# Do you read album liner notes? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [May 17, 2007, 2:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-read-album-liner-notes/404445 "2007-05-17T14:26:54Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 11\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Mbossa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/73ab20/32.png) [@Mbossa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mbossa)\ **Post date:** [May 24, 2007, 4:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-read-album-liner-notes/404445/21 "2007-05-24T04:49:45Z")
Every time. And after finding the hidden artwork in Radiohead’s _Kid A_, I also fully disassemble the case for every CD I buy. ---
**Author:** ![susan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/susan/32/17537_2.png) [@susan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/susan)\ **Post date:** [May 24, 2007, 4:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-read-album-liner-notes/404445/22 "2007-05-24T04:56:46Z")
Yup. ---
**Author:** ![Equipoise](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/equipoise/32/151_2.png) [@Equipoise](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Equipoise)\ **Post date:** [May 24, 2007, 6:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-read-album-liner-notes/404445/23 "2007-05-24T06:37:07Z")
Always, at least once, before I burn the CD to mp3 and put it up on the shelf. I’ve been thanked in the liner notes of several albums, so those are particularly special to me, and it’s more fun to see them in print on the CD booklet than in the credits online. ---
**Author:** ![DfrntBreign](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/f6c823/32.png) [@DfrntBreign](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DfrntBreign)\ **Post date:** [May 24, 2007, 10:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-read-album-liner-notes/404445/24 "2007-05-24T10:12:41Z")
[QUOTE=Equipoise] I’ve been thanked in the liner notes of several albums, [/QUOTE] \ Could you expand on this, please? (As much as your comfortable, I am not asking for your identity.) This is something I’ve always been curious about. For what kinds of things are the band thanking people? Are they friends, or relatives, people who loaned them a djembe or what? And yeah, I read them. My friends wish I wouldn’t. ---
**Author:** ![Crotalus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/crotalus/32/41_2.png) [@Crotalus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Crotalus)\ **Post date:** [May 24, 2007, 11:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-read-album-liner-notes/404445/25 "2007-05-24T11:25:05Z")
Of course I read them. How else would I acquire the information I need to bore my wife and friends with esoterica about the music? ---
**Author:** ![interface2x](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/c0e974/32.png) [@interface2x](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/interface2x)\ **Post date:** [May 24, 2007, 12:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-read-album-liner-notes/404445/26 "2007-05-24T12:43:39Z")
I always read them, as well. ---
**Author:** ![Spoons](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/spoons/32/3141_2.png) [@Spoons](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spoons)\ **Post date:** [May 24, 2007, 2:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-read-album-liner-notes/404445/27 "2007-05-24T14:52:22Z")
I read them. I’ll agree with the others who say that they’re difficult to read at times, owing to their smallness; and I believe there is a special corner of hell reserved for those graphic designers who believe that people can easily read them in spite of the design elements on the page, but I read them. ---
**Author:** ![Sean\_Factotum](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/50afbb/32.png) [@Sean\_Factotum](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sean_Factotum)\ **Post date:** [May 24, 2007, 3:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-read-album-liner-notes/404445/28 "2007-05-24T15:01:07Z")
[QUOTE=Equipoise] Always, at least once, before I burn the CD to mp3 and put it up on the shelf. I’ve been thanked in the liner notes of several albums, so those are particularly special to me, and it’s more fun to see them in print on the CD booklet than in the credits online. [/QUOTE] Whoa, I could have wrote this exact entry. Scary. ---
**Author:** ![Equipoise](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/equipoise/32/151_2.png) [@Equipoise](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Equipoise)\ **Post date:** [May 24, 2007, 9:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-read-album-liner-notes/404445/29 "2007-05-24T21:47:46Z")
[QUOTE=DfrntBreign] \ Could you expand on this, please? (As much as your comfortable, I am not asking for your identity.) This is something I’ve always been curious about. For what kinds of things are the band thanking people? Are they friends, or relatives, people who loaned them a djembe or what? [/QUOTE] They’re probably mostly relatives and friends who supported the artist, and professional people who gave a leg up. I’m really none of those. In my case, I was the first person outside her local area to play her music on the radio (though it wasn’t “professional” radio, it was Community radio), and I played it heavily, enough to get her a fan base local to where I was (thousands of miles from where she was). Then, I was responsible for her gaining an online international fan base to the extent that an Internet music mailing list was started for her in 1991 (which is still going strong btw, it has to be one of the oldest continuous music mailing lists on the net). She likes me. 🆒 ---
**Author:** ![Dr.Rieux](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/aeb1de/32.png) [@Dr.Rieux](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dr.Rieux)\ **Post date:** [May 24, 2007, 10:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-read-album-liner-notes/404445/30 "2007-05-24T22:12:30Z")
The only liner notes I regret reading were in _Genius:The Best of Warren Zevon_. Some Brit "music journalist"just going on and on about his longtime friendship with a transgendered prostitiute, having very little to do with, and barely even mentioning, Warren’s songs. ---
**Author:** ![Johanna](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johanna/32/8318_2.png) [@Johanna](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johanna)\ **Post date:** [May 27, 2007, 12:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-read-album-liner-notes/404445/31 "2007-05-27T00:08:21Z")
I love to read 'em, I always take them out and check for art or any information that would be interesting. Remember when Jethro Tull made _Thick as a Brick_’s LP cover an entire pseudo-newspaper? There were like 8 sheets of paper in there that folded out to tabloid size, full of joke photographs and parodies of a parochial English village paper. Oh, and the lyrics too. I went to a Niyaz concert last month, and the singer Azam Ali introduced Carmen Rizzo, the producer and computer electronica guy, someone who’s contributed to a lot of albums and was credited way down in the tiny print that no one ever reads. So they brought him out on stage to be appreciated. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-read-album-liner-notes/404445.md?page=1)