Remove one song from an almost perfect album to make it a perfect album

Of course there are loads of famous Beach Boys ones - Student Demonstration Time and Transcendental Meditation being two. Controversially, I'd have left Good Vibrations off of Smiley Smile as it totally ruins the mood of that album.

i'm new here. what's OTM mean?

Take the tracks from the EP you've got left and include them as bonus tracks on the end of Love.

I know that's two.

So, so right.

Also:

Take "Don't Stop" off The Stone Roses
Take "Someone Like The Moon" off His'n'Hers

Oh well, whatever...I'd purge "Hell Ain't a Bad Place To Be" from Let There Be Rock, "Tea For One" from Zep's Presence, "3-Minute Rule" from Paul's Boutique and the title cut from Taking Tiger Mountain By Strategy.

Oh, and "Dreams" from Fleetwood Mac's Rumours. Nothing wrong, I just don't like it.

Maybe "The Murder Mystery" from The Velvet Underground.

I don't like "Good Vibrations" tacked onto the CD and tape versions of Endless Summer.

I've never much liked "She's Out Of My Life" on Off The Wall.

"O My Soul" is a good song, but a rather sluggish (and lengthy) opening for Radio City.

More:

"Thorn Tree In The Garden" from Layla.

"Opportunities (Let's Make Lots Of Money)" from Discography (Pet Shop Boys)

"Snappin' & Trappin'" from Stankonia

"In Love With You (ft. Stephen Marley)" from Mama's Gun (Erykah Badu)

Comments?

I totally agree with you. However, I'm looking at Aquemini and Stankonia, and I don't know what I'd take off. I picked on "Snappin' & Trappin'" because it follows "Gasoline Dreams," "So Fresh, So Clean" and "Ms. Jackson," and just kills the momentum.

On a side note, "Kim and Cookie" is the best thing ever.

wack???!!

Take "Stand" off of Green. It wouldn't end up a perfect album, but for me it'd make it the last early REM album instead of the first late REM album.

Shouldn't it be "Songbird"? That's the dud one for me.

BTW, yknow what another good homogenous album is that ive never seen mentioned here? cass mccombs's A. a friend of mine pointed out that listening to the whole thing makes him feel totally drunk, and i agree.

I would submit "Within You Without You" from Sgt. Pepper to this unglorious list.

Why do we need a John Cale wank piece in the middle of a rockin' album?

I went into greater depth about that here...

In Praise of....It'll End in Tears by This Mortal Coil

This isn't a bad song at all but it's the only song on this stupendous double album that smacks, just ever so faintly, of filler. It was perfect already but removing this song would push it over the top into transcendence, probably.

Tug Of War is a remarkably strong and overlooked album, but I'd be tempted to take off 'Ballroom Dancing' too. The other Wonder collab on that album is a slammer!

There are no perfect albums. They're all flawed in some way.

you're flawed in some way

As is everyone, including you. Well observed, by the way. Gold star.

But, y'know, to be fair, I've never once thought that XTC were an "'80s synthpop band", so clearly the ability to listen and comprehend what I'm hearing isn't one of those flaws.

I like the "Ebony and Ivory" demo as well, that version would have fitted nicely on McCartney II. I think the song would be a lot more tolerable as one of McCartney's non-specific "why can't we all get along" neurotically-anxious-under-the-surface lullabies, rather than awkwardly trying to make it "about" racism.

I always stop Help! before "Dizzy Miss Lizzy". Feels tacked on.

I always skip "Something Big" on Jim O'Rourke's Eureka. Those fucking singers and that chorus... I mean, I know there's gotta be some intertextual reason for having the Hawaiian chorus in there, just like the over the top SNL sax on "Through the Night Softly," but when that "THERE'LL BE JOY AND THERE'LL BE PLEASURE" warble comes on I abandon ship.

Surprised the removal of "Nothing Like You" from Miles' Sorcerer hasn't come up yet.

― Montgomery Burns' Jazz (Tarfumes The Escape Goat), Tuesday, August 16, 2016 10:03 AM (three weeks ago)

Haha, just discovered this album and did a search to see if this was mentioned

I'd suggest removing "It Ain't No Use" from The Meters' Rejuvenation... It's not a bad tune per se, but a sprawling 12 minute hippie rock jam on an album full of tight incredibly funk numbers (the second longest tune is less than half the length of "It Ain't No Use") feels wrong.

Also, remove "Purple Rain" from Purple Rain. The rest of the album is filled with energetic pop-funk numbers and idiosyncratic slower jams ("The Beautiful Ones"!) exploring Prince's psychosexual tics in ways rarely heard in mainstream pop. And then it ends with a pointlessly stretched-out, run-of-the-mill hair metal power ballad with lyrics that'd make Bom Jovi proud.

I like "Purple Rain" but I agree it's the least interesting song on the album.
Also I have never liked "Let's go crazy" much...
The album would be better with "Sex Shooter" and "Jungle Love" instead !

And "Erotic City"!

"Let's Go Crazy" works better as the 12" extended mix, and "I Would Die 4 U" even moreso. In fact, the 10 minute version of the latter is clearly the best single from the album.

is there an equivalent thread where you add one song to a classic album to make it better ?

cos PR with "Erotic City" would be great indeed !

yall are INSANE

Bon Jovi's spirited use of cliches is not to be confused with Prince's simplicity, not to mention the use of a striking image (uh "purple rain").

Maybe so, but even with genius lyrics it'd be by far the most boring song on the album.

Challops

"My Rival"

thought you were talking about like flies on sherbert for a second and was ready to internet fight you. anyway back on track, i've been listening to green's s/t a lot and technology, while not awful, seems pretty unnecessary and is the only track i ever skip on this record.

"Born in a Mourning Hall" on Blind Guardian's Imaginations isn't a bad song, but it kind of lags in between two great ones....so that one.

Yes, I'll match him whim for whim now" is the key Gaucho lyric.

i don't know if there's a thread about it, but my platonic image of the first roxy music album includes "virginia plain". same goes for _nothing can stop us_ and "shipbuilding".

Hymn of the Big Wheel

"Bodysnatchers"

Remove "Across The Universe" from Young Americans.

Remove it, place it in lead lined box and dump in somewhere in the North Atlantic. Talking of shitty Beatles' covers, someone please build a time machine and go back and tell Jimmy Webb to not to bother with a finger popping version of "Ticket to Ride" and not to stick it right in the middle of the 5th Dimension's "Magic Garden", like fresh dog turd on fine Persian rug.

... lost an 'a' or two there.

this is probably not going to go down well but I don't think removing "Beside You" from Astral Weeks would harm it much

It's not my favorite song, but it's certainly one of Richard Davis' more intriguing performances on the record. And less Richard Davis would make for a worse Astral Weeks.

I think I might prefer an instrumental version

the sequencing doesn't help it any either

Blasphemers

Ornette's Town Hall 1962 is pretty much perfect (and the equal of any of his Atlantic LPs) if you lose "Dedication to Poets and Writers"

Take Shot With His Own Gun off Elvis Costello Trust.

take "single file" off the elliott smith s/t. it's not awful by any means but it doesn't live up to the rest of the album

"Wendell Gee" from Fables

― Mr. Snrub, Monday, August 22, 2016 2:37 PM (six years ago)

WTF(?!)

“Deeper Understanding” should have been omitted from The Sensual World

“Stay Away” from Nevermind (even though I really like the guitar melting with Cobain’s voice on the refrain; “Even in His Youth” should have taken its place)

Not sure I'd delete any tracks from Rumors, but I'd absolutely close it with "Silver Springs."

Yes to Stay Away. Even in His Youth would have been better.

“Stay Away” from Nevermind

illegal opinion

“My Little Problem” from All Shook Down is corny AF. It wouldn’t be a Replacements album without something self-consciously anti-earnest, but I don’t like this one.

Going the other way, I kind of love notorious perfection-interruptor “Student Demonstration Time”. Anyone else?

"Box 25/4 Lid" from The Soft Machine, (apart from the 90s CD which also has Volume Two, then it functions as an intermission between LPs)

I still skip 'The New Stone Age' from Architecture & Morality, I don't really dislike the song, it just sounds so terrible, the horrible, out-of-tune guitars mostly.

It does have a brilliant outro though, so I will skip/rewind and listen to that bit.