Do you care for cohesiveness with albums?

[Guillaume Hamon 6,517]

7 minutes ago, elijahfan said:

Making it cohesive without the songs sounding the same can be tricky though.

This!

[KORG 4,756]

4 minutes ago, Guillaume Hamon said:

This!

The fame managed it, as did born this way.. and ARTPOP, and chromatica...

[Guillaume Hamon 6,517]

2 minutes ago, KORG said:

The fame managed it, as did born this way.. and ARTPOP, and chromatica...

I globally agree but to different extents imo.

[berlinforme 5,316]

I enjoy cohesiveness but I don't need it. On albums with such a strong theme as Chromatica and a tied in production with songs going into each other I think it's a must, though

[Chris Thomason 963]

I couldn't care less about cohesion, I feel like cohesive albums can get quite monotonous and unmemorable. The songs can be quite indistinguishable. Give me a full collection of great songs with variation send me on a proper journey. Surprise me.

As Gaga has always said, don't put the artist in a box. Remember, most people aren't listening to full albums at a time they are hearing a song off an album as a standalone. Playlists are usually put on shuffle so album cohesion quickly becomes meaningless.

[ARTGOD 3,266]

Cohesion is good but not to the detriment of other elements like sonic variety., though at the very minimum there should be something tying the songs together, it could be sound, lyrics, or something else.

Despite popular belief, I think Gaga’s albums are really cohesive, and they have good track sequencing. There are very few harsh transitions between songs, which helps make an album feel cohesive.

[whore 11,447]

[redacted]

[Guillaume Hamon 6,517]

9 minutes ago, ARTGOD said:

Cohesion is good but not to the detriment of other elements like sonic variety., though at the very minimum there should be something tying the songs together, it could be sound, lyrics, or something else.

Yeah gaga's albums that were called "not cohesive" often receive this title cause it was very different music genres on the same album yet it was telling the same story globally like a travel with different ways of transport. ^^

PS: Unrelated but Zayn on your pic, the dreamed boyfriend lmao.

[Guillaume Hamon 6,517]

21 minutes ago, Chris Thomason said:

Give me a full collection of great songs with variation send me on a proper journey. Surprise me.

Same I like surprises more than I like the full experience thing even if I don't have anything against it.^^

[Guillaume Hamon 6,517]

7 minutes ago, Loeppke said:

Yes, because it wouldn’t be an album without a cohesive sound or theme.

Yep cohesion can be made in different ways. I feel like gaga critics about her lacking directions etc mainly came from her doing widely different rythmes/ music genres etc yet it still were coherent projects imo. ^^

[Defmix100 6,394]

I personally prefer albums where each song sounds pretty different. I see (or feel?) the color of music and so albums where each song is a different color is great, ARTPOP is that way for me.

[Guest]

I care about cohesiveness if it is there, but an album without cohesiveness is not something I fault it for.

[Bling 31,443]

I much prefer a cohesive album and production versus not. 

My issue with Chromatica is the tracks as a whole sound more alike and aren't different "enough" if that makes sense. For reference, Madonna's Confessions had a very cohesive feel but you can pick the tracks out from each other. SZA's CTRL is another example of impeccable cohesion. 

Many of Chromatica's tracks bleed into each other a bit too much. Still an amazing album though. 

[ARTGOD 3,266]

To elaborate a little bit:

Every album should have something that ties every song together, it could be a theme, a story, a sound or something else, if an album lacks at least one of those elements I tend to wonder “Why are all these songs on this album aside from the fact that they were written around the same time?”.

Usually just one thing is enough to make an album feel like a cohesive work, if you try to make an album cohesive in every single way then the songs start to blend together. You shouldn’t try to make an album overly cohesive because then you start to lose what makes an album exciting which is the ups and downs, the variety and the journey it takes you through.

I think some people value cohesion too much, and think a good album is necessarily a really cohesive one, while often that is not the case. Being cohesive is just base level stuff, and it’s honestly not that hard. For an album to be truly great it has to offer way more than that.

[Guillaume Hamon 6,517]

9 hours ago, Delaytica said:

My issue with Chromatica is the tracks as a whole sound more alike and aren't different "enough" if that makes sense. For reference, Madonna's Confessions had a very cohesive feel but you can pick the tracks out from each other. SZA's CTRL is another example of impeccable cohesion. 

Many of Chromatica's tracks bleed into each other a bit too much. Still an amazing album though.

I agree! Cohesiveness needs uniqueness to work and Chromatica lacks it a bit here or there.