I have moved from craming 20 songs onto an 80 minute CD down to about 14. I guess this indicates my preference.

It is true that I let a slight sigh go when I discover a new album to be over 15 songs, or 50 minute. I find that those last few songs become 'mystical' tracks that I know are there, and have heard them a few times, but not that often. The last couple of tracks off Tool's Aenema is like that....even though I know they're great.

Hidden tracks? What about the rubbish on A Ghost is Born!

A great hidden track is on Travis' 'The man who'.

But like Mark said, some albums can only be the way they are, and if that happens to be 80 minutes, then so be it. Lift your skinny fists....... is one of those.

quote:

Originally posted by crazed:
Can I mention bonus tracks? I hate it when a bonus track appears on the end of the final song. Doesn't matter whether 10 seconds or 10 minutes seperates the the final song from the bonus one, the extra tune should be a numbered track on its own. Maybe a 10 second dead track can come between final real song and bonus track(s), that'd be fine by me, long as those bonus tracks are music. Not like 30 dead tracks at the end of an album, regardless of length, that sucks.

Antichrist Superstar by Marilyn Manson is a great album. But it ends with 85 blank tracks each 5 seconds long that finish on track 99 with random fuzz. Totally unecessary in my opinion. An album by Coheed and Cambria called In Keeping Secrets of Silent earth 3, finishes on song 10 and has short blank tracks until 23. This works well as track 10 is 9 minutes long, and track 23 is also 9 minutes long. It serves as a break between two epic songs. This also brings into question song lenghts. The aformentioned album clocks in at 65 minute with 11 songs. This does not affect the quality because they break up their songs into loud and soft sections. This also brings into question sequencing. What this band have done is not only sequence the songs a s a whole, but the individual songs as well. Don't tell me it can't be done. BTW, there next album is 75 minutes long with no blank tracks. Try that on for size.

The perfect length for an album is somewhere between 40 and 50 minutes. Under 40 and it had better be a fantastic 30-some-odd minutes.

I'm all about some epic albums, though, well-paced or not - cause, if you're in the mood, you can live in an album like that. I've had extremely pleasant afternoons spent with Blonde on Blonde and, for that matter, the new TV on the Radio (with bonus tracks) because they last long enough and you can just kind of immerse yourself in them...

The albums that flow best for me from this year - or the one album that just hands-down FLOWS - is M. Ward's Post-War - which, sequenced any other way - is not the same album. I both appreciate it more primarily because of the way it flows from song to song - and at the same time don't quite appreciate it as much because it's so dependent on its structure.

Minor quibble. Best-paced album ever is Crooked Rain, Crooked Rain by Pavement. Look it up.

Can I point out to those that are bemoaning the shuffle-effect of the iPod being imposed on you that you don't NEED to carry your entire music collection around with you; you dont NEED to put it on shuffle; you dont NEED to get an iPod.

Why don't you get a small, cheap MP3 player, 500MB say, and put on it only your recent purchases, leaving the rest of your collection at home?


(PS yes I agreee 40-50 minutes is the best length. Some recent albums seem determined to fill 76 minutes because they can, when a bit of editing would make a far more rounded record - the latest OutKast album is one example)

quote:

Originally posted by Tru Blu:
you don't NEED to carry your entire music collection around with you

I disagree. You never know when you're going to want to jam out to Live at the Acropolis!

For me the perfect length for an album is between 35 and 50 minutes. There are albums I absolutely adore that are considerably longer (Blonde on Blonde for example) but theyre very rare.

Even though Im young I don't own an ipod and listen to albums from beginning to end without skipping tracks and in the order it was intended.

Even when I had an iPod, I would listen to albums all the way through. The artist arranged them that way for a reason, dammit.

And the reason I had the iPod was because I did have almost 20 gigs of music that I wanted to listen to at any time.

the longer the length, the better. though it might men more filler, the term becomes a lot less relevant when i can get a longer picture of the bands aesthetic instead of evaluating it on a track by track basis.
but also i cant begrudge those who put out 40 or even 30 minute albums. they say what they need to in however long a time they want. it's a complete statement. there might be b-sides and unreleased stuff you thought should have made it, but you take or leave an album.
it's weird that we're seeing people admit more and more to buying CDs they dont listen to before it pops on their ipods and become subsumed in the playlists. i should be even more susceptible to it as i keep up to date pretty ferociously on leaks i'm interested in and will have lived with and gotten close to a CD-R version of an album long before i get a physical copy.
that's messed up. i'm trying to finbd a way around it other than the self-imposed "just wait for it" route right now and it seems that i should stick to listening to individual songs on my ipod lists and save the whole album stretch for when it comes out.

now, about sequencing. it seems, like anyone who's tried to make a decent mix that not only keeps flow but general momentum in mind, that it's an entirely persoanl thing. there's so much that goes into it that it's a little difficult toget into or say much about it except examine what effect any individual track one has based on the placing. there's the "a day in the life" example just mentioned. there's the unfortunate "put the pop one as the second one" route, but generally these seem pretty instinctive and finding some actual writing or book on that would be pretty interesting. i will agree that the dead space between songs is incredibly important though. it's the difference between coming in at the right time, or jostling everyone out of the way to get straight to it. it's weird how the difference between a one or three second gap can make a small difference in it sounding either liek an album or a compilation.