Ok so I get to this point in the year and I'm rating all of the albums I liked this year. However for me it is not just a case of seeing which one I liked best/think is the best, the amount of hours spent listening to each album is a huge factor.

So I'm wondering how much do or should you consider playcount in your end of year summary?

I tend to go for the difficult listening albums so I can get a lot of replay value as I loose interest pretty quickly. Hence each year albums like dear science, or in rainbows, I can listen to 30 times plus and I still want more. Then there are the "of montreal's" which I play 30 times because I hated it at first and only start really "getting it" after 25 listens.

However most albums seem to run about a 20 listen course before I feel like I can truly rate it. But by that time I don't feel the urge to listen to it anymore. If someone put fleet foxes on while having lunch or something, I would really get into it. Yet the at the computer private listening would not demand more listens.

Hence when I think of hercules and the love affair compared to fleet foxes they come off the same, even though I like fleet foxes more I have played it twice as much as hercules and love affair. Maybe some records aren't as good because they demand a quick burst of heavy listening but loose their appeal quickly (like viva la vida) or maybe perhaps you can still consider admire something and give it a handicap because it has reached its 20 listens.

I guess perhaps that raises a fundamental question of why do you keep listening to an album, to discover more or just to enjoy what is there. That is where the term guilty pleasure comes in.

I don't know, there are so many variables, other stuff like album length and radio play. I usually go with the albums that have survived after heavy listening and the albums that have less than 10 will maybe grow on me next year.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: PrairieFire,

To be honest, the really easy-to-listen albums get a lot more play from me. You'd see a lot more Fleet Foxes and Vampire Weekend than you would most other bands.

I don't go back and look at play count when making my list, but I would say (logically) that I tend to listen to albums I like more than albums I don't...

I always use my last.fm stats as guide for my favorite band of the year. I mean, it doesn't bind me to say that's it my favorite, but I think it's part of the consideration in deciding the best album. There are some tremendous albums I only need to listen to a few times (ie, Refused The Shape of Punk to Come) and there are a ton of other considerations when thinking about album of the year.

To provide an example; Hercules and Love Affair's debut is handsdown my pick for the best album of the year. It also happens to be by most listened to album. My next most listened to album is Vampire Weekend, but they probably won't end up being my #2. Although its a good CD, it just isn't the second best album. I did listen to it a lot, but there are other qualities. Cut Copy is another great example; not my most listened to album of the year, but its definitely going to be in my top 5.

I also use the LastFM plays as a gauge for my faves of the year. Between work and home, I listen to music from morning through late night, mostly from the puter which is basically my home stereo. Anyway, if I'm still diggin an album past 20, 25, 30 plays, it's gonna make it high up my list as it should. How MUCH I listen to something or how much I enjoy it -- even if in a perverse or depressing way -- are my only criterion. (There's no "coolness factor" or "ought to like" in my lists. I'm old, have 4 kids and a minivan, so cool was gone from these parts years ago.;-)

This favors albums that come out earlier in the year, of course, but later releases that are still getting better to me after 5-10 plays will shoot up and I estimate how much more staying power they'll have. (This year, the late, fast risers are The Rural Alberta Advantage The Walkmen, James McMurtry and The Bug.)

This one is easy for me. MGMT "Oracular Spectacular". I have it at #7 on my Best of 2008 list...but it stays in my player more than any other disc.

"Makin' mama so proud.. but your voice is too loud."

I tend to play more fun pop albums than experimental ones, but I have a slight higher respect for the experimental albums.

Strangely, I tend to listen to the more challenging albums more. For example, albums like Stay Positive, The Midnight Organ Fight and The '59 Sound I loved on first listen. But, albums like Alopecia and You & Me, which I did not like much at first, I listened to constantly.

Sadly, all of my efforts to penetrate Alopecia and You & Me have come to naught, since neither will likely make my top 50 (but they will be listed).

I did put my more listened albums on my list above "better" albums. This is becuase listening to Feed the Animals makes absolutly any activity more enjoyable. Was it one of the more thought provoking, innovative, deep albums this year? No. But it was god-damned enjoyable.

On the other side there is Bon Iver and Fleet Foxes. I liked both of these disks and can appreciate why other people love them and were perhaps better than Alopecia, Flight of the Conchords, or Feed the Animals but they just didnt bring me the same kind of joy. So when I would have some time off work this summer and I was playing Age of Conan online, those albums would get the majority of the play time over For Emma or Ragged Wood.

tl;dr - Yes, playtime played a large part in my album selection.

With only a couple of exceptions, the albums on my top 20 list are the ones I listen to the most. I think I get more cumulative reward from music that becomes part of the soundtrack to my life than I do from music that showcases virtuoso vocal, instrumental, and/or compositional skills, but requires more attention to appreciate it than I usually have to offer.

On the other hand, one of the exceptions is the album I ranked highest, There's Me and There's You by the Matthew Herbert Big Band. This record is definitely a demanding listen and not something I have played all that many times. I just found it so stunning and thought-provoking that I couldn't get it out of my head for days.

Another factor is the torrenting vs purchasing of music. An album from I'm from barcelona may be lots of fun for a few listens, but if you are like me, If I'd paid for it, I would want it to have infinite listens.

Granted not many albums could have the replay value radiohead's albums give me. That is why I would only buy the more difficult albums, to feel like I am getting my money's worth as I have to put a bit of work in. Strange concept.

If you are just downloading everything then it doesn't really matter, you listen to it and love it and that's it.

Also I realised some people actually have a life and so they might only have time for a few listens for an album to gain favor.

The more times I listened to an album, the higher it usually wound up on my list. Fleet Foxes, Cut Copy, Frightened Rabbit and Bon Iver are all in my top 5 and among my most listened-to albums ever.

I think it comes down to time. Any list taken a month after a first listen would look very different from 6-12 months out. Poppier albums tend to get a load of listens then rapidly get old. My played list over a longer period would be very close to my favourites list.

Albums that are ranked lower than plays over a long enough period are probably either guilty pleasures or albums with a few great songs that don't quite work as a whole. The MGMT album is a good example of the latter.

quote:

Originally posted by The Oracle:
Poppier albums tend to get a load of listens then rapidly get old.

Agreed. I listen to the Black Kids' album non-stop for about 5 days, and haven't played it since.