Playing whole albums/not shuffle

[Justforonequestion]

God, I feel about a million years old. I was in the car with my 20yo cousin the other day (I was driving). He was putting some music on and asked what I wanted so I suggested something. The conversation went like this-

• you mean, the whole album?
• yes
• ok, wow
• what?
• it's just...I don't know anyone who listens to albums

He then put the album on shuffle. I know I'm ancient (42) but I see an album as being something carefully arranged to best effect, not best played at random. It's a piece of work in itself, not just a random selection of songs (obviously this holds more true for some albums than others).

Do kids no longer listen to albums, and in the right order? I am a million years old and am now going to crawl into the corner and read the Telegraph until the merciful release of death.

I listen to whole albums still (I'm 29)! If it's a new one I'll listen to it in order a few times but do occasionally stick them on shuffle as well.

I just had to Google shuffle to make sure it meant what I thought it did. Why would you do this? I could understand if it's a compilation album, playlist or best of etc, to keep things interesting, but why a normal album? What do you gain from it? The artist put those songs in that order for a reason.

I miss listening to albums. All of my music is in files and folders on a hard drive and rather annoyingly they want to list them in alphabetical order rather than track order. So the next track isn't the one I'm expecting.

My DH is religious about albums too - he likes the whole experience rather than dipping in and out. He is nearly 50 though. I'm late 30s and will listen to whole albums but will often have favourite tracks in playlists, so I suppose I can listen either way.

I'm late twenties. I listen to albums from artists I really like, although I also then take my favourite songs from them to make playlists (which I suppose is just the modern version of mixtapes or NOW albums?). I wouldn't shuffle an album either, don't see the point.

Artists still release albums, so people must listen to them in some format.

He doesn't really listen to the music, does he. Its just background noise.

Life's too short to listen to music you're not keen on. I listen to the songs that I like best on the cd then move on.

Yes especially Pink Floyd CDs Dark side of the Moon for example there's no way you could have that on shuffle as the songs fade out and move into the next one with no breaks inbetween.
I'm with you on this one OP

Albums were originally like a photo album, a collection of individual songs, one per record. Record players had a stacker so you could put the songs in whatever order you wanted. The 'LP' long playing record won the format war, and this meant generations got used to listening to songs in a specific order, chosen partially by the artist but also by the sound engineers (the quality and dynamic range of the audio being better in the outer grooves of the record).

Since the advent of streaming, things are moving away from albums and back to custom playlists of individual songs arranged in whatever order the listener wants or in no particular order.

I'm 21 and I have albums I like but it doesn't matter what order the songs are in

Life's too short to listen to music you're not keen on. I listen to the songs that I like best on the cd then move on.

Music's a bit like friends. Those you take too instantly or hook you in can lack depth and longevity, whereas the ones you take time to get to know have a complexity that becomes more interesting and meaningful to you over a period of time. And they're the ones you come to love, admire and value.

Depends on the album, certain things need to be listened to in order:

Marillion - Misplaced Childhood
Pink Floyd - The Wall

Many others but those two are the two that jump out to me. They are stories and just don't work out of order.

Some albums can be listened to on shuffle with little effect on the overall experience.

Other must be listened to in order to appreciate the story or theme. Pink flloyd famously have multiple albums that tell a story (I refuse to listen to the wall unless I have time to listen to It's entirety).

The advent of streaming and storing all music digitally has changed how people listen to music so it wouldn't surprise me if artists took less time constructing music to played in a particular order.

Sitranced

If you're on Windows 10 that is changeable. I suspect it is for earlier Windows as well. If you're interested, post and I'll post a quick "How to".

Albums are not the same any more. There are loads of older albums that I listen to in full, but modern stuff I tend only to like a few tracks so just make a playlist.

I prefer listening to albums as the artist intended, but if it’s a greatest hits/best of, I want to hear the music chronologically, so I’ll use iTunes to change the order.

If I’m listening to random favourite tracks, I like to use playlists by decade.