I agree with Uwe:
I love albums!
Listening to Sergeant Pepper is like a journey and so is Tommy. If a random song from Tommy comes by at my Creative Zen it just doesn't work... And with albums there's the sleeve notes, the sleeve itself. I remember my early teens, listening to soul and asking myself who this Cropper guy was who wrote songs with Otis. The same with Goffin/King, which brought me to Tapestry (*), and Shuman/Pomus.
(*) There are still dozens of albums I wanna buy, but sometimes I have a black out in a record store. I keep a list in my computer, but of course I'll always forget it. That same thing happened some years ago when I was in a record store with a colleague. We decided to go for a beer and the moment we walked into the pub (next door to the record store) I remembered Tapestry by Carole King. Not even a minute later the whole album started. After the third song i ordered a second beer and I asked the bar lady if she heard me talking 'bout Tapestry. She didn't, so it was sheer coincidence.
I immediately went to the store to buy Tapestry, but it wasn't in stock.
The next day I visited the same store and Tapestry just came in.
Harry Mulisch-like coincidence as we call it in The Netherlands.
About albums:
Q magazine featured an article about U2. The Edge and Bono, both multi-millionaires of course, argued day after day about the right track listing of the new album. They both tried to win the opinion of the journalist and they fought like little children about the track listing. When Q reviewed the album they stated, like always: Download track 1, 3, 6 and 8. They're best.
I hate that, cos some songs grow on you.