Blue Eyes Designs

Is the album a dying art form? (By “album” I mean a group of songs ordered
specifically and released together.) I was reading an article about it a while
back that got me thinking (sorry I don’t remember where.) With services like
iTunes and this new Napster pay service, when you can pick and choose one song
at a time, does it banish the uncertainty of “the first listen,” having just
torn the shink-wrap off the latest album from your favorite band or a young
upstart?

I’ve always found that some of my favorite music is not the remixed radio edits
I’m bombarded with, but the companion tracks, oft-forgotten gems of the same
album. The example that readily comes to mind is that of Smash Mouth’s Fush
Yu Mang. While it doens’t quite fit, as the radio-release (“Walking on the
Sun”) is also great, if not over-played, the boys of Smash Mouth also slipped in
very different, yet equally great songs such as “Nervous in the Alley,” “Flo”
and “Fallen Horses” that I might never have thought to download were they not
connected in some way.

In addition to marketing and efficiency, there exists the idea that through the
selection and ordering of a set of tracks, an artist can say more than each song
individually. Rob Dougan has certainly made the effort, his use of “Pause” (a
short track of Silence) and the inclusion of “Prelude” as an introduction to
Furious Angels shows thought to something bigger than “just getting it
out there,” something I feel is missing from more and more music now-a-days.

I’m glad that a few of these new sites seem to have features that allow you to
buya whole album at a time, but I can’t help to wonder if, seeing the slow
release of a song at a time might to be too inviting to the musicians of today;
an alternative to the hetic and often trying process of writing and recording a
group of songs at a time.

That’s also not to say that the album is a perfect art form. I certainly don’t
like “Pacifc Coast Party” stuck between its betters on Smash Mouth or the
second version of “You Are my Number One” on Get the Picture?.

Maybe I’m reading too much into it. It seems to me that the album indicates a
dedication to the work, persistance and patience. I never use the “shuffle”
feature on my CD player.

What do you think?