Deleting One Song

Emily and I were discussing the new Wilco record, Sky Blue Sky, today. We got an advance copy and have been listening non-stop in our house the past couple days.

Emily said she loves it, but hates one song on the record called Shake It Off. She mentioned that she had the same problem with A Ghost Is Born and the song called Spiders (Kidsmoke).

I suggested she just hit the delete key and zap the song from the record in iTunes.

Now album purists like Jackson are going to cry foul. Skip the damn song if you don't like it, but don't maim the record, they'll likely say.

This is the dilemma with digital art. The consumer can modify it to suit their tastes and destroy what the artist was trying to accomplish. But on the other hand if deleting one song (microchunk) makes the listening experience notably better and leads to more listens, isn't that a positive?

What do you all think?

Comments

[dave]

I think people should be free to do what they choose; but my experience suggests that deleting it entirely is a mistake. I've felt that way about a number of albums -- there was one song that I hated and needed to skip every time. But over time, many of them have really, really grown on me, and I came to really like the effect they had on listening to the entire album. My tastes aren't immutable, and I want to make enough time for them to change.

[TheBillfold]

Remember the old adage: "The customer is always right." So, feel free to do as you please with what you buy, in my opinion.

[Mike Feinstein]

Of course, people can do what they like. However, as an old-time 'album' collector, I have a hard time deleting songs I don't listen to. I just skip them. Or, I give them another try to see if they will grow on me. I think that the digital music phenomenon has curtailed the album view of music. Some great albums only work in order (Quadrophenia, The Wall). You can't listen to those on Shuffle Play...

[carl rahn griffith]

unless it's a heavyweight (ie, pretentious more often than not) concept album of the type that dominated the 70s - eg, dark side of the moon, tubular bells, tommy, et al - i believe one can edit tracks away without compromising the listening experience; even the most noble and gifted of bands have 'filler' tracks.

about the only 'whole' albums on my ipod are ones by the white stripes and the raconteurs/the arctic monkeys (easy for those last 2 guys, having each made only one album thus far!).

for example, how many times did a - sorry - ringo starr track ruin a beatles album? not many times, but enough - eg, octopus' garden. even mccartney sang a few duffers also, that compromised the listening experience.

qed!

[Eric]

Too bad for Emily - Spiders (Kidsmoke) is the best song on the record. :-)

[Dave!]

Why delete *anything*? It's easy enough to keep the song and just modify the playlist so you don't hear it. Then you don't destroy the album, but don't have to listen to a song you don't like.

I'm with Dave, though, sometimes a song I initially hate will grow on me in ways unexpected.

[Steve]

Gotta agree with Emily -- "Shake It Off" is pretty awful. My friends and I have already started calling it the new "Kingpin", which, if you've seen Wilco live before, it's impossible not to hate. "Spiders", on the other hand, is an incredible (if a tad long) song.

As for deleting the song, though... it's not something I could ever do. It's part of the album, and part of the band's artistic vision. After 12 years (and longer with Jeff's prior band), I've come to trust his vision pretty well. I may skip the song, but IMO it should be there on my iPod.

Plus, if it's not on my iPod, there's no chance it will ever grow on me. I don't like it now, but you never know what happens down the road...

[Eric Lunt]

If she deletes it, how will she grow to appreciate what is undoubtedly the best track on the album? Please tell Emily she can just send the track to me ... save the bits!

Glad you're enjoying Chicago's hometown heroes.

[Henkel-Wallace]

Hey, it's hers. Forget the artist. She won't be "maiming" anything.

I know you're asking a question of taste, but think for a sec of the bigger question: what has happened to the doctrine of first sale? In general, droit de suite is a messed-up idea, and it's infiltrating the USA.

This idea leads to such travesties as the David Lynch attitude that viewers should not be permitted to pause or fast-forward his DVDs (did he get away with it? Who knows -- I won't bother to get one and be annoyed). And how come the DVDs have to implement that misfeature anyway?

Should Ford care if its car is used to commute to work, rob a bank or make a baby? Should Wilco care if the music is listened to by kids/hipsters/nerds/wrinklies?

[jackson]

You see, the forest IS MADE OF trees, forest, trees, see? No I guess not.

If you don't understand why such behavior is unfortunate - and why would you you when you are so busy tossing out the past, then you'll just never get it I suppose.

Do what you like, Rock is dead, dance on it's corpse while your at it.

(Dramatic enough? I can do bigger)

Octopus' Garden is a f'in masterpiece - who ARE these people?

[Chris Rako]

I know you're really busy, but posts like this cause me to wonder if you have too much time on your hand. rar rar

[Tony Alva]

Needless to say, I'm with Jackson on this one. Wolfmother is the ONLY good band to emerge in the last ten years, and along with a couple of Tom Petty albums, is the only "new" music worthy of purchase.

Ain't technology grand. Rock is dead, long live rock.

[jeremy]

how is this different from downloading 1-2 songs from an album?

[JayR]

I opted out of all of the Yoko shit on Double Fantasy and lived happily ever after.

[EthanB]

Fred, you should probably pull this same stunt with the Nels Cline album...purge the avant-garde, save the listenable stuff!

I say deleting a song forever is probably not a smart move, but backing it up and then dialing in your iTunes library with only the tracks you like makes enough sense to me.

I'm as deep in music as anyone but records don't need to be [and can't be] as sacrosanct as they used to be. I think your daughter's opinion is excellent evidence of this. That is the future, without doubt.

Unless it's UNBELIEVABLY good. Scarcity of attention = content has to be truly amazing to capture it.

[Tanya]

I have struggled with this myself- but I have done deleted a song here and there. If I try...but just can't seem to like it- I'll delete it- and feel guilty about it for a short time. Once I listen to the album again a few times- I appreciate not frantically trying to skip the song.

As for learning to like a song...one can find themselves singing along with REALLY BAD music if they are exposed long enough- if you don't like it- and don't want to like it- delete!

[Peter C]

Once the artist decides to sell their art, it is the consumer's perogative to enjoy that art in any way she chooses. The artist can defend their perspective on the art during live performances, album ordering, magazine interviews, etc.; but once they sell it to someone else, the means and order of the consumption should be determined by the rightful owner as long as they are respecting copyright law. Delete away. Eye of the beholder and all that.

[Brad]

Personally, i dont delete very much music. If i dont want to hear the song, i rate it 2 (if i want to come back and revisit why i have an entire artist, i will rate those 1) and then filter all my autoplaylists to keep out the ones rated 1 or 2.

[Preston]

Delete it. If you can purchase by the song, then you can purchase 10 of the 11 songs. Delete the song. Purists lost their leg to stand on when labels started selling songs to iTunes for 99 cents.

[Steve]

That's actually a pretty silly point. Purists tend to want to listen to an album straight through because that's the way the ARTIST intended. Your point, though, is that LABELS started selling songs to iTunes for 99 cents. Two very different things, and no purist I know gives a darn as to how a label thinks they should listen to (or obtain) their music.

And, to the extent that artists offer their songs individually, for most it's a necessity of the business if they actually want to eat.

[swl]

For artists you truly love/respect: don't delete
For all others: delete

[Dan]

there is a middle way. In iTunes (at least) you can just 'uncheck' the song (should be an icon on the first column on the left). This way you can keep it, but iTunes will not play it or transfer it to her iPod.

[John Zeratsky]

I'm with Dan.

I never delete music I purposefully acquired, but I uncheck songs a lot.

But then again, I'm an "album guy" through and through. Sometimes I go back and re-check songs just to hear an album as the artist intended.

[Brett Crossley]

That entry took me back. Before mp3's took off I thought about adding a feature with a tiny database to CD players that would remember which tracks you didn't like on any given CD so that you could 'delete' them. I did the same thing Emily did as I ripped CDs early on, not bothering to grab tracks I didn't like. Currently I use Napster, so there isn't anything to delete, just a question of whether I go get a track or not.

[Andy Swan]

Pick the pepperoni of the pizza if you don't like it.

Not every album is Sgt. Pepper and the artists know it.