A New Way to Blast Your Old Mixtapes

Crosley’s faithful replica of a vintage cassette deck lets you indulge in the staticky joy of favorite compilations from the past

OUR LOVE OF CASSETTES, those chunks of plastic eclipsed by shiny CDs in the early-90s, is being replayed thanks to the mixtape nostalgia of “Guardians of the Galaxy” and “Stranger Things,” not to mention Taylor Swift’s endorsement.

The format reached a five-year sales high last year, finding a niche audience among music geeks seeking underground cachet. Now Crosley, the maker of the ubiquitous dorm-room vinyl players, has responded with its retro CT200 tape deck ($70, crosleyradio.com), a dead ringer for the boombox in 1984’s...