Monday, January 2, 2012

Introduction & Ground Rules

"Digital music killed the album!"  That's what the internet prophets seem to scream on a regular basis.  Albums are portrayed as a lost art in the MP3 era.  But the more I hear that argument, the more I question it.

Has the digital revolution altered basic fundamental musical output at its core?  Are the memories of those older works skewed by nostalgia?  Has the musical landscaped evolved (or reverted back to the fifties/early sixties, depending on how you look at it) into nothing more than insular nuggets of three minute gold, or did we give undue weight to songs that didn't deserve it and tune out all the junk, fluff and filler because the LP format forced us to do so?

Often, my favorite songs are the deep cuts and the too-long-for-radio anthems.  However, I also think there are whole lot of tracks that exist only because there was groove space left on the vinyl.  I have a nagging suspicion that the album is not a lost art at all.  Rather, I think it may be something which was never that common to begin with and that technology is simply shining a light on that issue.

It all boils down to this - did providing us with the ability to pick and choose which specific tracks we want to hear/purchase come at the cost of a larger overall experience?

I'm not sure.  So, over the course of the next year I plan to randomly select a hundred releases from my collection and listen to them with one question in mind: "Is it an album?"  I'm not counting how many great tracks it has; I'm not  checking singles or record sales; I'm not exploring the music's cultural significance or place in history.  I may talk about all those things, but ulimately, I'm trying to determine whether or not it sounds like a cohesive effort made by people working toward a similar goal and capturing a specific moment in an arc that makes some sort of emotional sense - that is what separates an album from a collection of songs that happened to be released at the same time.


GROUND RULES

No musical genre is off limits.

Release must be of album length - at least 25 minutes.  Dual release LPs with EPs on each side by different artists will not be considered.

Original release date had to be between 1965 and 1990.  Before 1965 or so (and for a while after in some cases), singles and albums were two different entities - songs slated to be singles were intentionally kept off albums in order to increase sales.  And after 1990, compact discs had become a commonplace format to both artists and consumers.  Listening to music without the ability to skip, shuffle or program songs is a critical part of the question I'm asking.

Greatest hits, compilations and soundtracks don't count.  With few exceptions (Queen's "Flash Gordon" jumps immediately to mind), these releases are primarily constructed in an altogether different fashion and for different purposes than other recordings, often by individuals other than the artists themselves.  Even though the "Saturday Night Fever" soundtrack paints a very vivid, well-developed picture, it's not an album and it's not trying to be.

Live releases count.  A good live recording should be a snapshot of an emotion and a feel.  If done correctly, it can make for a very cohessive album.  "Kiss Alive" and "Johnny Cash at San Quentin" are both albums in the truest sense, due to (rather than in spite of) the fact that the material originated from live performances.

Multi-record releases count with a qualifier.  On these efforts, a cohesive vision tends to get sacrificed in lieu of artistic exploration.  The results can range from inconsistent mess to hit-and-miss grab bag to something downright phenomenal.  When considering these recordings, I'll look at each side as an individual suite and see how well it gels, and then the work as a whole to determine if it's a "double album" or just a bunch of disjointed tracks.


So, that's my plan.  Up first on Thursday, "Killing Me Softly" by the Roberta Flack (1973).

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