[rhythmdevils]

you track skippers are all sinners!

 

[Feanor]

When I listen to something on CD (rarely), I don't skip tracks. On the computer, however, between my short attention span and itchy trigger finger, I skip tracks / listen to just favorite tracks a fair part of the time.

 

[eyeteeth]

#4:I only listen to some albums straight through, mostly individual tracks.

Time is short, life is short, and I don't like listening to songs I don't like or know very well, are great, but I'm tired of.

 

[Patu]

Well mostly tracks. It's easy to pick up any track from foobar's playlist. But sometimes I listen to albums straigth through. This is actually pretty usual with Pink Floyd albums.

 

[gratefulshrink]

Quote:

Originally Posted by omedon If I have the time I will usually listen to the full album. One good song after another ensures that. But sometimes time is short & I will flip around. I wonder what kind of negative impacts itunes style downloads are having on quality music. Obviously there are benefits, but also huge drawbacks. Seems to promote ADD as does most everything in our society. Too many stimuli means not enough focus.

I re-read this thread again, and it seems like there is tremendous tension these days between enjoying music at the album level (which takes a much greater committment in time AND mental focus) and at the track level. Somewhere (on this thread or a similar one) someone commented how in the old days (pre-CD era; "PCDE") you were more or less forced to listen to an entire album side on your phonograph, as it was a pain to get up, lift up the dust cover (if you had one), lift up the tonearm, and then plop the needle down on the track you wanted. I mean, I did it sometimes, but who wanted to hassle like that? It was even more of a pain in the a** with cassettes, since you didn't know where you would end up after your fast-forward. (I never owned an 8-Track, so I suppose that made things a a little more user-friendly.)

But many rock/jazz/prog artists knew this (they listened to LPs too, after all) and crafted the albums to try to keep you in the right "groove" for at least one side of their album. In fact, even those "classic" rock ablums we all know and love (e.g., Abbey Road, DSOTM, Wish You Were Here, etc.) often had two "halves" that could stand on their own.

Yes, and CDs changed all that, amaking it so easy to skip around. Then multiple disc-players came out, making it possible to shuffle discs and tracks. Now mp3 player and computer let you do that to the nth power. And society does throw all this media at us at mbps speed, making it difficult to avoid the temptation to skip around. I still manage to find CDs that flow like albums used to, but I really think those are no longer in the majority.

 

[sacundim]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ferbose On the other hand, I try to stay away from mindless compilations like Greatest Hits of XXX or The Difinitive XXX because bits and pieces of music stuffed into one CD does not make much sense musically. It is hard to enjoy such mega compilations. Of course, there are also compilations that make sense, compilations that reflect a phase of an artists career or a musical trend, or one showing interesting contrast.

I think many mega-compilations are actually a good way to figure out which albums from a given artist (or country, or genre, or whatever) you'd like to own.

I find, however, that the problem I tend to have with them is not so much the ordering of tracks or how they often sound like they come from different albums, but rather, the fact that most compilation CDs are just too damn long. Listening to something past 45 minutes is pushing it, and past an hour is definitely too much.

The most enjoyable compilations I've heard tend to pick up on this, and stick to 45-60 minutes, instead of stuffing the CD with as much stuff as possible.

There's also music that's hard to get on anything other than compilation form. A good amount of old, rare music is like that. In the earlier days of the music industry, singles were all there was. And there's also a lot of very valuable material for which it only makes economic sense to release on mega-compilations. Lots of releases of older music from the third world for first world audiences (a.k.a. "world music") fall under that category.

 

[Head Creep]

I change up my listening style quite often. Whenever I'm doing standard Internet stuff (site browsing and IMing), I use foobar's "Follow Cursor" option to make an on-the-fly playlist of sorts, letting me hear whatever song I feel like hearing. But if I'm playing a game or just have my speakers on, I listen to whole albums, since I can't run to the computer every few minutes to choose what song I want to hear.

As for greatest hits CDs, I rarely listen to those from start to finish. I treat them like a sampler platter: you can try a little bit of all the different flavors a restaurant has, without committing your whole meal to one flavor.

 

[wearymicrobe]

I must be in the minority here but I can't stand start to finish albums, this is due to most of my music being lets say modern (last 10 years) which is song driven.

I have over a period of several weeks just left my ipod attached to my main system and let it run, very bizzare to hear sublime followed up by stereolab and then my chemical romance but it keeps you on your toes. Some stuff like Queens'ryche need to be played in full album order but really about the dedication a artist needs to keep me interested start to finish.

 

[jerb]

I almost always listen to the whole album, IMO listening to the album sets a mood and after listening to the album a 2nd time it just adds to the music. I cant stand the shuffle function either, skipping around completely ruins a mood or atmosphere.

I do however listen to single tracks or a small number of tracks, for instance if I'm listening to NIN I might get the urge to throw on some radiohead but after three songs I realize I relly wanted to listen to muse.

Also I agree with above posters, I hate it when people skip tracks on albums! their like channel surfers, once I commit to an album I feeel incomplete without finishing it

 

[Jigglybootch]

When I first get CDs, I listen to it all the way through and do so for a little while, so as to assimilate teh material. Then I just start picking and choosing specific songs I want to hear. However, I often get in moods and want to listen to a specific artist, at which point I tend to listen to albums all the way through.

 

[trains are bad]

I call it like I see it. Sometimes not only do I not listen to whole albums, I don't listen to whole songs. Some songs fall on their face after an exciting beginning, and that the song actually sucks is no reason to not enjoy a good section.

 

[Rangers34]

Whenever I get a new album I'll run through it start to finish... and for all but my favorites that's likely the last time it'll get that treatment. Like many here, I listen to a WIDE variety of styles, and I prefer to bounce around between them at a rapid pace. And, quite simply, art appreciation is at the bottom of my list of reasons to play music - I'm there for entertainment and relaxation. This is of course aided by the fact that mp3s have been around for almost as long as I've been listening to music, and even in the few years prior I had my 6-disc changer to facilitate track-hopping.

 

[ServinginEcuador]

Mostly albums with the occasional listening of tracks of music. I listen to tracks when new gear arrives and I want to see how it plays my test tracks. After that I revert back to listening to whole CDs.

 

[Riordan]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kameleon At least part of my music listening experience is art appreciation, and I wouldn't skip through tracks on an album any more than I'd hang the Mona Lisa upside down.

i'm an album man through and through - but mona lisa would definitely hang upside down in MY gallery