Most of time I listen to albums on shuffle, but when I get a new album I have a habit of listening to the album track by track in the order that it was intended.

:P Impossible Soul is one of my favorite Sufjan tracks.

This. On most punk albums it really doesn't matter for example. But there are a decent amount of albums out there that are as good as they are in part because of the track order.

It matters to me. The original tracklisting is the only way to listen to it for me. Each track fits into its own groove (most of the time) and they play off each other by the way they flow together and create tensions. Sometimes you'll have thematic or aural connections that creates an intended sense of unity and focus that you lose by shuffling.

Yes, a messy tracklist makes for a poor listening experience.

I only read about half of the posts and I have to say I agree, that even if an album weren't a concept album and isn't aa load of generic tunes or most pop music, then the order does matter in regards to flow.

There is another reason though that it is important to me. Certain artists and groups that I like are for me, hit and miss.

One example is Die Fantastischen Vier [The Fantastic Four, German hip-hop group].

I love about half of their material and the other half is simply annoying, but some of the tracks on either side of the fence (loved or annoyed) are ones I actually prefer to listen to on occasion when I am in the mood for them. By listening in order, I know which track numbers on which albums to skip or not. Shuffling them would make that difficult to remember, because again, there are some that I sometimes want to hear and sometimes don't so even if I made a mix without the ones I never want to hear, it would be tedious skipping, or if there was one in particular I wanted to hear, it would be even more tedious.



Sent from my SCH-S720C using Tapatalk 2

Never used the shuffle button, don't plan to.

1st track Heavy

2nd track there AAA track

3rd track the single

4th track there AA tracks

5th track Ballad

6th and 7th TEH MEAT or MIDDLE

8th ..????

9th this track is usually a good song

10th and 11th ..??????

12th the closer

I don't shuffle an album. It loses impact of the story telling in a lot of ways. like Kendricks Lamars-Good Kid Maad City or Pink Floyd etc etc. majority of the time the artist put the songs in that order for a reason.

I'm an album guy. Ever since I started listening to music seriously with Led Zeppelin (who were always an album band) I've always seen albums as one piece of art. So in 90% of the music I listen to, the order matters as the album is a piece of art that was made in a certain way for a reason. But then again, a lot of early jazz and blues were recorded before albums became a thing, so then it doesn't really matter. A lot of 60's soul focuses on singles and the album is never really thought out as an album, so that's also an exception.

The shuffle function is one I use if I listen to any of these genres and I want it to get more exciting, or if I've created say a hip hop playlist with songs and I want to be surprised. But putting "The Black Saint and the Sinner Lady" on shuffle would never work for me for example. I must say though, that it is fun at times putting your whole music library on shuffle...