The reason for creating this topic was because I am in a listening session now. I notice my listening habits have changed over the years. I seem less patient to listen to full albums. It’s like I get bored easily, unless it meets my " Gold Standard " of material.
Way back in the day (60’s) it almost like most albums out in that era seemed great and I soaked up entire albums. It may also have had to do with being so stoned I was lazy to change an album in thee middle of playing it. To this day I still remember most of those albums in their entirety.
It’d be nice to hear other folks comments and habits re: this.
For listening to gear - I want to hear stuff that highlights the capabilities or deficiencies of the gear, so no - just snippets are enough. For listening to music or working with music in the background, absolutely, assuming the music was released in album form. Artists put work into creating an experience, so why not be the beneficiary of that work?
Very seldom do I listen to a full album anymore. I blame MP3s for that since they made it much easier to jump between songs, albums, etc. Nowadays, if I find an album I can just push play and never feel like skipping or leaving… it’s golden to me, 5 stars. Most have a few tracks that I’m not interested in whether just not my taste, haha.
I switched to shuffle mode in my music listening several years ago and do not plan to go back to album-based listening. I just get bored listening to one artists for several tracks, the same goes for live concerts, I get bored much sooner than before.)
I agree with the original poster, I seldom listen to an entire album now. Back in the days, I wish we had the option of skipping songs easily. However currently I do find an album every now and then that I like. And there is something compelling about an album that is well done (all the same type of music or flow). For example I love Holly Cole’s album Temptation. Right now I am a new Qobuz and Roon subscriber and loving just finding one song, one artist I like. I then go back to listen to the album but most of the time, I select songs not the album.
Back in the 60’s, many artists actively tried to make an album a unified whole. The Who Sell Out is a good example, as are the first five Moody Blues works, and of course Jefferson Starship. This is much less the case today, with a few notable exceptions (Taylor Swift?). If an album is now just a collection of songs to be marketed to old people who don’t get song-based sales, it’s no wonder you have less patience with the format.
100% agree. When I hear the albums and many more you refer are well thought out in advance to provide a full musical experience. These are also similar to many classical albums, the above albums you mentioned were designed to be a full body of work.
I find myself saying " There’s not a bad song on this album " when I listen to that golden age.
Of course, the Who’s Tommy and Quadrophenia are also examples, but I picked Sell Out in my post above because it’s a great very EARLY example.
Even when albums were not designed as a full artistic work, you had unifying elements. Workingman’s Dead and American Beauty show this, quite different from the psychedelic jams of Aoxomoxoa and Anthem of the Sun.
Sort of different than the folk roots where there were song collections - The Seeker’s Georgie Girl album, The Limelighters’ mostly live albums, or even Linda Ronstadt’s Stony End. Dylan, however always seemed to have a little more than just a collection going on, from his Times They are a Changin’ to Nashville Skyline and Highway 61.
The only when I am listening to a full album is Diao ye zong album.
As the whole album tell the whole story. Listen to seperate song still makes sense but then I don’t get the whole image of RD Sounds writing.
This 1000%!!! Unfortunately, most artists focus on that one song, or at the most those two or three songs that are “radio singles,” and the rest of the album is hit-or-miss. There are some great full albums out there, but they’re harder to find, and fewer and farther between.
