Do you like listening to albums in full or do you just hate the album concept in 2011?

Peter Robinson hates them

But to Peter Robinson of the website Pop Justice this is the past speaking.

"Most albums, you've got a pretty good idea. The bad songs are pretty bad, you know. We're busy people. Let's just get rid of them."

Every album he owns is split, analysed and re-ordered. This, he says, is progress. The listener is in control and we do not have to sit through bad music. If he were to spend time with a "classic rock" album, he says the solution is simple.

"What I would do is open the track as an audio file, take out any drum solos, look for any guitar solo, take it out, close it and put it back into iTunes."

Albums, he says, have often become meaningless. Some songs are given away as free downloads, track listings can change with bonus tracks being added or changed. You can, he says, listen all the way through but do not feel obliged to obey the whims of a pop star.

Albums all the way for me.

weirdo. i mean, with imovie you could re-edit great movies if you wanted to. but why would you want to?

ew he doesn't have the time to listen to a song he may not like the one time he hears it but has enough to rearrange every record he has?

^ what I was thinking

i don't mind albums. they're handy. i listen to very few of them "all the way through" after the first few times, but i don't think that's necessarily the point? sometimes i do, and the tracks i listen to "less" are often still worthwhile. i don't privilege them over trax and there are fewer great albums than great songs, but they're...handy, i guess.

From xgau's end-of-year essay:

In 2010 I stopped hearing the death-of-the-album guff that's been in the virtual air since the great Napster bubble of 1999. Not that the album has retained its economic primacy, though for many musicians of quality that was always a chimera anyway, good for a passing windfall or auxiliary revenue stream in a career dependent on the rigors of touring and the luck of the licensing deal. On the contrary, sales continue to dip. But the album isn't about to go away, because it remains the most efficient way for musicians to showcase their songbooks. If you take pride in your art qua art, as musicians of quality tend to do, that showcase is satisfying in itself

I hear just as many consistent albums and just as many patchy ones as I ever did.

I think Peter's trolling a bit there - especially about editing out guitar solos.

I'm not necessarily pro-album, but this guy's standard of quality is arbitrary and laughable. Out with drama and mood, bring on the climax!

if i like something i like it. and the other way around. don't really care how long or short something is. i like ten minute long cassettes. 45s. 78s. albums. EPs. whatever. CDs did ruin the world kinda with the length thing. but most people have adjusted.

it's a form that'll probably continue to appeal to some people, it has done some really great things in the past, no reason why it couldn't in future except for the change in viable running time offered by new media. switch from 40 minutes of vinyl to 80 minutes of CD probably diluted the number of good albums being made and the switch to whatever happens next might dilute that number some more.

i hardly ever listen to albums from beginning to end now except in the car.

There was a reordered and abridged "A Thousand Leaves" suggested on another thread, and it helped me appreciate that album, or should I say a lot of the material on that album.

Here's my big idea: leave great albums alone and fell free to fuck with albums that don't quite work.

"What I would do is open the track as an audio file, take out any drum solos, look for any guitar solo, take it out, close it and put it back into iTunes."

This is an awesome challenge to the rockist hegemony and I assume this quote is from 1986.

i own lots of albums cuz i like one song on them. and i just play that song when i play them. its really easy.

maybe peter robinson has attention span problems

xpost but the other songs aren't taking up space on your phone

Albums are still valuable to me as a collection of songs united by a particular aesthetic. They're helpful if I want to listen to the same sort of thing for like 45 minutes. But I don't think there's any great artistic sanctity to the format.

i like the idea of people fucking with stuff though. re-editing songs and albums. i mean that's partially why people used to make mix-tapes. but taking out solos and stuff sounds like fun.

If peter robinson, or anyone else , wants to only listen to singles or tracks then that is fine, but why would anyone want to get rid of them totally and deprive those who do like albums?

fuck that kind of thinking

Bit of both really. I have more music coming to me each week than I used to, and I want to hear them all. Also, I don't want to spend my life scrolling around looking for the ultimate album to suit my mood, so Shuffle All is often an option for me.

However, listening to stuff on shuffle, rather than making things stand out from each other, has a habit of turning music into aural wallpaper. I stop being aware or caring about what I'm listening to, and often find it frustrating if, say, a track by Grouper is followed up by Boregore or whatever.

The role of an album, at least since the '60s, is to create a narrative; a musical journey however loose, rather than a jumble of songs. Time should have been taken to select and arrange the tracks. I remember reading interviews with Thom Yorke about how he listened to OK Computer in many many different orders before deciding on the best tracklisting. The sequencing of an album can be as important as the segues in a DJ mix. Without it, it's just a bunch of tracks.

The death of the album is kind of a shame I guess. MP3s have already jettisoned album artwork, destroying the visual iconicism that's often inherently associated with certain albums (what would Screamadelica be without that fried egg face? You can't skin up on an MP3, also). Album artwork is important - it's the clothes worn by the music if you will. Listening to music without artwork is a bit like walking into a bar and finding everyone naked: Great for a while, but you can tell a lot from people by their clothes etc. With metal albums, for example, you can pretty much tell how good an album is by the artwork.

What Peter Robinson is saying here is that the listener should have more control over the musi he or she listens to, much in the way we can now choose what we watch with TV On Demand. But sometimes I get home and don't want to choose. Entertainment is just that. I want to come home and be entertained. If I want to be an artist, I'll make my own art. Would you cut out Mona Lisa's eyes because they detract from her smile?

The album as a concept is part of the music as a whole. The medium, in the case of album music, is the message. Without this you are stripping away the mystique, the necessary illusion with which the artist is trying to entice. Now they just sound like "indie music" or "dance music" or "rap music".

do not feel obliged to obey the whims of a pop star.

One thing I love about albums is thinking my way into someone else's headspace, and following those whims for a bit. It's what makes you engage with art as opposed to just consuming it. Some albums reward this in full and some don't, and you can work out pretty quickly which is which. PR's view (at least as expressed here) is too utilitarian for me, suggesting there's only one kind of pleasure and that's the instant kind. I'm sure it's meant to be bracingly poptimist - get out of the way, rock bores! - but it just sounds depressing and reductive. I like dog latin's point about not always wanting to choose every single track - with a good album, the job of pacing an hour's listening is done for me.

Here's my big idea: leave great albums alone and fell free to fuck with albums that don't quite work.

This is basically the only sensible response.

also, i don't want anyone else fucking w/albums on my behalf - am happy for the pop star and/or label to throw all the tracks they want at me (within reason - i find that double/triple albums are a bit of a slog to bother with these days) and i'll decide for myself.

I don't get why music has to be instant. Sure it's great when you hear a song for the 1st time and you need to hear it again, same with a great album you want to put on again after it's finished, but I like hearing something on the 4th or 5th listen and it just clicks. Everyone just seems to be in a constant rush these days.

xp

PR's view (at least as expressed here) is too utilitarian for me, suggesting there's only one kind of pleasure and that's the instant kind

yeah - take the knife's silent shout (which i think is a great album). at the time i played it all the way through quite a bit. nowadays, i'll almost always pick out 4-5 particular favourites. but the tracks that i don't play as much aren't any less valuable or pleasurable to me on the (rarer) occasion that i feel moved to play, say, "from off to on" (13 times since 07, according to last.fm) instead of "silent shout" (42 times in the same time period).

xpost
And the language these kids use...!

same with a great album you want to put on again after it's finished, but I like hearing something on the 4th or 5th listen and it just clicks

i agree w/this - just yesterday taylor swift's "haunted" suddenly clicked with me in a massive way (something to do with striding through the rain while listening to it). i'd had the album since october and never picked out that song as a particular fav but here we are.

Some of you guys are as humorless as the dopes commenting on that article.

i listen to albums from beginning to end while initially exploring them, and less frequently during periods of reconsideration, but after that tend to hone in on my favorite songs, making playlists or just shuffling everything. suppose this is similar to what i used to do with mixtapes, but technologically enhanced. even in the 80s and 90s, i spent almost as much time listening to mixes i or others had made as i did the albums they drew from. well, tapes and the radio.

xpost - I feel it's definitely important to check out an album beginning-to-end at least once if you enjoy the act's work. And yeah, it goes without saying that some of the best albums are the ones you don't appreciate first time you hear them.

With metal albums, for example, you can pretty much tell how good an album is by the artwork.

yeah but no

Grief album covers are the pits but the music is awesome

i actually think the death of the album - or the death of its privilege - is really important and positive, and fetishising it is weird to me. solely focusing on albums leads to so, so much great music getting overlooked, whether because a genre isn't album-driven or an artist isn't an album artist or whatever

nostalgia for album artwork, i can't even be bothered w/that. arguing that artists and bands suddenly now lack any sort of visual presence or aesthetic is a non-starter.

but you're the lex. this goes w/out saying.

I don't get why music has to be instant. Sure it's great when you hear a song for the 1st time and you need to hear it again, same with a great album you want to put on again after it's finished, but I like hearing something on the 4th or 5th listen and it just clicks. Everyone just seems to be in a constant rush these days.

― Algerian Goalkeeper, Tuesday, January 18, 2011 5:47 PM (7 minutes ago) Bookmark

Society is in the gutter

albums are fine, non-albums are fine. but re-ordering or re-editing albums makes u a huge dork.

i still like albums just cos i don't usually have time to sift through everything and make my perfect playlists and also i still listen to cds in my car. same thing also goes for mixtapes + mixes made by other people though.

just cool to have something you can stick on for an hour or so and not have to keep changing the song imo

music is now instant vs. let's all sit in the dark and listen to this classic rock album for the 1000th time is just a massively smh argument anyway. do whatever tf you like!

I try and listen to albums in full when I can. A well-sequenced album is one of life's more satisfying pleasures.

Also what tpp just said xpost

albums are fine, non-albums are fine. but re-ordering or re-editing albums makes u a huge dork.

― call all destroyer, Tuesday, January 18, 2011 10:00 AM (11 minutes ago) Bookmark

foo. i rarely do it, but there's a fine (and intensely dorky) pleasure to be had in struggling to reorder a good album that you just know has a great one trapped inside and screaming to get out.

Albums for sure. Its mostly because I am a metalhead...metal musicians write with the album, not a "single" in mind. And there are several albums where I don't dislike a single track.

Even for pop though I'm an albums guy, I mean the idea that every pop album must be half crap is stupid. There are plenty of pop albums I play front to back with minimal skipping.

Also article writer is never allowed at any of my Slayer listening parties with hiscretinous 'solo' editing!

i feel like we have a thread every year about how the album is dead, then spend the rest of the year talking about albums

download desoloed "maggot brain" here:

Hmm on second thought I'd love to see this dude go to town on a Cacophony album

Wonder if he edits every instance of the word "wodie" off of NOLA rap albums

but he doesn't listen to albums! They belong in the past maaaaaaaan!

One thing I love about albums is thinking my way into someone else's headspace, and following those whims for a bit. It's what makes you engage with art as opposed to just consuming it. Some albums reward this in full and some don't, and you can work out pretty quickly which is which.

these days I do most of my listening on computers, have most of my music in itunes, and assemble short playlists of whatever I feel like listening to. sometimes it's a bunch of random tracks, sometimes chunks of albums that I like, sometimes whole albums, whatever. but an album I really love — Kaputt I guess being the most recent example —never suffers from this treatment; on the contrary, playing songs in and out of their 'proper' context is a great way to end up appreciating the effort that goes into sequencing, or to recognize the hidden qualities of tracks you've tended to overlook

someone should do an 'album' as *just* a collection of songs. like, just put them all the internet, but refuse to give a running order for the album. that would be neat.

^ we call 'em albums 'cause before LPs, they were collections of 78s bound in these binders that look like photo albums

This whole albums are extinct is bullshit for pretentious pop listeners with a distracted mind. I also find this weird that Popjustice where they talk about the quality of pop music in the context of the album format.

I would only edit an album if I've been following it via leaks throughout its inception (Ciara's Basic Instinct & Diddy's Last Train to Paris). But mostly I just reconfigure the sequence with the leaks, remixes, & bonus tracks if I didn't get them. Then again I'm a dork for some albums.

surely everybody's favorite song is one that didn't top the iTunes "most downloaded" filter?

itunes has a most downloaded filter?

― normal_fantasy-unicorns (contenderizer), Tuesday, January 18, 2011 9:45 PM (15 minutes ago) Bookmark

The "popularity" button/column right next to the Time column. It's been reworded with every occasional release so I just referred to it as that.

And I actually meant "one of your favorite songs" not THE favorite song, like we're a society of iconoclasts or whatever.

Massive eyeroll at Algerian Goalkeeper at getting so annoyed by Peter Robinson he felt the need to start this thread. He's obviously being a wind-up merchant and having a troll at the ridiculously self-important attitude at work in that story. He's not actually trying to deprive you of your precious metal albums or whatever.

I remember about three or four years ago you asking Gareth or someone which minimal house albums he'd recommend. He recommended a load of individual tracks, because it's a track-based, set-based genre. You weren't particularly interested in anything that wasn't in the album format. Think how much great music you're missing out on by limiting yourself only to albums, or only to singles.

I still have a residual fondness for albums but it's not the sole format to me, most of the music I've really loved in the last 12 months hasn't got near an album. Actually, the thing I personally miss is the concept of albums having 'sides', or even an obvious division in the middle, but that just appeals to the nerdy symmetrical side of me.

weirdo. i mean, with imovie you could re-edit great movies if you wanted to. but why would you want to?

Well, no, a movie has an obvious narrative. Albums, by and large, don't.

Also someone needs to explain to Neil McCormack how Dickens novels were written and consumed. And if you can read a Dickens novel in one sitting you're a better man than I.

surprised we got this far without anyone doing

If he were to spend time with a "classic rock" album, he says the solution is simple.

"What I would do is open the track as an audio file, take out any drum solos, look for any guitar solo, take it out black people, close it and put it back into iTunes."

Maybe it's a tiny bit interesting/funny that these album listening clubs sound like they'd be frequented by the kind of people who are into 1940s cosplay.

also when I say "anyone" I mean Lex

also Neil McCormick is just the worst

also I don't have iTunes and never had so when I put on an album I tend to play it until the end, unless I'm drinking or something

is 1940s cosplay like stockings painted on with gravy?

^ i dunno, but that sounds like a good kind of cosplay

yeah Puppini Sisters wasn't the Empire awesome EDL stuff

sitting in a hushed circle smoking on your pipe while some tit in a trilby drops the needle onto Sergeant Bastard Pepper again

Unless it's Woody Bop Muddy...

"Would you mind turning that air raid siren down? It's interfering with Dark Side Of The Moon."

that's The Great Gig in the Sky iirc

had no idea music fans stopped listening to albums

is this serious?

Probably the biggest audience for mp3s are young people who don't remember the "albums" era of the seventies. A lot of young people came of age musically in the nineties, when - I'm sorry - but a lot of those CDs had an unhealthy percentage of "skip it" tracks. Kids are so cute when they hit the little "skip" button because the song "sucks".

I'm liking the "album" concept more in recent years, and I'm a heavy user of mp3s...I think it's the greater competition that makes superior artists stand out.

Also, I think this is making artists think about how they present their music differently. The (admittedly rather dry) 33&1/3 book about OK Computer by Dai Griffiths argues that it was an album very much designed around the CD format and its capabilities. With MP3s, artists no longer have a captive audience, so there are two routes to choose from: A. Go with the flow, admit your listeners are more likely to skip about and only listen to your album as part of a larger playlist; or B. Try to capture your audience by ramping up the "album-as-workpiece" ethic.

I think if I were a recording artist, I'd deem it more rewarding if I could get listeners to listen to my album as a whole creation, but the opposite could be true. Although I can't think of many very recent albums that kowtow to the "skipper" audiences. Definitely some albums that work with this throughout history though: Wowee Zowee, Troutmask Replica, maybe Speakerboxx/Love Below?? But recent releases that attempt to get the audience listening through are in abundance at the moment. You'd think it would be the other way round.

I have a very poor concept these days of consumer tendencies, I am sure I am not alone! For the past five or so years, I have been terrified to look at charts.

what's the reasoning behind the OK Computer argument - that it's the kind of length that's not wildly indulgent, but just a shade too long to fit on one LP (without sacrificing sound quality a bit at least)?

I dunno, the book goes on and on and on. I'm surprised it fit in my pocket.

Probably the biggest audience for mp3s are young people who don't remember the "albums" era of the seventies. A lot of young people came of age musically in the nineties, when - I'm sorry - but a lot of those CDs had an unhealthy percentage of "skip it" tracks.

This may be true. A lot of 90s album suffered heavily from overload and overkill.

But it has actually become better again in recent years. While still freer to go beyond 50 minutes than before, few CDs go much beyond the 55 minute mark. And, if they do, they tend to be in genres that typical tend to have long tracks, such as prog or electronic dance music, and long albums didn't use to be a problem in those particular genres in the 90s either (Actually, many of the albums Yes and Genesis released in the 70s would be way over 50 minutes).

a few months ago my 14 yr old son bought a few cds.
then this weekend as part of the all important taxi service role i now partake in, i had to pick him up from the bus station.
so, i decided to purloin one of the cds to soundtrack the journey (not i hasten to add, pretending to be down with the kids).
kid got in car, listened for a few tracks, and then asked what it was we were listening to.
i told him, and he just shrugged and explained how he only ever listens to one or two tracks from the cd, and never all the way through.
clearly the very concept of listening to an album will never be on his radar.

there's too much either/or in this thread. why not both? people have for decades listened to albums and to tracks. to albums as cohesive works and as scattershot collections of potentially agreeable songs. not only to albums, but to singles, mixes, DJs, radio & MTV, etc. don't see what's going on now as radically different, really. technology's changed and the AOR bubble has definitively burst, but that aside, i think people relate to albums and to songs much as they always have.

classic or dude: editing tracks to remove long irrelevant intros and endings, esp songs with skits in them. if i liked it enough to care, i'd edit that chris rock bit out of that kanye west track in a second. or that birthday-intro to that conor oberst song

Classic, Mordy.

I think Peter's trolling a bit there - especially about editing out guitar solos.

― The baby boomers have defined everything once and for all (Dorianlynskey), Tuesday, 18 January 2011 17:28 (Yesterday)

If "trolling" means "patting yourself on the back for being a dickhead" then yes.

there's too much either/or in this thread. why not both?

Got to work with what you've got, and we were given a ridiculous binary in the thread title.

I like listening to albums, but usually I don't got the time, I hate the concept bah.

I was trying to get someone into Bauhaus in high school, so I made them a tape where I taped just the choruses of all the songs I liked. I was worried all the other stuff would be a dealbreaker. It still didn't work.

would listen to bauaus chorus tape

But yeah dont put out shit to fill up space, quality over quantity!

― Algerian Goalkeeper, Tuesday, January 18, 2011 9:39 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

I wish certain people had this philosophy when it comes to polls.

bill what was your problem with the metal poll? you seem to have a chip on your shoulder about it

Although perhaps that would be best if you said so on the actual metal poll thread as not to annoy anyone on this thread.

I remember about three or four years ago you asking Gareth or someone which minimal house albums he'd recommend. He recommended a load of individual tracks, because it's a track-based, set-based genre. You weren't particularly interested in anything that wasn't in the album format. Think how much great music you're missing out on by limiting yourself only to albums, or only to singles.

But I did check them out, also Gareth is always linking me to youtubes on AIM. but whatever, pigeonhole me as someone who only listens to metal, i don't care. It's just funny as on the metal threads im seen as the outsider who isn't into real metal.

dude you don't like manowar? for shame ;_;

bill what was your problem with the metal poll? you seem to have a chip on your shoulder about it

― Algerian Goalkeeper, Wednesday, January 19, 2011 12:38 PM (40 minutes ago) Bookmark

Im just joking with you AG. I had no problem at all with the metal poll.

so these official parties sound like dorksville and no fun if you can't sneeze or whatevs, but does anyone get together w/ bros for informal album listening sessions? used to do this all the time back in the day, come back from a group trip to the record store and enjoy the spoils of the hunt

I toyed with the idea of setting up something like that. Then I got married.

ahh ok bill, no worries

the anti-album thing just seems to more about shitty albums than the album being shitty in concept.

it's like i don't want some soggy ass french fries...but at the same time, if they are good fries i want gang of french fries, not one french fry, one skittle, one yogurt-covered almond, one dorito, and one cheez-it etc

http://sickmouthy.wordpress.com/2011/01/19/is-the-album-dead

I still like albums but most of the pop ones these days seem like a greatest hits album. I'm glad we're back to 8-10 tracks to an album without interludes but I'm unhappy that they aren't cohesive.

maybe Speakerboxx/Love Below??

I remember listening to The Love Below more than I ever did Speakerboxx when it came out, probably because The Love Below actually had decent singles while Speakerboxx was just another run-of-the-mill rap album.

The ILX version of record listening clubs could be get to a group of friends, crappy ghettoblaster and listen to an old fashioned homemade C90 mixtape. Everyone gets a turn to make a tape.

I still like albums but most of the pop ones these days seem like a greatest hits album. I'm glad we're back to 8-10 tracks to an album without interludes but I'm unhappy that they aren't cohesive.

OTM

Ban the "executive producer"!!!

oh god....

the anti-album thing just seems to more about shitty albums than the album being shitty in concept.

There are of course a lot of shitty albums, but I think going too much after single tracks means that people miss some great tracks that may take a bit longer to appreciate as well. Most classic albums would contain a handful of singles that made people buy them, and then maybe a few other epics or more ambitious stuff that would gradually become fan favourites in spite of not being singles.

James Brown made the best singles ever, of course. ;-)

i only listen to albums where the songs average 4 chords or more. any less, 3.995, 3.75 chords per song won't cut it because that doesn't mae a quality song