Now I'm confused again!
Grim is basically saying anything goes and just include whatever tracks I want regardless of vintage or production quality.
Chuck is saying, "I've heard your stuff, and you should stick with 5"
Armistice is saying 8 songs is fine, but they better all be awesome.
I should explain that because I love albums, I accept whatever the artist feels should be on the album. If you listen to the first 6 Black Sabbath Lps, there's quite a bit of varied stuff that they put on that was outside of their general ouvre {"Planet Caravan", "Fluff", "Solitude" "Embryo", "FX", "Changes", "Laguna sunrise", "Don't stop", "Supertzar" etc}. Actually, loads of artists included songs that were generally outside what their fans had come to demand.
I remember seeing Paul McCartney on telly once, talking about the White album. He said that George Martin thought that half the songs were shit and that they should whittle it down to one super awesome single album, get rid of stuff like "Revolution 9", "Wild honey pie" and the like. Initially on release, George Harrison wondered whether or not it should've been a double album as "30 songs were hard to digest in one sitting". But I liked McCartney's view on it ~ he said "Shurrup ! We're the Beatles. People can take it or leave it !". And that's what I say to you ~ you're "Pete the Heat !" and you have no control over how each individual listener will relate to it. You'd be amazed what each individual ends up liking and not liking, if indeed there is anything they don't like.
Going back to the White album for a moment, generally over the last 40 years, it's been held in higher regard than "Pepper" and many cite it's 'anything goes' diversity as one of it's strengths.
Armistice is saying 8 songs is fine, but they better all be awesome.
You know, over the last 19 years, I've never heard anyone praise the Pink Floyd songs "Take up thy stethoscope and walk" and "See saw". Quite the opposite in fact. I think the latter was voted in a poll as the worst Floyd song ever and the received wisdom is that it only made the second album because Syd Barrett was in such a bad way, the rest of the Floyd had to cobble together anything that they had around. The former is usually cited as the pathetic beginnings of Roger Waters as a writer, just to show how far he travelled to the stuff he was writing on "Dark side of the moon" and is also used to demonstrate how great Syd was in comparison.
Well, from that first day I heard them, back in the 70s, I loved both songs. I think they're uber awesome.
I'm evidently alone.
Do MEs ever offer objective advice on stuff like which songs to keep and which to ditch? Do they offer opinions on song order too?
If I was putting in something to be mastered, as far as I'm concerned, that would be it, that's the finished mix. I wouldn't be accepting any advice on whether there should be more kick or tone down the guitar or leave that track off, that's all been thought out in the mixing.
Don't tell me how to read "War and peace ! "
In that regard, the ME would be like someone polishing my car ~ it's not for them to tell me the angle the windows should be at or the best setting for the windscreen wipers. Just make the car shine !
I'm really psyched that you liked it and shared a lot of thoughts with me about it.
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}. But the public loved it and it was a huge hit. The Stones weren't fans of "Start me up" because it started out as a reggae piece and they tried so many versions over the years before the one we know. But people loved it. Same with "Satisfaction", Keith didn't think it should be releasd as a single. Thin Lizzy nearly died when their record company put out "Whiskey in the jar". It was at best a warm up song, one they all hated because it was so trad and Irish and they wanted nothing to do with it. But their manager got them to record it anyway then the record company released it and people loved it !