I've had a few of my old CD singles out this week and I used to love the fact that artists included extra tracks on singles (OK I know that the term "B-Side" strictly applies to the other side of a 7" single but people still used the term to refer to extra tracks on CD singles too). Now that some of the big artists seem to be making CD singles available again to try and chart as high as possible, do you think they should include exclusive tracks that aren't available elsewhere? Surely this would drive more sales? Would this be an incentive for you to buy CD singles by your favourite artists? It would definitely tempt me.

 

If not CD singles, how about including "B-sides" on streaming platforms? i.e. exclusive tracks that aren't available on the album. Maybe this wouldn't work so well because streaming those tracks won't count towards the album so there's no incentive for record labels. I'd love the concept of B-sides to be brought back in some capacity though!

Edited February 15, 20223 yr by Mangø

Some additional tracks are made available on Spotify singles besides the main 'A side', much as was the case with some download singles, and so these could be considered the direct equivalent of 'B-sides'; the concept has never died out completely despite the transition from 7" to cassette and CD, and thence to downloads and audio streams. However, I'd imagine few of these are recordings unavailable anywhere else, unless the release is in fact an EP of new material and no parent LP has yet been released containing those same tracks.

 

In my experience, quite a few B-side tracks on streamable singles are simply songs which have been released as singles in their own right earlier on; I can think of one recent example where the first song was released as a single-track single, the second single as a two-track bundle with the first single as a 'B side', and third single as a three-track bundle with the previous two singles as 'B-sides'! The album they're all likely to feature on in the same versions is due at the end of this week, making it possible to stream those songs from four possible different packages on Spotify! It would've doubtless been preferable in the interests of musical diversity to feature new songs for 'B sides' with each single release, or at least variations on the versions which are due to appear on the forthcoming album.

 

I suppose a lot of that is whether the artist has the repertoire and inclination to bother recording additional tracks that are only to appear as subsidiary tracks on a single; especially when that will inevitably incur further costs for studio use etc. Actually that was to some extent the case even in the good old 7" days; from the early '80s onwards it became increasingly common for acts to just go down the lazy route of putting an instrumental, live or remixed version of the 'A' side on as a 'B' side rather than a brand new song. Even when the 'B' side was a different song to the 'A', often one could find it on an already-available or soon-to-be-released album. As singles became perceived increasingly as loss leaders and primarily there to trail upcoming albums and once the album was issued to keep interest in it going over the course of the next year, the notion of putting songs out as 'A' or 'B' sides of a single that weren't to be featured on an album sadly became less and less fashionable, as it became less and less cost-effective. There was some revival in the 'B' side's fortune in the mid '90s when pushing differently-tracked multiple-formatted singles was all the rage to maximise initial chart impact, but since the digital era dawned, they've once more taken a backseat, as let's face it have LPs - the ability to cherry-pick songs from an album to buy, and latterly to stream separately, has rather taken the impetus out of creating a complete canon of 12 tracks, as the consumption of that album in its entirety as a singular piece of work is now pretty narrow. It's only more committed fans of an artist who'll bother with the whole LP and possibly listen to it end-to-end, and it's probably only those same few people who'd really be interested in buying or streaming new songs only put out as 'B sides'. Alas few consumers now are that devoted to singular acts and few are that completist. Which is why I suspect we won't see an across-the-board revival of the 'B side' additional track only available as part of a single release. But I agree it would be nice, especially where the artist is bothering to issue their singles on CD for their fanbase.

Edited February 15, 20223 yr by Gambo

I personally would love to see this. It is the only reason I would consider buying a cd single or download these days, if it is exclusive and not on streaming (at least for an initial period of time).

 

This was one of the main reasons post album singles did well if they do just release the album version of the track to radio. Not keen on the current trend of artists releasing 4/5 singles before the album and then the campaign being over unless an album track takes off. Rarely listen to new albums after the first couple weeks these days where there is no incentive to do so.

 

As a fan, I would rather get an exclusive track than a machine signed CD cover.

Yesss, Måneskin recently brought out a limited vinyl for their 'MAMMAMIA' single and the other track is a B-Side that you can't get anywhere else officially. It is only in demo form, but this song was teased before in the background of a merch advert, so as a big fan I was very excited for it in full in whatever capacity. I like the exclusivity of this product although it is a bit of a pain to not have the song properly in my library. Maybe a better idea would be initial exclusivity before then being rolled out on streaming at a later date too - I bought Bicep's 'Isles' vinyl during release week and the deluxe songs were vinyl-only for a while before then appearing on streaming platforms. So it was cool to have that exclusive feel in my hands for a bit and then eventually getting that streaming convenience too.

 

As a record collector I was getting bored of 7" singles where the second side was the same song in instrumental form :lol:

yes, collecting singles and b-sides was amazing back in the day, some artists really worked for it

 

I was a big Tori Amos fan and she was crazy, like CD1 hard 3 new b-sides, CD2 another 3 newbies, the 7" had another one... then in the US there were different ones too...

 

But back then, albums were more tight and short... now albums are longer and in a way b-sides are already part of the album, as sure if artists were more strict they wouldn't include them all...

No was never a fan of them. Likewise with double A-sides.

Absolutely, especially now artists are selling more CD singles through their websites, they need to have something more worthwhile than just a few rubbish remixes. I feel like a lot of B-sides served a purpose, to complement the A-side (there was a lot of album reject rubbish too obviously :P). Janet’s Accept Me is one of my favourite songs of hers and it was a B-side to Every Time

Loved the b side days as sometimes the b sides were as good if not better than the actual single.

I used to love extra B-sides to singles throughout an album campaign, as if you've played the album itself too much it's always nice to hear something else from those recording sessions.

 

Although I don't know, with the way artists these days release lots of material rapidly and keep us fed do we still end up getting that same amount of content anyway - just in a different way?

 

When I first started buying singles, b-sides were often tracks considered to be not good enough for the album. As said by others above, we then started to see remixes of the main track.

 

In the 1990s - again as referred to above - multi-format singles meant there was more scope for new tracks, either written specifically for that purpose or, in some cases, left off the album because they didn't fit in very well. Bands such as Suede and Oasis became renowned for the excellence of a lot of their b-sides. The rise of the CD single probably contributed to the trend as more people listened to the additional tracks by simply leaving the CD to carry on playing. As downloads became the dominant format for singles, the concept of a b-side lost its meaning, particularly if iTunes etc. charged extra for the additional tracks. All this means that the chances of b-sides returning are, sadly, close to zero.