and CEO Romain Boudruche played it straighter: “To call The Dark Side of the Moon a classic album is an understatement… We’re happy that We Are Rewind can play a part in helping preserve the physical album experience.”
The set is available now at €179 / £159 / $199, through retailers including Amazon, Rough Trade, Selfridges, Tower Records, Urban Outfitters, FNAC and MediaMarkt. That is real money for a format with audibly worse fidelity than the free streaming tier on your phone, and We Are Rewind knows it — the whole proposition rests on the object, not the audio. Whether the exclusive remaster tips it from indulgence into collectible probably depends on how many Floyd box sets are already on your shelf.
