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The Wedding Present Experiment

Although I am a big fan of the "album" - a collection of songs with various common threads and if done correctly, greater than the sum of its parts - I have sometimes wondered why artists don't simply release each new song as a single. It makes a certain amount of sense from a marketing standpoint. (I'm gonna let you guys run down the pros and cons.)

Apparently, the Wedding Present tried this in the early 90s, against their label's advice I might add. For some reason, the British music press disliked this band (which is weird, cos they've a sound the music rags would likely champion, eh?) and despite a rather loyal fanbase, the experiment failed*.

* I don't think we can blame the quality of the songs. I have Hit Parade 1 which is a collection of the first half of songs released initially only as singles, and I can tell you it's pretty darn good.

Singles vs Albums, the Wedding Present, fickle critics, fickle fans, or whatever the heck is remotely related to the above! DiScuss.
oceanRain | 30 Sep '05, 05:17 | Send note | Report this | Reply | X

  • Re: The Wedding Present Experiment

    "the British music press disliked this band"...

    That's not how I remember it at all. In the NME all year with that one.

    Was a good project anyway. Some songs weaker than others. Great band anyway.

    They keep talking about the "Death Of The Album" what with all these new interweb download whatsits and all that. But I still download complete albums, doesn't feel right otherwise.


    zxcvbnm | 30 Sep '05, 07:40 | Reply | X

  • Re: The Wedding Present Experiment

    The Wedding Present probably weren't big enough to pull it off...which is why it's doomed to fail from the start.

    You need a band that people are into who buy singles but which are big enough and have a big enough publicity machine that they can sell those singles.

    Unfortunately these days I think the rules regarding singles make it impossible because a CD has to cost £3.99 or something like that (record companies give freebies to the shops to allow them to sell cheaper) and they can only have 3 songs on or something. I guess the last point isn't a big problem if you're only releasing singles as you'll not have much b-side material.

    But you could only make this work if the total cost was much less than an album and you could guarantee all of them being elligible for the charts.


    That said, MP3 singles would now be do-able since they fall under a totally different set of rules. And at the end you could just burn the 'album'.
    iShotTheDeputy | 30 Sep '05, 08:56 | Reply | X

    • Re: The Wedding Present Experiment

      wut? it did work. They released the singles, people bought them. They probably never went platinum or nuthin but I don't think that was the point.

      zxcvbnm @iShotTheDeputy | 30 Sep '05, 09:55 | Reply | X

      • Re: The Wedding Present Experiment

        I thought it worked for them too. The Melvins released a limited edition single a month for a year and they all sold out. It's not something you want to do to enhance your profile though. People who are already your fans are going to be the only people buying most of the time.
        mug_mug_mug @zxcvbnm | 30 Sep '05, 10:30 | Reply | X

      • Re: The Wedding Present Experiment

        They all went top 40 as well - until all those bloody elvis reissues, I think they held the record for most top 40 singles in a year.
        guntrip @zxcvbnm | 30 Sep '05, 10:43 | Reply | X

        • Re: The Wedding Present Experiment

          They held the record for most top 40 singles in a year - for a UK act..............but Elvis had 14 singles enter the chart in a year, sometime prior to this. Then went and beat that with those bloody 1 a week releases. So it goes something like this:

          (1) Elvis with (I can't bloody rememeber how many of the fuckers they re-released?!! Was it 18?!?!)

          (2) Elvis with 14

          (3) The Wedding Present with 12
          Selfie @guntrip | 30 Sep '05, 16:48 | Reply | X

  • Re: The Wedding Present Experiment

    did it fail? i thought all the singls went top 40
    back in the days when this was something of an achievement.
    alcxxk | 30 Sep '05, 20:15 | Reply | X

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