Board 8 > Rank the Tracks Week 26: Jimi Hendrix's Are You Experienced (+ Moon Safari)

(+) Yeah! (+)

Previous results can be seen here:
https://board8.fandom.com/wiki/Rank_the_Tracks

The rules:
1. Listen to the album in full
2. Rank every track on the album
3. For the results, there will be a curve at the top of each list; two additional points between #1 and #2, and one additional point for the next two ranks. This way, the songs that really stick out to someone get an edge that is not immediately negated by someone else putting it lower. In the case of Demon Days, someone's 15th track will get 1 point, 14th 2 points, 4th 12 points, 3rd 14 points, 2nd 16 points, and 1st 19 points
4. If you want to include comments for individual songs, I will compile them in the results
5. The results will be posted at the beginning of the next topic
6. The deadline to vote is Sunday, September 5 at 8:00 AM EST - though if you are for whatever reason listening to the album around that time, just say so in the topic and I can delay a bit
7. You can sign up to be added to a user cycle for after we finish the queue; once we get through the last planned album, the next person on the list will choose 3 albums which the other users will vote on for the next topic.
7a. To ensure people are being given an actual choice, the three nominated albums must be by different artists. You can otherwise stick to a similar sound or era.
7b. The tiebreaker for these polls will be whichever is listed first in the poll options - make sure to deliver the results in order of your own preference (which will hopefully have the added benefit of influencing people toward your first choice if they can't decide).
7c. The order of the user cycle will be randomly determined, but users will first be sorted into tiers by how many of their nominations have been covered during the early nominations period.

The Jimi Hendrix Experience's Are You Experienced track list:
Note: Are You Experienced had separate track listings for the UK and US releases - I am using the 17-song version that has been the standard release since 1997 which includes all tracks from both versions plus a few extras
1. Purple Haze
2. Manic Depression
3. Hey Joe
4. Love or Confusion
5. May This Be Love
6. I Don't Live Today
7. The Wind Cries Mary
8. Fire
9. Third Stone From the Sun
10. Foxey Lady
11. Are You Experienced?
12. Stone Free
13. 51st Anniversary
14. Highway Chile
15. Can You See Me
16. Remember
17. Red House

Schedule:
9/5: Nine Inch Nails - Pretty Hate Machine (Steiner)
9/12: The Knife - Silent Shout (CasanovaZelos)
9/19: Billy Joel - The Stranger (Seanchan)
9/26: Spice Girls - Spice (SpikeSetsFire)
10/3: Iron Maiden - Powerslave (TheArkOfTurus)
10/10: Rancid - ...And Out Come the Wolves (Snake5555555555)
10/17: OutKast - Aquemini (Giggsalot)
10/24: Of Monsters and Men - My Head Is an Animal (Jesse_Custer)
10/31: Taylor Swift - Speak Now (Snake5555555555)
11/7: The Avalanches - Since I Left You (SpikeSetsFire)
11/14: Moby - Play (SpikeSetsFire)
11/21: Steely Dan - Can't Buy a Thrill (Seginustemple)

User Cycle sign-ups:
11/28: MetalmindStats
12/5: TheArkOfTurus
12/12: Snake5555555555
12/19: Jesse_Custer
12/26: ZaziGuado
1/2: SpikeSetsFire
1/9: Johnbobb
1/16: VeryInsane
1/23: CasanovaZelos
1/30: Seanchan
2/6: Giggsalot
2/13: RyoCaliente
2/20: darkx
2/27: neonreaper
3/6: Great_Paul
3/13: jcgamer107

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Air's Moon Safari results

The participants sorted by deviation from final results:
ZaziGuado (14)
Giggsalot (18)
Jesse_Custer (20)
TheArkOfTurus (22)
ChainLTTP (22)
SpikeSetsFire (22)
CasanovaZelos (24)
Johnbobb (26)
HBJDubs (28)
Raetsel_Lapin (30)
Seanchan (30)
Snake5555555555 (38)
MetalmindStats (40)

General Album Comments

Snake5555555555: This album is so good holy shit. Ever since the pandemic hit last year I've loved these kind of chill, downtempo ambient albums, but I think this is also a bit more than that as well. Plus I'm currently experiencing a hurricane in my area so playing through this album only felt that much more appropriate and surreal. Much like Vaporwave, there's a prevalent sense of nostalgia that runs through every song, and unlocks feelings you had long tucked away years ago. But it's not a depressing feeling, rather I feel uplifted and quite pleasant, with ethereal soundscapes transporting me to a world of pure imagination & wistful wonder. It's albums like this that make me wish I was more skilled at describing the beautiful musicianship behind it all. Almost all songs on this album are of equal quality, and last place is merely a formality here.

ChainLTTP (responding to Snake): Yes, exactly this. Except the nostalgia is FOR the first time I heard the album. This is peak golden age electronica (if that's even a thing). I love it so much.

SpikeSetsFire: I've been really looking forward to this week's album for months!
This album is one of my favourites. It really takes me back to the early 2000's.
And it's not going to be easy to rank the songs. There's not a bad song on here.

ChainLTTP: Takes me back, man. This was one of the first albums hyped on board 8 that I listened to as a teenager.

Giggsalot: Strange album for this topic series, I don't think of this as being a particularly song-based record at all. It's all good stuff, just pure vibez

(instrumentals are the best here though)

SpikeSetsFire: Far out. This was hard to rank.
I look at the songs at the bottom of the list and think to myself... that's so unjust.
But something has to be there.

All I Need just gets the #1 spot for me. Really good memories of the days when I smoked weed with my best mate on the balcony in my Brisbane apartment on a summer afternoon, listening to Ministry of Sounds Chillout Sessions, before going to play an 'All-Cup' on Mario Kart Double Dash on GameCube.

Sexy Boy just misses out on 1st. It was the first Air song I ever heard and I just love it to bits. Kelly Watch The Stars had the same kind of vibe for me and I liked the video too. I ranked it high purely on nostalgia value.

Everything else is fantastic. I've listened to this album 6 times already this week.
At one stage, I had Remember and Talisman in my Top 5, but constant re-shuffles sent them down the list.
No disrespect to those songs at all. I just love everything on this album. It's so chill.

ZaziGuado: I love this album so very much. It's a 10/10 for me. It's one of those albums that is greater than the sum of its parts, but that in no way knocks the parts because these songs are so tight and I could listen to any of them outside the context of the album. While I consider "La femme d'argent" to be the best song, it somehow doesn't get me discouraged once its over with the rest of the album left to play like a lot of other "best song on the album" songs would. Rather, it gets me excited for what's to come because it's the perfect first course to an album full of chill electronic vibes. That french horn in "Ce matin la" gives me 70s sitcom theme song vibes and might be the most relaxing song on the album. "le voyage de Penelope" is such a fun closer and the way it springs the last bit of the melody on you excites me every time. "All I Need" has such a beautiful breakdown at the end. Sometimes I wish I would've made "You Make It Easy" the first dance at my wedding. "Kelly Watch the Stars" is super bouncy and super fun. "New Star in the Sky" is the only song that never truly gets off the ground for me, but I still respect the hell out of it. There's so much to love throughout this album and it's been exciting seeing the rankings on everybody's list (thus far) be fairly varied.

Seanchan: First listen, and you guys are right, this is pretty good! A very easy listen and I'm looking forward to doing the ranking.

I know this is an easy comparison because they're both French but there were quite a few songs here that reminded me of a more chill Daft Punk.

Johnbobb: Listened 3 times now, haven't even considered how to rank it yet, it's just instantly becoming a go-to chill album. Put it on today to take a bath after work and just kinda drifted

Seanchan: This is a really good album. Other than first and last I think there's a lot of flexibility in my ranking. And I'm going to have to buck trends and say I think the 2nd half is better than the 1st.

Johnbobb: Not a bad song on the album. Possibly my favorite album I hadn't already listened to to come out of this group

MetalmindStats: I think I've always remembered music mainly by its lyrics, and the unfortunate result of that here is that I prefer each song with them to every song without them three album listen-throughs in. Still, I enjoy even the instrumentals for what they are here - I just find and have found it difficult to evaluate and fairly compare the intermixture. Paradoxically, I think that all is part of why Moon Safari makes me think of my hopes I can live a fuller future (in apparent contrast to a few others here), alongside qualities more inherent to the music itself.

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Moon Safari track ranking

10. Remember (Track #6)
Score: 56 (Average Rank: 7.15/10)
Biggest Fan(s): Snake5555555555 (#1)
Biggest Detractor(s): Jesse_Custer, Giggsalot, SpikeSetsFire (#10)

9. Kelly Watch the Stars (Track #4)
Score: 59 (Average Rank: 6.46/10)
Biggest Fan(s): SpikeSetsFire, CasanovaZelos, MetalmindStats (#4)
Biggest Detractor(s): TheArkOfTurus, HBJDubs (#10)

8. New Star in the Sky (Track #9)
Score: 62 (Average Rank: 6.54/10)
Biggest Fan(s): Snake5555555555, HBJDubs (#2)
Biggest Detractor(s): ZaziGuado, CasanovaZelos (#10)

7. Talisman (Track #5)
Score: 68 (Average Rank: 6.08/10)
Biggest Fan(s): Giggsalot (#2)
Biggest Detractor(s): Snake5555555555, MetalmindStats (#10)

6. Sexy Boy (Track #2)
Score: 79 (Average Rank: 5.38/10)
Biggest Fan(s): SpikeSetsFire, CasanovaZelos (#2)
Biggest Detractor(s): Seanchan (#10)

5. You Make It Easy (Track #7)
Score: 81 (Average Rank: 5.46/10)
Biggest Fan(s): Jesse_Custer (#1)
Biggest Detractor(s): ChainLTTP (#10)

4. Le voyage de Pnlope (Track #10)
Score: 84 (Average Rank: 5.23/10)
Biggest Fan(s): Seanchan (#1)
Biggest Detractor(s): Raetsel_Lapin (#10)

3. All I Need (Track #3)
Score: 90 (Average Rank: 5.08/10)
Biggest Fan(s): SpikeSetsFire, CasanovaZelos, MetalmindStats (#1)
Biggest Detractor(s): Johnbobb (#10)

2. Ce matin l (Track #8)
Score: 100 (Average Rank: 4.31/10)
Biggest Fan(s): Raetsel_Lapin (#1)
Biggest Detractor(s): MetalmindStats (#9)

1. La femme d'argent (Track #1)
Score: 127 (Average Rank: 3.31/10)
Biggest Fan(s): TheArkOfTurus, ChainLTTP, Giggsalot, ZaziGuado, HBJDubs, Johnbobb (#1)
Biggest Detractor(s): Raetsel_Lapin, MetalmindStats (#8)

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The first Rank the Albums topic has been created, covering the first 25 albums:
https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/boards/8-gamefaqs-contests/79636777

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Lot of disparity with Moon Patrol. As someone else mentioned in its topic, 9 of the 10 songs had at least one person rank it #1 or #2 (except being Kelly Watch the Stars). Conversely, 8 of the 10 songs had at least one person rank it #10 (exceptions being La femme d'argent and Ce matin l).

So, now that we're 25 albums in, any fun/interesting statistics to give us about this project?

• What were the least and most ranked albums?
• Which albums had the least and most deviation (perhaps taking into account # of tracks)?
• Who cumulatively of the rankers had the most deviation?

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Those are all interesting questions I can try to answer when I have time - but, yeah, deviation beyond each album is difficult due to varying track lengths. I'm sure there is a way, but I am not sure how to calculate it myself.

If I had to guess, Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix probably has the least deviation, since nearly all of us agreed "1901" and "Lisztomania" were in the top 3.

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CasanovaZelos posted...

Those are all interesting questions I can try to answer when I have time - but, yeah, deviation beyond each album is difficult due to varying track lengths. I'm sure there is a way, but I am not sure how to calculate it myself.

If I had to guess, Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix probably has the least deviation, since nearly all of us agreed "1901" and "Lisztomania" were in the top 3.

I love data but I'm not a statistics major so I'm not certain myself. I'd imagine you'd have to take into account the album length, likely dividing the deviation by the number of tracks?

It's pretty simple to look at with Moon Patrol since it had 10 tracks.
ZaziGuado (1.4)
Giggsalot (1.8)
Jesse_Custer (2.0)
TheArkOfTurus (2.2)
ChainLTTP (2.2)
SpikeSetsFire (2.2)
CasanovaZelos (2.4)
Johnbobb (2.6)
HBJDubs (2.8)
Raetsel_Lapin (3.0)
Seanchan (3.0)
Snake5555555555 (3.8)
MetalmindStats (4.0)

The total deviation is 334 and we had 13 rankers, giving an average total deviation of 25.7 and an average deviation per track of 2.57.

Not sure if any of that resultant data would be meaningful but it could be interesting to see the comparison between different albums.

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1: Highway Chile
2: Hey Joe
3: Purple Haze
4: I Don't Live Today
5: May This Be Love
6: Manic Depression
7: Red House
8: Can You See Me
9: The Wind Cries Mary
10: Are You Experienced?
11: 51st Anniversary
12: Foxy Lady
13: Love or Confusion
14: Stone Free
15: Remember
16: Fire
17: Third Stone From The Sun
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First listen and I'm a little conflicted. I've heard at least a third of these songs before but I've never had any real desire to seek them out. An hour of this and I was a little fatigued of it..

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Seanchan posted...

First listen and I'm a little conflicted. I've heard at least a third of these songs before but I've never had any real desire to seek them out. An hour of this and I was a little fatigued of it..

I haven't relistened yet but historically agree with the fatigue - this would probably be a better listen at the original 11-song length, if only there weren't two versions. A few major acts had separate US and UK releases in this time period, but at least with bands like The Beatles, we tend to just go with the UK version now. Mashing them together gives us more Hendrix, which I guess is good for fans, but it doesn't really feel like a cohesive album.

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bump

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Jimi Hendrix is a weird artist because he was so romanticized by the Boomers / Rolling Stone critics that he became wildly overrated. Then that feeling kind of corrected itself in the last decade or so to the point where he's kind of underrated now.

In either case, this album is pretty bloated.

I know we all talk about Hendrix himself but Mitchell is an excellent drummer, just wanted to put that out there

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up

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1. Purple Haze
2. 51st Anniversary
3. Love Or Confusion
4. Foxey Lady
5. The Wind Cries Mary
6. Hey Joe
7. Are You Experienced?
8. Stone Free
9. Highway Chile
10. May This Be Love
11. I Don't Live Today
12. Manic Depression
13. Red House
14. Fire
15. Remember
16. Third Stone From The Sun
17. Can You See Me

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This just gave me a nostalgic memory of listening to Hey Joe while hanging out on board 8 ca. 2005, waiting for the poll to change during the summer contest season. That was on rotation with like six other songs because that's how I rolled back then.

I think the others were Do You Feel Like We Do?, Feel Good Inc., Freebird (lol), and Sultans of Swing. Maybe more...?

bump

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Up

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1. Love or Confusion
2. Third Stone From the Sun
3. Are You Experienced?
4. Manic Depression
5. Highway Chile
6. May This Be Love
7. The Wind Cries Mary
8. Purple Haze
9. Red House
10. Stone Free
11. Remember
12. Foxey Lady
13. Can You See Me
14. Fire
15. 51st Anniversary
16. I Don't Live Today
17. Hey Joe

Purple Haze was something I loved as a kid, but now I find I like his more progressive and meandering tracks more. It (unsurprisingly) seems to play to his strengths a lot better. I haven't heard most of these songs in a decade (and this album has apparently nearly everything I know from him). I still have vivid memories of listening to the title track while exploring Blackreach in Skyrim. Solid album with no duds, though I thought Hey Joe was kind of repetitive and boring

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1. Foxey Lady
2. Hey Joe
3. Third Stone From The Sun
4. Highway Chile
5. Fire
6. I Dont Live Today
7. 51st Anniversary
8. Purple Haze
9. Stone Free
10. Are You Experienced?
11. Can You See Me
12. Love Or Confusion
13. Manic Depression
14. Red House
15. Remember
16. The Wind Cries Mary
17. May This Be Love

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NFUN posted...

17. Hey Joe

Wat

Yep, I would definitely prefer the 11 track US version to the current 17 track monolith. "Red House" is the only bonus track to really do anything for me. Of course, the UK version was the original release and my top two songs are essentially tacked on.

Purple Haze (#1375 all-time)
Hey Joe (#1674)
Fire (#2205)
Manic Depression (#2299)
Are You Experienced?
The Wind Cries Mary
May This Be Love
Foxey Lady
Red House
I Don't Live Today
Third Stone From the Sun
Stone Free
51st Anniversary
Can You See Me
Love or Confusion
Highway Chile
Remember

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Last day and only 5 votes so far; I know plenty of people usually wait until the last day but it will be funny if this of all albums ends up on the lower end of votes - it's generally considered one of the all-time greats, listed as #14 of all-time on Acclaimed Music. The only higher albums we have covered so far are Nevermind and OK Computer.

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I have listened to this several times and will definitely have a ranking in tonight

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1. Fire
2. Purple Haze
3. Highway Chile
4. Red House
5. Hey Joe
6. Third Stone From the Sun
7. Manic Depression
8. I Don't Live Today
9. Remember
10. The Wind Cries Mary
11. Love or Confusion
12. Stone Free
13. Foxey Lady
14. Are You Experienced?
15. May This Be Love
16. Can You See Me
17. 51st Anniversary

I'm afraid this is a substandard effort from me this week. These holiday weekends are always tough for me to find time, so I'm providing this after only 2 listens rather than 3.

Overall I didn't really enjoy this album very much. There's nothing here that's bad necessarily, it just felt overly long and a bit of a slog to listen to. Now granted part of that comes down to the circumstances under which I'm trying to listen...but if this had grabbed me I would have found the time to dedicate. That I didn't is pretty telling for my personal regard of this album.

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In a rare twist, I find myself agreeing with the general consensus on this album and kinda wish we'd done the shorter US version of the album than this almost arbitrarily extended version. Almost all enthusiasm I had for the album drained when I got to the title track (which was a natural stopping point) and saw just how much longer it was going to go. Like, this isn't a long album, but it definitely feels like it keeps going far longer than it had any reason to.

On the other hand, my personal favorite song from this album is one of the random extras, so I can't complain too much and I'd say I generally liked the music. It was worth the listen.



And some general song comments on my top three, since I'm in the mood for it:

Highway Chile: Not entirely sure why, but I think this might be the most fun song from any of the albums we've ranked so far and I can't help but kinda love it as a result.

Hey Joe: I absolutely love his vocal performance on this song and wish more of the tracks went for this sort of sound. I'd love an entire album of songs in this sort of style.

Purple Haze: The rare song that I've heard far too many times and still haven't gotten sick of.
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1. Purple Haze
2. The Wind Cries Mary
3. Third Stone From the Sun
4. I Don't Live Today
5. Manic Depression
6. Hey Joe
7. Fire
8. Love or Confusion
9. Foxey Lady
10. Are You Experienced?
11. Highway Chile
12. Stone Free
13. May This Be Love
14. Remember
15. Can You See Me
16. Red House
17. 51st Anniversary

This album fully deserves all the acclaim it gets. I'm of the not-controversial opinion that Jimi Hendrix is hands down one of the greatest musicians to ever live. Vocals, songwriting and guitar skill are all top tier and he's pretty handily the GOAT of his particular style of psychadelic blues rock. I will agree with some of the others that the ideal version of this album is the original 11-track NA release, as every song on it is at least a 9/10 and the songs added in the extended re-release don't live up to that same level, but I'm not complaining too much because any Hendrix is good Hendrix. Seriously, the top tier songs on this album are some of my all-time favorites that I could listen to on repeat forever.

also, semi-related, made this about a year ago for a Kirby shitpost group



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Johnbobb posted...

also, semi-related, made this about a year ago for a Kirby shitpost group

That is fantastic.
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Final bump

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