It Was Twenty Years Ago Today

When the Beatles released Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band, the music world was turned on its end. The 1960s, a decade dominated by singles, had suddenly become an album-oriented era. This trend continued through the '70s, '80s, and '90s. In recent years, the art of the album has slowly died down.

But with this in mind, two significant album-related items came up this week. On Tuesday, Billboard announced that Modest Mouse's We Were Dead Before the Ship Even Sank moved the most copies of any album last week, totaling 129,000 albums ordered by retailers. To put the significance of this into perspective, the band had never had so much as a gold album until its 2004 release, Good News For People Who Love Bad News. With the new release, Modest Mouse beat out such pop heavyweights as Joss Stone and American Idol's Elliott Yamin and Chris Daughtry.

This news was interesting in conjunction with an article titled "The Album, a Commodity in Disfavor" in Sunday's New York Times. The article details how the album is essentially a dying art in the mainstream pop, hip-hop, R&B and country genres, offering the example of girl group Candy Hill, recently signed to a two song deal by Universal. Two songs? Seriously? Even Universal, which — no matter what the RIAA tells you — is making more money than God, can't afford to risk signing this group to a whole album deal. But in contrast to the more radio-friendly genres, "fans of jazz, classical, opera and certain rock (bands like Radiohead and Tool) will demand album-length listening experiences for many years to come."

Are these two events connected? I say they are. Modest Mouse has gradually built a rabid album-loving fan base, ultimately resulting in two smash hits in a row. A similar thing happened to Arcade Fire, though signed to an independent label, hit number two with its second album, Neon Bible. The same goes for The Shins, whose album Wincing the Night Away debuted at number three without the help of major label support.

Is the album going the way of the buffalo? Maybe, for the RIAA and Clear Channel. But even in the singles era of the 1950s to 1960s, artists like Bob Dylan were relying on the LP to hit it big. I love albums, but I'll welcome this singles era with open arms if it ends in another golden age of music.