Stocka
25 Jun 2002, 18:12
What is it with most commercial records these days?
Even "good" bands stick to this ridiculous format which seems to suggest that every album should have their songs arranged to some sort of predetermined order.
More often than not, you'll have the first two or three songs as singles, or at least radio-friendly, non-threatening tracks. Chuck in a few lively or provocative tunes in the middle, a long epic or a slow and sincere song towards the end, with a lightener to conclude with, and there's your hit record.
Now, I'm sure that it's quite a successful format, tried and true by many bands in the 90's, but when I pick up a new album, and it's in the same format, it tends to detract from the record, as the contents become somewhat predictable (almost as if songs were specifically chosen to fit into a particular stereotype, or cliche).
While it may be, that this way of track-listing is beneficial in capturing the attention of the listener, I believe a point will come, where more and more people will begin to become annoyed with the predictability of this format, as it is adopted throughout many of the popular forms of mainstream music.
Even "good" bands stick to this ridiculous format which seems to suggest that every album should have their songs arranged to some sort of predetermined order.
More often than not, you'll have the first two or three songs as singles, or at least radio-friendly, non-threatening tracks. Chuck in a few lively or provocative tunes in the middle, a long epic or a slow and sincere song towards the end, with a lightener to conclude with, and there's your hit record.
Now, I'm sure that it's quite a successful format, tried and true by many bands in the 90's, but when I pick up a new album, and it's in the same format, it tends to detract from the record, as the contents become somewhat predictable (almost as if songs were specifically chosen to fit into a particular stereotype, or cliche).
While it may be, that this way of track-listing is beneficial in capturing the attention of the listener, I believe a point will come, where more and more people will begin to become annoyed with the predictability of this format, as it is adopted throughout many of the popular forms of mainstream music.