Where do dud tracks do the most damage?

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OK so the question is this: where does a scrappable track do more harm: on a really good record, where it stands out as the obvious time-stretcher, or on a pretty good record that clearly wasn't going to change any lives but which would have been more solid without said dud track?

― J0hn Darn13ll3 (J0hn Darn13ll3), Sunday, 5 January 2003 23:37 (twenty-three years ago)

I say great records are actually better with their duds intact. Perspective, right. Whereas Peter Murphy's Holy Smoke, which is the only reason I raised the question in the first place, is a perfectly nice little record made up of intersting little pseudo-pop experiments, which record is almost ROONT by the closing "Hit Song," a total piece of shiznit which probably is meant by the Murphy as proof that he can just reel off an anthemic song if he feels like it (wherefore we are to apprehend that the album, full on obvious non-hits, must mean something much deeper but which actually proves that really he can't do any such thing.

― J0hn Darn13ll3 (J0hn Darn13ll3), Sunday, 5 January 2003 23:40 (twenty-three years ago)

I agree. The dud track will really kill my goodwill towards a consistently pleasant, but inoffensive album. Lots of my fave albums have a dud or two, but it makes little difference. A quite-good band could at least have the courtesy to not make me press the Skip button when I give them an occasional spin.

― weasel diesel (K1l14n), Sunday, 5 January 2003 23:49 (twenty-three years ago)

In these CD times, they do the most damage on track 2, between the album opener and the "hit."

― felicity (felicity), Sunday, 5 January 2003 23:56 (twenty-three years ago)

Ha Felicity is so right on, track #2 is THE key track

however the hit should be delayed until track 7 if possible just so the artist can prove he/she has the arrogance necessary to become a STAR

― J0hn Darn13ll3 (J0hn Darn13ll3), Sunday, 5 January 2003 23:59 (twenty-three years ago)

track 7 = side 2, track 1 to many folks... we arranged our album as if it had sides, despite being cd-only release.

― masonicboom, Monday, 6 January 2003 00:06 (twenty-three years ago)

i'd very much prefer Automatic For The People WITHOUT "Ignoreland", thanyouverymuch

― t\'\'t (t\'\'t), Monday, 6 January 2003 00:09 (twenty-three years ago)

duds are sometimes revealing though...and sometimes later you discover they're not quite the dud you thought.

― gaz (gaz), Monday, 6 January 2003 00:09 (twenty-three years ago)

I've always thought track #4 was key. If the artist can keep up momentum after presumably putting all the weight in the first three tracks, then the album should keep rolling along smoothly.

― paul cox (paul cox), Monday, 6 January 2003 00:11 (twenty-three years ago)

btw, he one dud track = totally neccessary 4 truly great album. does more damage 2 up the 'um,like whatever' factor on not-classic but otherwise solid album. but... on the other hand, doesn't stan out so glaringly.

― masonicboom, Monday, 6 January 2003 00:13 (twenty-three years ago)

Where do dud tracks do the most damage?
On the radio?

― Lord Custos Omega (Lord Custos Omega), Monday, 6 January 2003 03:24 (twenty-three years ago)

http://depts.washington.edu/hearing/%20Inner%20Ear.jpg!

― felicity (felicity), Monday, 6 January 2003 04:12 (twenty-three years ago)

good one. i used to think "Don't Stop" killed The Stone Roses stone dead (see what I did there?) and routinely deleted it from copies I made for people including myself - its positioning right after "Waterfall" just didn't. Make. Sense.

― Charlie (Charlie), Monday, 6 January 2003 05:16 (twenty-three years ago)

Just think of Waterfall/Don't Stop as one superlong track and then it doesn't violate the track 4 rule.

― Vinnie (vprabhu), Monday, 6 January 2003 05:46 (twenty-three years ago)

B-b-b--b-b-ut I like "Ignoreland"!

― donut bitch (donut), Monday, 6 January 2003 06:02 (twenty-three years ago)

Besides... Stipe hammers out an extension of the famed REM Countdown theory by saying "2" twice!

― donut bitch (donut), Monday, 6 January 2003 06:03 (twenty-three years ago)

The last track on that Springsteen album The Ghost of Tom Joad (a good but not great album IMO) is horribly misconceived and completely out of place. I just stop the album before it begins, so it's not a huge loss. But it just gives the album a feeling of compromise overall.

On his album Tunnel of Love there are two stinkers, one egregious ("Spare Parts") and one just dull ("Cautious Man"). For some reason they don't bother me as much as the one superdud track on TGOTJ just because the other tracks are often so spectacular that my good will is difficult to expend.

― Amateurist (amateurist), Monday, 6 January 2003 06:08 (twenty-three years ago)

No Spingsteen-haters to thread, pls.

― Amateurist (amateurist), Monday, 6 January 2003 06:09 (twenty-three years ago)

Wha? "Ignoreland" was possibly the highlight of the entire album.

― sundar subramanian (sundar), Monday, 6 January 2003 06:58 (twenty-three years ago)

No, "Ignorland" is awful. And so is "Electioneering."

― Amateurist (amateurist), Monday, 6 January 2003 07:12 (twenty-three years ago)

Oh, whatever, not like I've been listening to Automatic in ages anyway. I'm with you on "Electioneering", actually "Fitter Happier" and the couple 'rockin' tunes after it all sucked.

― sundar subramanian (sundar), Monday, 6 January 2003 07:20 (twenty-three years ago)

Exhibit A of the Track 2 theory.

― felicity (felicity), Monday, 6 January 2003 07:39 (twenty-three years ago)

A GRATE album with a dud track will still get played because the GRATEness outweighs the dudness. However, an OK album can quickly become meh if there's an absolute stinker on it, because the dudness isn't eradicated by the greatness but rather accentuated by the average-to-goodness.

― Nick Southall (Nick Southall), Monday, 6 January 2003 09:52 (twenty-three years ago)

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