Order of the day

Album sequencing and wine tastings

Abbey Road is my default album of choice. The go-to record for when I’m running short on inspiration. Or for those moments when I lack the wherewithal to scour through the endless musical options which lie at our thumbtips. In other words, it’s the Chicken & Bacon Mayonnaise-led meal deal for when I’ve no clue what to eat during my lunchbreak (in case you’re wondering, a packet of Fridge Raiders Roast Chicken Bites and an Innocent Smoothie complete the so-called deal).¹

For a long time it’s been like this. In November of last year, a work trip to the skeletal vineyards of Burgundy was no exception. I was the designated driver (and part-time tasting note-writer), meanwhile one of the UK’s 208 Masters of Wine was riding shotgun. A heavy responsibilty having his life in my hands, not only because he was paying for dinner every night. As darkness descended on our return to Beaune, I glanced in the rearview mirror, waiting for the backseat DJ to provide us with a fitting soundtrack to our drive. Nothing was forthcoming. Five minutes of indecision ensued. The solution? “Abbey Road!” I cried.

“Shhhhoot me.” The album’s unmistakable opening line. A bass riff rolled in like sea mist. The mixologist lifting the smoke-filled belljar to reveal this evening’s cocktail of choice. As Come Together faded, I mimicked the rolling toms of the next track against the steering wheel in anticipation. Instead of the howling guitar of Something’s opening gambit came the volcanic, attack-minded Polythene Pam. I threw my hands up in disgust, nearly taking the vines of Pernand-Vergelesses with us. That’s not to say I don’t enjoy Lennon’s Scouse-soused lyricism but this isn’t the natural order of things. To be propelled recklessly into the middle of a sixteen-minute suite, with not even a Mean Mr Mustard to ease us in with a little foreplay. Sequencing sabotaged by the shuffle button. The album’s illusion broken before our very ears.

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Fluid mechanics

An album’s chronology is of upmost importance. Its track listing is intentional. The sequence of songs is created in such a way so as to provide fluidity, to allow a narrative to unfold uninterrupted. We can thank (or blame) Adele for removing the default shuffle button when playing albums on Spotify. “Art tells a story”, she implored back in 2021, and though on a personal level, I find much of her music comparable to a multipack of Walkers Salt & Shake crisps minus the salt sachet², she has a point. Lyrically, Adele’s 30 unveils her own emotional arc from self-destruction to redemption, via instances of rumination. To disrupt the artist’s intended order is to trivialise the album as a work of art in its own right.

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Any album we consider to be great is great because of the way in which it has been attentively assembled. The Dark Side of the Moon, The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill, Never Mind the Breeze Blocks… from start to finish, these records refuse to relinquish the listener’s attention. Never dithering, nor distracting. Albums have the power to create worlds, be they fictitious or somewhere closer to home, in which we are submerged completely.

Marvin Gaye’s What’s Going On is a cyclorama of social consciousness and gospel-laced soul, where each track bleeds into one another as if painted with watercolour inks; the dreamlike, lyric-less backing vocals waft through the album like a pervading summer breeze; to follow the bassist from start to finish is to run your hands along the bark of a single oak’s tree trunk. Chopping and changing the album would be illogical and all momentum would be lost. Any tension between songs would slacken at best and snap at worst.

Would we read a novel from back to front? Would we start a film from a timestamp at random? Imagine a version of 12 Angry Men where the jury votes not guilty in the opening scene. Now these are the facts. You can’t refute facts.

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Sequential logic

The same can be said about that trip to Burgundy. Each tasting was deliberately curated so that the line-up of wines read like an epic poem of that particular producer; a recital of their work, of the year, and of the land. Of course, the cynics will point to the fact that the majority of wines in a structured tasting are shown in ascending order of price. In terms of individual styles, however, the order makes sense. A Bourgogne Blanc, with its all-cards-on-the-table attitude and, for want of a better word, simplicity, always comes first. This is where it belongs, forever on the undercard. To taste it after a Saint-Aubin, a Puligny-Montrachet, or a Le Montrachet Grand Cru, would be jarring. Overpowered or understated, in a single sitting, the merits of each wine would be lost.

Particular vineyard sites within the same appellation can display subtle differences too. The rich alluvial soils of Nuits-Saint-Georges’ Aux Bousselots will give a riper and more expansive expression of Pinot Noir than, let’s say, Les Damodes from down the road; the latter’s northerly latitude and higher altitude produces wines with more self-discipline and restraint. In the same way an artist approaches album sequencing, it’s the winemaker’s prerogative to choose which way round those two wines are best shown.

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There’s nothing wrong with listening to individual tracks from an album out of their original context. Here Comes The Sun doesn’t need a foreword from I Want You (She’s So Heavy) for it to be a glorious song. Just as we can appreciate a Bourgogne Blanc as a standalone glass or bottle, far removed from some formulaic tasting.

Yet, an album is proof that some things are greater than the sum of their parts. Little by little, they have been carefully constructed, transforming a pile of snaggle-toothed pieces into a single masterpiece.

1. In truth, Abbey Road is more of a banquet than a meal deal, which is why I feel it’s important to point out that I would normally add a packet of Openshaw’s Pork Crunch and a Cadbury’s Crunchie bar for ballast.

2. A diet low in sodium can help lower blood pressure.