Comments on: The Pros and Cons of Classic Album In Full Sets

By: Tim Hall

Tim Hall — Mon, 15 Sep 2014 07:53:22 +0000

It’s always been true for much mainstream commercial rock, even from the classic rock era. Just listen to any 70s/80s Whitesnake album. Even the best ones have a lot of filler on them.

By: Synthetase

Synthetase — Mon, 15 Sep 2014 02:50:18 +0000

My guess is that if all you listen to is post-punk Brit pop, or corporate ‘indy’ rock you have to skip half the album filler to get to the obvious singles.

By: David Meadows

David Meadows — Sun, 14 Sep 2014 23:39:09 +0000

I’m trying to remember the last time I *didn’t* listen to an album all the way through.

I wonder if that Guardian journalist skips through movies to miss out the scenes he doesn’t like, too?

By: Synthetase

Synthetase — Thu, 11 Sep 2014 15:06:48 +0000

“Be honest: when was the last time you actually played an album, including all those rubbish â€œskitsâ€ artists are so keen on, all the way through?”

Er, today. I listened to three albums back to back and it was great.

“You want the emotional peaks and troughs of a tried-and-tested performance, not something predictable.”

Yes, because as we all know, ‘tried and tested’ is never predictable… If no-one ever listens to albums any more, how is the track list of an album predictable? Did anyone actually proof-read this rubbish?

By: Tom B

Tom B — Wed, 10 Sep 2014 13:05:14 +0000

I'd loved to have seen that Sam, Pornograffiti is a true classic album. I've only been to one gig where an entire album was played, and that was Therion playing Vovin last year. As Tim says, it all depends on the band and the album but you can't really go wrong with Therion (very few duff tracks) and Vovin is possibly their finest work.

By: Sam Lewis

Sam Lewis — Tue, 09 Sep 2014 06:35:51 +0000

I’ve not seen many shows like this, but seeing Extreme play all of ‘Pornograffitti’ was pretty awesome

By: Tim Hall

Tim Hall — Mon, 08 Sep 2014 22:39:24 +0000

Marillion did that one the second night of their 2011 convention; they didn’t have any songs beginning with “X”, so they did a cover of XTC’s “Senses Working Overtime”, with a guest appearance from Dave Gregory.

Judas Priest did their “One from every album” set at the 2011 High Voltage; made sure they covered every era by playing one song from every album they’re recorded. Still left room for plenty of their standards, and by playing one of them as the encore they managed to include both of their big hits from “British Steel”.

By: ObjectiveReality

ObjectiveReality — Mon, 08 Sep 2014 22:27:26 +0000

Have you heard about Paul Kelly’s “alphabet tour” approach? He makes the setlist for each show by putting together his songs in alphabetical order (so time periods and albums are all jumbled together, but things are still organised somehow) and if he does several dates in one place he’ll do the A-H show one night, the I-O show the next night and so on.

It probably wouldn’t work as well for an artist who was less insanely prolific in terms of songwriting, but it’s an interesting way to shake things up.

By: Tim Hall

Tim Hall — Mon, 08 Sep 2014 11:57:25 +0000

Yes, I think that was Metallica with The Black Album.

By: PaulE

PaulE — Mon, 08 Sep 2014 11:39:25 +0000

The pacing of albums is very different from gig sets. Didn’t someone do their “classic album” in reverse order so that the big hits were at the end ?