From Zombies to Ri-Ri: Bonus Hits are Album-Buyer's Ripoff and Chart Bonanza - Idolator Comments

From Zombies to Ri-Ri: Bonus Hits are Album-Buyer's Ripoff and Chart Bonanza

Halfwit — Fri, 16 May 2008 21:24:15 EDT

@Chris Molanphy: I don't have my CD reissue in front of me (stupid Rhino with their stupid crappy mono version of "This Will Be Our Year". The whole rest of the damn album is the stereo version! Why mess with the best song!).

But I digress...

Anyway, "Time of the Season" was on the original album. The "too late" aspect of that band is that the single was released (and took off) like, a year after they had broken up.

Halfwit

From Zombies to Ri-Ri: Bonus Hits are Album-Buyer's Ripoff and Chart Bonanza

Chris Molanphy — Fri, 16 May 2008 19:10:33 EDT

@The Illiterate: Thanks!

Chris Molanphy

From Zombies to Ri-Ri: Bonus Hits are Album-Buyer's Ripoff and Chart Bonanza

The Illiterate — Fri, 16 May 2008 18:44:10 EDT

@Chris Molanphy: If the Zombies example doesn't work out as an example from the 60s, there's always the first Buffalo Springfield album, which didn't originally include "For What It's Worth".

The Illiterate

From Zombies to Ri-Ri: Bonus Hits are Album-Buyer's Ripoff and Chart Bonanza

Chris Molanphy — Fri, 16 May 2008 18:00:32 EDT

@Al Shipley: Good point, and I knew that, but I didn't have time to discuss the nuances there. (Good Lord, if this column isn't long enough!)

To further your point, the Shakira track is also the outlier among the stuff I listed, because "Hips Don't Lie" wasn't just a hit, it was by far the biggest hit from that album (and of Shakira's career). "My Boo," "Don't Forget About Us," etc. were all lesser, shorter-lived hits than their predecessors.

All that said, I guess it depends on whether one classifies the Shakira album as an out-and-out flop or just a conglomerate-worrying underperformer. The album was gold-plus when they decided to order up the Wyclef track. I agree with you, it was an album-saver, not a "victory lap," but very broadly speaking it qualifies.

Chris Molanphy

From Zombies to Ri-Ri: Bonus Hits are Album-Buyer's Ripoff and Chart Bonanza

Chris N. — Fri, 16 May 2008 17:52:56 EDT

Dunno how this fits in, but Cracker's "Eurotrash Girl" was worked as a single even though it only appeared on 'Kerosene Hat' as a hidden track.

Chris N.

From Zombies to Ri-Ri: Bonus Hits are Album-Buyer's Ripoff and Chart Bonanza

Al Shipley — Fri, 16 May 2008 17:46:42 EDT

You lumped Shakira in with the victory lap re-releases of already big albums, but I think that was more of an instance of trying to save an underperforming album. Oral Fixation Vol. 2 and its first single actually charted lower and sold less (in the US!) than their Spanish-language predecessors Fijación Oral Vol. 1 and "La Tortura" had a few months prior, so they really needed "Hips Don't Lie" to rescue it from flop status.

Al Shipley

From Zombies to Ri-Ri: Bonus Hits are Album-Buyer's Ripoff and Chart Bonanza

Chris N. — Fri, 16 May 2008 17:41:45 EDT

"The real shocker: who are the 44,000 people who paid for 'Violet Hill' a week after it was offered for free?!"

I'm guessing people who didn't know about it until it showed up on their iTunes storefront.

Chris N.

From Zombies to Ri-Ri: Bonus Hits are Album-Buyer's Ripoff and Chart Bonanza

NeverEnough — Fri, 16 May 2008 17:41:09 EDT

@Butch Huskey: Yay! for the KLF reference.

NeverEnough

From Zombies to Ri-Ri: Bonus Hits are Album-Buyer's Ripoff and Chart Bonanza

Chris Molanphy — Fri, 16 May 2008 17:25:28 EDT

@sydbarrett05: This is what I get for relying on Wikipedia. Could you check the CD liner notes, please? (Am at work, can't check.) I thought they confirmed that "Time of the Season" was a belated edition to the album.

Truthfully, I've always heard the album this way - love "Time of the Season" but it always stands out of the flow of the rest of the record, which has a thematic unity I don't hear in that single.

@Butch Huskey: Good point about Plain White T's, but they don't really fit the trend of the last half-decade of intentional, premeditated re-releases of already-successful albums. "Hey There Delilah" was just an old-fashioned fluke hit that made the PWTs' reissued album a hit in the first place; it's not like it had been a hit before.

Chris Molanphy

From Zombies to Ri-Ri: Bonus Hits are Album-Buyer's Ripoff and Chart Bonanza

Ned Raggett — Fri, 16 May 2008 17:22:54 EDT

"Dirty Dawg"? God help us. (So of course I went to YouTube and...)

Ned Raggett

From Zombies to Ri-Ri: Bonus Hits are Album-Buyer's Ripoff and Chart Bonanza

Butch Huskey — Fri, 16 May 2008 16:48:29 EDT

Gym Class Heroes "Cupid's Chokehold" & Plain White T's "Hey There Delilah" were not on the original album (cd) releases

but back to PSB-era chart flukes; The KLF's "Justified And Ancient" was another too-late for the album hit

Butch Huskey

From Zombies to Ri-Ri: Bonus Hits are Album-Buyer's Ripoff and Chart Bonanza

sydbarrett05 — Fri, 16 May 2008 16:46:21 EDT

"Time of The Season" was always on Odessey And Oracle...according to the scratched original UK issue of this that I have it is...it is the last track on the record...

The new edition has the album in different mono and stereo mixes and a couple of bonus tracks from the sessions...
I see it as the last word on this record...

sydbarrett05

From Zombies to Ri-Ri: Bonus Hits are Album-Buyer's Ripoff and Chart Bonanza

Audif Jackson Winters III — Fri, 16 May 2008 16:37:20 EDT

Anyone else notice that "4 Minutes" has topped the UK singles chart for 4 weeks straight? And probably will for a fifth? Despite the fact that's it's a dreadful, dreadful track?

Audif Jackson Winters III