The Album R.I.P?

Artrockers,
a few years back it was announced that the single was dead. Who made this announcement? Well, those forward thinking types we like to call 'the record industry', you know, the guys who sat on their hands and not inconsiderable personal fortunes while Steve Jobs deftly removed their entire industry from beneath them, the guys who thought that charging £18.99 for a CD was entirely reasonable in a world where we all knew that CD production costs were in pence rather than pounds. And the NME of course, who announced that it would no longer review singles, replacing them with 'Tracks'. At the time I railed against it, arguing that the single was the base unit of pop music and that albums were an industry construct designed to make you pay the maximum price for product you didn't actually want in order to get the 'tracks' you did want, if anything had to go it was the album; two great tracks and a whole load of padding. I think that the present booming singles market and declining album sales tend to back me up here - the single is once more the base unit of pop, how much longer can the NME swim against the tide? The American Record Industry actually did go so far as to stop making singles during the CD boom, and they didn't even attempt to hide their reasoning: release a track to radio, plug it to death but don't allow people to buy it as a single - if you want it you'll have to buy the album (£18.99), whether you want the rest of it or not. It was this venal, greedy, dumb stupidity that opened the door for Napster, and once that door was open none of the industriy's Canute-like attempts to hold back the tide were going to achieve anything but making the industy look even more venal, greedy and dumb.

The other day I was asked by a young person which album she should own by a particular classic act. 'Well' I said 'there are great tracks on all the albums, and there are some major bummers, I'll make you a compilation of the best stuff from iTunes.' As soon as the words came from my mouth I knew that I had turned a personal corner, that I could even think about cut and pasting a 'best of' rather than recommending albums surprised me. But it made me think back to the 'singles are dead' debate and my belief that albums were a means for libertaing the maximum money from punters for two great tacks and a whole load of rubbish and realised that indeed, the album has had its day. Thanks to downloading you don't have to buy the album, so why would you?

As musicians we cling to the idea that the album is everything, the true expression of creativity, and in some cases this is true, sometimes people make albums that are meant to be albums, not just a selection of recordings bundled together, and to them I tip my hat, if an album is a complete work then it should be consumed as an album.

On a general level though the album is an anachronism, a hangover from a former age, lacking any real validity in the digital age that allows you to pick'n'mix rather than being force-fed music that's second rate simply because it's part of the all holy album.
The album, RIP?

Tom Artrocker

Agree, disagree? Mail tom[at]artrockermagazine[dot]com