The cassingle, perfect for when you spent all your money at Sbarro and Spencer Gifts on pizza and black lights.  And I did.  But, wait... what's that in the inside pocket of my acid washed jean jacket?  No... not my Spuds MacKenzie Party Animal ID card... that's three crumpled one dollar bills son!  Off to Strawberries to see what this surprise jackpot can afford me.  Other than a few A-ha cassettes in the discount bin it looks like my money will be well spent on one cassingle with money left over for a bag of Pop Rocks... watermelon.  

The cassingle, also known as the cassette single, is today's equivalent to the single-song digital download.  The cassingle afforded you, much like today's digital download, the opportunity to enjoy one or two songs at a time from your favorite musical artist(s) at a lower price.  Looking to get your Trixter fix in small doses? That double-sided "One in a Million" cassingle is just what the doctor ordered. Cassingles replaced traditional 45s when album sales began to dwindle in the late 80s.  Traditionally, much like the 45, cassingles offered a single version of a hit song with a lesser known tune on the flip side.  Some simply offered the same song on both sides, like Trixter's often-overlooked pop rocker, while other b sides served up alternative versions of the same song.  Cassingles were simply packaged in a shrink-wrapped cardboard sleeve but could also be found tucked away in a traditional plastic casing with a one-sided insert resulting in a less cost effective marketing move therefore harder to find in masses.  But however they were served up... I ate them all up... at one point owning hundreds of these tiny nuggets of rock, pop and rap.

Believe it or not, cassingles survived into the 2000s before totally being phased out with the popularity of digital downloads... the tech savvy grandchild of the dated cassingle.  Although now defunct, cassingles will forever remain one of the pure joys of discovering music throughout my teen years.  Being the nostalgic guy that I am, I have managed to hold on to a select few for from my youth.  Do you have any of yours?

This is apparently a rare cassingle!

Side A - Kid Ego

Side B - Smoke Singles

From the A&M album, cassette and compact disc "Extreme"