CD bonus tracks

Factual Questions
1

I’ve noticed a spate of CDs lately with “hidden” bonus tracks. Usually these are completely unmentioned in the CD packaging or on the track listing. Generally they appear at the end of the CD after a long silent pause.

I realize the penchant for artists to be cute and original, but with so many artists doing it, it’s no longer very original. In fact, it’s become downright annoying. I think I’ve heard a real non-artistic reason for the bonus tracks but can’t remember it. Something to do with royalties, perhaps? Or do these artists just have too much time on their (and my) hands?

2

Back to the top for this thread. I wanna know. I have many cd’s where the last track is like 17 minutes long but the song is only like 6 minutes long, so there’s 11 or so minutes of dead air and then a weird little song at the very end (usually instrumental.)
I wonder if this is to take up the entire cd as an inconvenience to cd copying or mp3 ripping?

3

I wouldn’t think so, since this has been happening pretty frequently for 9 or 10 years now. MP3 hadn’t even been invented (AFAIK) and cd copying was not very easy for the common joe, as it is today.

4

CDs initially were able to fit more music than other formats (well, cassettes could fit longer than vinyl, but at those lentths the tape quality stinks), and to take advantage of this - as well as drum up sales for a new expensive product which was platyed ona new, expensive product - record companies and bands started to put bonus tracks on the CDs.

Contrary to what the question brings up, these tracks were indeed advertised, both in the track listing and often on the cover itself and in advertisements.

Needless to say, as time went on and CDs were not a “gimmick” anymore, the practice was no longer necessary, but habits die hard.

The practice of “hiding” the songs was an added bonus meant to add some creativity to the process of putting extra tracks on the disc. And fans kinda liked going through all the trouble to find a secret track, your complaints notwithstanding.

Some of the more creative things I’ve seen include how Tool put a bonus track at the beginning of one of their CDs (you had to start the disc, then go backwards through the song it skipped over automatically), and The Supersuckers had an unlisted bonus track which was THE ENTIRE CD PLAYED AGAIN AS ONE SONG! This was, according to the singer, “if you played it in a juke-box, you’d be able to get the while album for the price of one song.”

And then there are the usual cases where there’s dead spots (like the OP describes) and skipping ahead to another track - NIN used 69 for this on one of it’s discs.

Ultimately, you are the first person I have ever seen complain about this. Even I didn’t have any problems with them, and I was someone who reviewed CDs, which meant that missing a bonus track made me look really uninformed about the disc.

Yer pal,
Satan

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5

My band puts hidden tracks in for fun, if you find them, good for you, if not, well you’re usually not missing much as they’re generally the “throw-aways”. We released a little demo tape with the whole B side as an unlisted track (basically it was a live bootleg).

6

I’ll be the second. It really is annoying when you have your changer loaded up to provide continuous music for there to be a 7 minute pause before the Verve storms back through the speakers. I’m glad that not many folks did that with casette tapes. The most annoying thing I had on tape was Revolution No. 9. If a band really wants to be friendly, let them stick a second disc in there like Saint Etienne’s “Good Humour” with an entire uncredited album (“Fairfax High”) tucked into the jewel case.

7

I found it annoying with one CD in particular, because there was that really long pause between the last listed track and the “bonus,” so the first few times I played the CD, the music would end, and I’d usually be doing something else and not paying attention, and the music would suddenly start up again and scare the bejeezus out of me.

8

My recollection is that if the track is not listed on the cover or the CD itself, it gets missed out as far as publishing and mechanical royalties: after all the royalty people don’t listen to the records.

picmr