Couple discover their 'ancient' car's tape player still works — instantly rewind to their childhood

There’s a reason the saying "old is gold" exists. Encountering anything from the yesteryears takes us back to the simpler times. Back then, the internet wasn't easily accessible to commoners and people couldn't play their favorite pieces of music from Spotify playlists. Older car models used to have cassette players, which required people to put in a physical audio cassette to enjoy music on their rides. A pop culture content creator named Melanie Murphy—who goes by @melaniiemurphy on Instagram—posted a video with her husband Thomas that took '90s kids on a nostalgic trip down memory lane.

"I hope things bring you as much joy as it brings me! Not usually one for Amazon but I had to make an exception for this little slice of happiness. The tape has all the songs from the movie and my heart," Murphy captioned her video. In the video, Murphy and her husband sit in an old car from the '90s that her husband still drives. Murphy initially introduces the car as a DeLorean, the time-traveling car in the "Back to the Future" movies, but Thomas quickly corrects her. "It's like a DeLorean. It's a Renault 5 from 1990. It's ancient," Murphy says with excitement.

She then mentions that Thomas recently discovered the old tape player in the car still works. Murphy knew exactly what to bring to test it: she purchased the "Guardians of the Galaxy: Awesome Mix Vol. I" cassette, which features all the retro tracks Chris Pratt’s character listens to in the film. "Go on, you do it. I don't know how to play this yoke," she jokes as Thomas inserts the tape into the player. Murphy admits that she hasn’t tried playing cassettes in the past 25 years.

The couple then started jamming to "Ain’t No Mountain High Enough," the 1967 hit by Marvin Gaye and Tammi Terrell. Murphy mentions how she’s used to clicking her fingers to skip tracks, but Thomas pulls out the tape and uses a pen to manually rewind the music before putting it back in. The comment section erupted with appreciation for the couple’s nostalgic throwback to playing cassettes in the old car’s audio player. "Do you know when our grandparents used to say, 'Oh, back in my day'? We are that already," Murphy says as the video comes to a close.

@franziloveskekse complimented, "Speaking of the '90s, you two look like Rick and Evelyn from the 1999 'The Mummy' film!" @_clasa shared, "The nostalgia! Don’t forget the pencil to wind the cassette just in case the film gets eaten." @emiliemooles commented, "This brought me so much joy! What an excellent choice. I hope you’ll acquire more tapes to have in your car. I have so many fond memories of listening to the Disney classics collections volumes 1,2 and 3 and making my friends listen to particular songs on each during our car journeys to school or any opportunity to be in the car. I now really want an old car and those tapes!" @tombroughtonphotography added, "I think this is the first time anyone has said a Renault 5 is like a Delorean but the Delorean did have a Renault engine though, so close enough!"

You can follow Melanie Murphy (@melaniiemurphy) on Instagram for more videos on lifestyle and pop culture.