Changing the order of tracks and/or skipping some

Steve Wyzard wrote: It's been a LONG time since I've listened to Judas Priest, but I always liked "Epitaph" on Sad Wings of Destiny. It was such a change of pace on an otherwise intense album and Halford's vocal is wonderful.

I was never a fan of that song. Although oddly enough I remember seeing that song on some professional greatest prog rock songs of all time list scratching my heads thinking "how is this prog?" and "why this and not King Crimson's Epitaph?"

Just thought of another good example:

The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway is one of my Top 5 favorite Genesis albums, but...

1) I ALWAYS skip over "The Waiting Room".
2) 95% of the time, I skip over "The Lamia".
3) On very rare occasions, I've skipped over "Ravine" and that bizarre instrumental overture to "The Colony of Slippermen".
4) I've NEVER skipped over "Silent Sorrow in Empty Boats", because I absolutely LOVE that brief atmospheric masterpiece in spite of other listeners always complaining about it.

David_D wrote: AlanB wrote: When I bought my first copy of Argus by Wishbone Ash it was on cassette. For some reason I don't understand, sides one and two were reversed and for years I thought the album started with The King Will Come and ended with Blowing Free. That actually made sense to me because The King Will Come is an obvious opener for live shows and Blowing Free was often the show closer or encore. It was only when I replaced my cassette with a vinyl copy that I realised that Time Was was the opening track but I still think the cassette order of songs is better. This reminds me of Judas Priest's Sad Wings of Destiny (not on PA). On the original release and early reissues, side 1 and side 2 were on the cover list the opposite of those on the vinyl itself, and this order makes best sense to me. For it means that the album opens with "Prelude", has imo better flow in its entirety, and I also find "Dreamer Deceiver" and "Deceiver" to be best final tracks.

Either order is fine but yes that might work better since that album loses it's steam after "Tyrant" in my opinion, the last three tracks being meh.

I love the studio disc of Ummagumma but dropping Several Species. It's cool enough, but not something I need to hear every time I want the rest.

Sysyphus
Grandchester Meadows
Several Species of Small Furry Animals
The Narrow Way
Grand Vizier

That's a perfect slab of Floyd right there.





Edited by Finnforest - 23 hours 19 minutes ago at 20:28

Grumpyprogfan wrote: I don't have any specific examples but I'll skip tracks. However, it's quite impossible to do this with vinyl without ruining the flow, so CD's rule for this.

Yes, but I'd say, you need a programmable CD-player where you can make a playlist for at least the half of an album (if it's not double) and then just listen to it.

Edited by David_D - June 10 2025 at 15:53

I always though "Cook with Fire" as the opener of Dog and Butterfly marred an otherwise awesome album. They could have replaced "Cook with Fire" with "Heartless" and had a much better opener. Heartless was floating around at the same time but had been used on the Magazine album which had two version itself, one in 77 and one in 78.

The one time I did something like this was making KeysStudio and KeysLive albums. Much better than the mix of studio and live tracks originally offered by Yes. Beyond that, I have always rolled with albums the way they were released. Well, that is except for expunging Whodunnit from Abacab.

About Wolf City and as it's documented on Discogs, the first track on the original release was actually "Surrounded by the Stars" - but not on the American where side 2 became side 1 on the vinyl itself, while the cover stated the opposite and thus like originals in other countries, including Canada.

Maybe it's because I'm used to it, but I think of the original non-American tracks order as the best one, while I actually own a copy of the American original LP release.



Edited by David_D - June 09 2025 at 10:25

I guess it's not the most popular opinion to consider these changes, but having my IPod and ITunes, and having my compilations of favorite music in them, sometimes I do like to make lists very close to the albums, but with a few changes. Sometimes it's just including live versions instead of the original ones. Some quick ones I might think. 6 Wives of Henry the VIII, I prefer to listen to it in the chronological order in which Henry was with each one of them. Perhaps even mix my favorite versions between the original and the Hampton Court Palace concert, and adding the Tudorture and Tudorrock songs. I also like adding a few of the re recorded songs from the Arthur album to complete the story on that one (Camelot, The Holy Grail, and Excalibur). Related to 6 Wives, on Fragile I like to change Ricks solo spot for Catherine of Aragon, which I understand was what he intended to use on the album, but wasn't able because of his record contract, and which features the whole Yes lineup anyway (except for Anderson, being an instrumental song).

None of these are "optimal"

Emerson, Lake & Palmer - Tarkus: skip side 2
Yes - Close to the Edge: 3, 2, 1
King Crimson - THRAK: 1, 2, 13, 8, 4, 5, 6, 10, Inner Garden KC50, 3, 14
Pink Floyd - Wish You Were Here: the short songs then Shine On You Crazy Diamond