KVR Audio

Sepheritoh · Post by **Sepheritoh** » Sat Oct 23, 2004 5:43 pm

Many of you have published an CD either through a label or private. I am just wondering how you decided which track do you place first, 2nd etc.

Do you choose a "hit" song from the CD and put that first?

It was said here sometime before that it is one of the jobs of the producer to decide on the order of tracks on the CD. How does the producer decide that?

Many of the CDs I listen to sound like the order was decided very arbitraty.

xoxos · Post by **xoxos** » Sat Oct 23, 2004 6:05 pm

i've heard people stress the importance of putting a strong song first.. however, depending on your dealie, you kinda hafta do what you want to do.. :p

my suggestion, open your sequencer, dump all your tracks in as audio tracks, then "compose" them into a play sequence..

..you can quickly drag stuf around to see which songs run into each other, plus if you like you can do fades or add blend contnt at this stage..

Steven West · Post by **Steven West** » Sat Oct 23, 2004 6:12 pm

Continuity is HIGHLY important for me, in hopes that I can take a listener on a journey from start to finish. Some might say this is 'concept', but doesn't come off like big '70's 'rock operas' atleast.

But I think if you're doing just 'songs' that each tell their own story, or a couple of dance tracks and ballad thrown in, you aim for 'variety'.
I'd say most albums never have their 'hit' on the first track, but usually a song that announces what the band is about and/or what the listener can expect in the next 10 or so tracks. A song that might not 'be great' but embodies highs and lows in your style and shows off your talents aptly. From there, it's whatever you're strongest at musically.
A 'good' dance track, but maybe not 'your best' yet.
Ease the listener into a soulful ballad after if you got one, then a 'interesting tune' - maybe with a good beat, and/or catchy melody, then a 'really good' song, a 'really good slow song', and then your 'hit', and maybe a good closing song like your intro that embodies all the elements again for the listener - or, something that sounds quite different. This can elude to what your next CD will be like as well.

Just my 2 cents.

Ja.x · Post by **Ja.x** » Sat Oct 23, 2004 6:15 pm

Right! I don't think there's such thing as a general rule. The track order is a creative process itself.

Sepheritoh · Post by **Sepheritoh** » Sat Oct 23, 2004 6:16 pm

I don't want to burn the CD from my sequencer. I use Sonar. Cakewalk have an extra program that do that (Pyro) which I do not have, so I export to wavs and burn with Nero.

That all said does not matter, because if I would ever release a CD the burning of CDs would be done by the publisher.

I always thought that the "strong song first" is a good idea, but when I listen to many CDs it seems like they tend to put the strongest songs somewhere arbitrary in the middle.

In the old days of vinyl it seemed to be a habbit to put the best song last on the A side.

Sepheritoh · Post by **Sepheritoh** » Sat Oct 23, 2004 6:20 pm

@Steven West

Your thought proccess makes sense. You would do great as a DJ at a party

I like the idea of starting with a "signature" track telling what the band is about.

|J|E|D|I| · Post by **|J|E|D|I|** » Sat Oct 23, 2004 6:38 pm

I have worked off and on with many different bands and artists, and one thing I noticed gets a great response from the artist AND the listener is a song that slowly builds and at the same time is very strong and powerful for the first track (i.e. - Nine Inch Nails - The Fragile - first track "Somewhat Damaged"). It is a great way to take the ears of the listener from silence to wherever you want them to go. But at the same time I have found a great response from using a track that has NO intro at all and everything just jumps right into your face out of nowhere (i.e. - Blink 182 - Dude Ranch - first track "Pathetic"). You have lots of options to work with on that. As far as the rest of the tracks go... you have many more options. You could make them flow all the way through, you could put huge jumps in like put your slowest pretties ballad right after your heaviest song, or whatever you want to do. My best advice is to see the entire album as one creation, rather than the individual tracks. It is just as much a work of art as the songs are, and you may even need to change some things in the songs (such as intros or outros) to make them fit better in their places. I have even heard of a song being rearranged completely almost from scratch just to make it fit in a certain place on the album. The whole thing is one creative process. Good luck and dont forget to have fun with it.

Jedi

xoxos · Post by **xoxos** » Sat Oct 23, 2004 7:53 pm

the uuh.. bit about putting audio files in your host is like, a suggestion for auditioning the track order, not for burning the cd..

this would also allow for you to do like, sometimes in the old days, 'special things' like have the tail of a song fade into a head, or have 'interludes,' et c.. but i reckon i ought to just shu

intel · Post by **intel** » Sat Oct 23, 2004 8:00 pm

Sepheritoh wrote:I always thought that the "strong song first" is a good idea, but when I listen to many CDs it seems like they tend to put the strongest songs somewhere arbitrary in the middle.

In the old days of vinyl it seemed to be a habbit to put the best song last on the A side.

of course putting the best song at the end of side A is a way to entice you to flip the record and see if side B is as good (Bootsy's 'Ahh The Name Is Bootsy, Baby' did this one up by actually have a medley preview of the B side at the end of side A and a reprise medley of the A side at the end of side B to remind you why you liked the first side).

my philosophy is that you never blow your load in the opening track. if you do that the rest of the cd is a disappointment. you start off with a good track, but not the best and work your way up to the best track. personally I think by placing your best track arbitrarily in the middle you're giving your listeners that extra boost in the middle that says "wait, you haven't heard it all yet". its the subtle little way to get someone to listen to the whole cd. you don't want to wait until the very end, for the best track, because you may have turned listeners off by then, but at the same time you don't want to peak too soon and leave your listeners unsatisfied with the full cd.

SuitcaseOfLizards · Post by **SuitcaseOfLizards** » Sat Oct 23, 2004 8:01 pm

xoxos wrote:the uuh.. bit about putting audio files in your host is like, a suggestion for auditioning the track order, not for burning the cd..

this would also allow for you to do like, sometimes in the old days, 'special things' like have the tail of a song fade into a head, or have 'interludes,' et c.. but i reckon i ought to just shu

lol!

Actually, this is exactly what I did when I burned a few CDs for friends to listen to: loaded all the tracks into Tracktion, played with order, adjusted relative volumes, tweaked and eq'd to make them sound like a coherent whole, then rendered each track out as a "final". Once done, Nero burned 'em and that was that. It worked a treat!

mychaleg · Post by **mychaleg** » Sun Oct 24, 2004 4:48 am

you want start with:

a track that incorporates all the elements of subsequent songs (kind of a teaser/preview)

most attention grabbing/interesting

you don't want all your awesome 'standout' tracks up front though...pepper them tracks throughout to encourage listening to the whole CD!

Steven West · Post by **Steven West** » Mon Oct 25, 2004 3:02 am

woolyloach wrote:
xoxos wrote:the uuh.. bit about putting audio files in your host is like, a suggestion for auditioning the track order, not for burning the cd..

this would also allow for you to do like, sometimes in the old days, 'special things' like have the tail of a song fade into a head, or have 'interludes,' et c.. but i reckon i ought to just shu
lol!

Actually, this is exactly what I did when I burned a few CDs for friends to listen to: loaded all the tracks into Tracktion, played with order, adjusted relative volumes, tweaked and eq'd to make them sound like a coherent whole, then rendered each track out as a "final". Once done, Nero burned 'em and that was that. It worked a treat!

This is why I got WaveLab before any synth or host on my lappy. The abiltity for montages, crossfades, additonal additives, relative track volumes, etc. STUNNING!

And like you Wooley, I set up and audition tracks over and over and over again. Even just the split second seque into the next song is vital I find. I blew my first CD, cause I was in a studio paying by the hour. The engineer was going to space all songs by 2 sec (like most old records) and I got anal about butting one song up to another in cases. Just the way Kraftwerk goes from the one song into Pocket Calculator was SO crucial, and that's what I wanted for my CD. But the engineer said he could only do it in 'frames per second' and I was thinking 'seconds of frames'

After a couple of long days of 'nudge this back five frames, okay 10, okay - jump it up 15'. I realised I was getting nowhere.

WaveLab though is so visual AND precise - I can be as ANAL as I want to be!

To the average listener - they're not going to know a crossfade from a mailbox, or that track 2 came in precisely on the 72ppq spaced beat from the previous song. But it's those details that I think EVERYONE subconciously appreciates.

progfusion74 · Post by **progfusion74** » Mon Oct 25, 2004 4:37 am

If an album is supposed to be anything more than a collection of songs, continuity and mood are very important, at least to me, so (and not that I have any experience doing so), for me the best song need not be the first, but the one that sets up the rest of the album.

Prog

vurt · Post by **vurt** » Mon Oct 25, 2004 5:03 am

suppose it depends on style of tunes?
me personally i try to make sure it flows,and all my tracks are pretty substandard anyway so finding the best in that lot is anyones guess

but for more "pop" orientated music or shall we say structured a general thig you find on most albums is start with a pretty strong track,midway hit em with the catchiest f**ker you got then build up again from there to finish with a strong track also

but try i guess to make sure all your songs/tracks at least have some relevance to you for being there.
no point in just filling out like some bands do with say a few cover versions or whatever?

just my twopennys worth but what the hell do i know

Mighty_Hero · Post by **Mighty_Hero** » Mon Oct 25, 2004 5:08 am

For me, the cd has to tell a story. I feel starting your cd with the hit, is a very bad idea, unless you're like maroon 5, and every song is a great song.
Since I know you are primarily into blues, I would track the songs to tell a story of some kind. If nothing else make 1/2 the cd 'sad' and 1/2 happy or vise versa etc.

In what order should tracks be placed on an CD?