I cannot listen to tracks on shuffle. When I start listening to an album, I usually don't skip, no matter how shitty and fillerish they are. I really don't get why people fill their mp3 player with random tracks. It really fucks my mind!

I have 1gb creative player and I never put on it loose tracks. I have 10 albums in it. No shuffle!
[Edited 1/10/08 6:24am]

Some songs take ages to finally reveal their genius so I listen to an album all the way through more often than not.

Cloudbuster said:

I think a great example is some of Kate Bush's albums. For example "The Dreaming"

MikeMatronik said:

I bought it in 1990 and loved it. But it was 122 years later when I realised just what a tremendous work of genius it truly is.

I meant to say 12.

my library is arranged by albums, but sometimes i go for shuffle to dig out the forgotten tracks for me.

Cloudbuster said:

in that sense: tometo tomato

PricelessHo said:

Cloudbuster said:

No, I skip around all the time because sometimes I am only in the mood to hear certain tracks off an album.

the first few listens of a new album i always have to hear from beginning to end so i can form some kind of opinion on it. then, it either becomes one that i always want to hear all the way through, or else it becomes one that i pick and choose from.

i do like the shuffle option sometimes, when i don't know what i want to listen to. this is usually when i'm in transit to work or at the gym. i have 8,000+ songs in my mp3 player, so when i put it on shuffle it's like i have my own personalized radio station and if i don't like the next song, i can always hit NEXT and move on to the next random surprise.

when i'm at home listening to the stereo, i usually prefer listening to whole albums.

for the most part i listen by album but i've gotten to an interesting pattern searching for a specific artist (say, bjork or aimee mann) and listening to their entire catalog randomly.

I never shuffle an album. But I sometimes love to shuffle an artist folder on my iPod. It's just a new way to listen to the same music I've been listening to all my life. Mixes it up some, and makes it feel like radio or a jukebox or something.

I've never used "Shuffle" intentionally and get really pissed off when it gets accidentally selected.

I like to use shuffle / random function on my computer mp3 player, but that's just because I have so varied stuff there that it's bound to produce hilarious mixes. Like it goes from Genocide Organ to something sung by Kermit the Frog, then from Arnold Schönberg to Vanity 6, or some sound effects from old Godzilla / Mothra movies.

Other than that, I listen to whole albums. If I want to listen to something else until I've reached the end of a single work, I'm just going to switch the piece. Rarely do I have to force myself to actually listen to anything.

I'm all about order so a tool promoting anarchy like the shuffle button is clearly the work of satan. There's a beginning, a middle and an end to an album and that's how I listen to it.

I'm usually very selective with the music I buy, so 99% of the time I like all songs on an album and will listen to it in it's the entirety.

sextonseven said:

Wow! That's deep! Gonna make it my signature!

MikeMatronik said:

I'm honored!

sextonseven said:

so let's say you buy an album and you like five out of thirteen songs on it.

what you're telling me is that you would FORCE yourself to listen to eight songs you don't like as the consequence of being able to listen to five songs you enjoy, simply because an album has a beginning, middle and an end and that's how you listen to it?

ok, scratch that, answer me this: how long do you expect to live?

Anxiety said:

To translate that into iTunes ratings, if an album has only five songs that rate four or five stars and eight that rate three stars or less then that album gets sold on ebay.

If the like to dislike ratio is higher than 50/50 then I'll keep it and suffer through the bad songs. If anything, the bad tracks make the good tracks sound better.

Yeah, I have to listen to the full album to get the full meaning.

Listening to an album from beginning to end used to be my preference, but these days, I've come to love the shuffle option on .mp3 players and online playlists, and I positively adore iTunes radio.

Listening to music on shuffle or digging a good radio station, IMO, brings out the power of individual songs better, and it's equivalent to enjoying an assorted box of chocolates or something of that sort. Listening to albums front to back can not only get tedious at times, but because that option and the shuffle option present different contexts in which you listen to songs, the powerful feel of the great songs on those albums can sometimes weaken when you play the album straight through. On a side note, videos can sometimes make songs seem a little different for me, too.. because of the visuals and the music going hand-in-hand. Sound quality is another potentially altering factor.


Of course, I WILL say that if it's a concept album, or simply an album with little to no filler/weak spots, then front-to-back listens are still completely welcome by these ears.

sextonseven said:

i read your response a few times and now i think i have to breathe into a paper bag for a minute

I don't like shuffle at all! And it will fuck up a Janet Jackson album! She's orgasming on an interlude then she's singing about children getting shot up in a playground. It doesn't work!

sextonseven said:

I often wonder if anybody updates this field on their player

I like shuffle when it is the fifth day that I have brought the same 1 gig ipod to work without changing the albums on it.

Anxiety said:

No one sees the world like I do.

PFunkjazz said:

I only do that because it reminds me immediately what I thought about an album without having to recall what each song sounded like. But most of my CDs are not in my computer and sometimes it's nice to pull an old disc off the shelf and play it and be surprised.

sextonseven said:

it's just that i don't want to listen to songs like "jughead" or "the laughing gnome" any more than i absolutely need to.