Lynch
Here for the cookies and the tunes
I've been playing Music From The Elder (1981) a lot lately! I have always liked this album, even dating back to the early 80's when I first got the album, I really dug it. A truly underrated album of theirs, probably the band's most underrated album. The album was both a commercial and a critical flop. However, it definitely has a 'cult status' among many die-hard fans. I remember many fans talking about the album during the early-to-mid 1990's when the band was doing their KISS Konvention tours. Thankfully the fans showed so much love for the album because the band included one of the songs on their Unplugged show, A World Without Heroes.
Anyway, back in the early 80's, when I was still a kid, I used to play this album (among every other KISS album) a LOT when I was playing Ultima II, a Dungeons and Dragons style game on my old Apple IIe. So, along with the memory of playing The Elder while playing games with a medieval theme, I am now playing Skyrim and playing this album in the background brings back memories for me, as well as the album theme really fits with the game.
Music From "The Elder" (1981)
View attachment 24889
Track Listing:
Side A:
1. The Oath
2. Fanfare
3. Just a Boy
4. Dark Light
5. Only You
6. Under the Rose
Side B:
1. A World Without Heroes
2. Mr. Blackwell
3. Escape from the Island
4. Odyssey
5. I
6. Finale
Music From "The Elder"
So, I have just finished listening to both releases of this album on CD. The original which has the PROPER damn track listing and proper track order, this is the version that I have known since I first got this album back in the early 90's.
Then I listened to the "remastered" version that came out in 1997. I have not understood why they changed up the order on this. It doesn't flow the same and it doesn't make any sense.
Original track listing:
1. The Oath
2. Fanfare
3. Just a Boy
4. Dark Light
5. Only You
6. Under the Rose
7. A World Without Heroes
8. Mr. Blackwell
9. Escape from the Island
10. Odyssey
11. I
12. Finale
Remastered track listing:
1. Fanfare
2. Just a Boy
3. Odyssey
4. Only You
5. Under the Rose
6. Dark Light
7. A World Without Heroes
8. The Oath
9. Mr. Blackwell
10. Escape from the Island
11. I
For the love of God, can someone, anyone, please share some insider secret as to why bands do this shit?
This is the only album that I am aware of with KISS doing it, but plenty of British invasion bands did this, hell, they had completely separate albums for the US and the UK, different names in some cases, and completely different track listings. Also a lot of hard rock bands in the 80's and early 90's did this with US vs Japan releases. This isn't even the different country relase though, this is US vs US ... original vs remaster, reorder, remix and readjust. It drives me nuts. The time stamps also don't match up, I don't think there is one track that is the same length on both versions, although there are 2 tracks that are only 1 second off.
*sigh*
just venting. Seriously though, I'd love to hear some honest opinions on question.