A remix album is an album consisting of
remix
A remix (or reorchestration) is a piece of media which has been altered or contorted from its original state by adding, removing, or changing pieces of the item. A song, piece of artwork, book, video, poem, or photograph can all be remixes. The o ...
es or rerecorded versions of an artist's earlier released material. The first act who employed the format was American singer-songwriter
Harry Nilsson (''
Aerial Pandemonium Ballet
''Aerial Pandemonium Ballet'' is a 1971 album by Harry Nilsson, and one of the first-ever remix albums, years before they became commonplace in the late 1970s and 1980s onwards.
Background
With the successes of "Everybody's Talkin'" and ''The P ...
'', 1971).
As of 2007, the best-selling remix album of all time is
Michael Jackson's ''
Blood on the Dance Floor: HIStory in the Mix'' (1997).
History and concept
''
Aerial Pandemonium Ballet
''Aerial Pandemonium Ballet'' is a 1971 album by Harry Nilsson, and one of the first-ever remix albums, years before they became commonplace in the late 1970s and 1980s onwards.
Background
With the successes of "Everybody's Talkin'" and ''The P ...
'' (1971) by
Harry Nilsson is credited as the first remix album.
It was released after the successes of "
Everybody's Talkin'
"Everybody's Talkin (Echoes)" is a song written and recorded by American singer-songwriter Fred Neil in 1966 and released two years later. A version of the song performed by American singer-songwriter Harry Nilsson became a hit in 1969, reachin ...
" and ''
The Point!'', when he decided that his older material had started to sound dated.
Neu!'s ''
Neu! 2
''Neu! 2'' is the second studio album by the krautrock band Neu!. It was recorded in January 1973 and mixed in February 1973, both at Windrose-Dumont-Time Studios in Hamburg, Germany, and released in 1973 by Brain Records. It was officially re ...
'' (1973) has also been described as "in effect the first remix album", as many tracks see the duo "speed up, slow down, cut, doctor, and mutilate the material, sometimes beyond recognition".
In the 1980s, record companies would combine several kinds of
electronic dance music, such as
dance-pop
Dance-pop is a popular music subgenre that originated in the late 1970s to early 1980s. It is generally uptempo music intended for nightclubs with the intention of being danceable but also suitable for contemporary hit radio. Developing from a ...
,
house
A house is a single-unit residential building. It may range in complexity from a rudimentary hut to a complex structure of wood, masonry, concrete or other material, outfitted with plumbing, electrical, and heating, ventilation, and air condi ...
,
techno,
trance,
drum and bass
Drum and bass (also written as drum & bass or drum'n'bass and commonly abbreviated as D&B, DnB, or D'n'B) is a genre of electronic dance music characterized by fast breakbeats (typically 165–185 beats per minute) with heavy bass and sub-ba ...
,
dubstep,
hardstyle, and
trap
A trap is a mechanical device used to capture or restrain an animal for purposes such as hunting, pest control, or ecological research.
Trap or TRAP may also refer to:
Art and entertainment Films and television
* ''Trap'' (2015 film), Fil ...
into full-length albums, creating a relatively low-overhead addition to the catalogs and balance sheets.
Soft Cell's ''
Non Stop Ecstatic Dancing'' (1981) and
The Human League's ''
Love and Dancing
''Love and Dancing'' is a remix album by English synth-pop band The Human League, released in July 1982 by Virgin Records. Issued under the band name "The League Unlimited Orchestra" as a nod to Barry White's disco-era Love Unlimited Orchestra, ...
'' (1982) are credited for inventing the modern remix album. Since this time, this kind of release is not only seen as an easy cash-in for an artist and their label, but also as an opportunity to provide a second lease of life for a record.
In the world of
reggae music, it is not uncommon for a whole album to be remixed in a
dub style.
[Dub: soundscapes and shattered songs in Jamaican reggae, p.2]
Jennifer Lopez's album ''
J to tha L–O! The Remixes'' is listed in the
''Guinness Book of World Records'' as the first remix album to debut at No.1 on the
''Billboard'' 200 chart.
List of best-selling remix albums
See also
*
Dub music
Dub is an electronic musical style that grew out of reggae in the late 1960s and early 1970s. It is commonly considered a subgenre of reggae, though it has developed to extend beyond that style.Dub: soundscapes and shattered songs in Jamaican re ...
*
List of best-selling music artists
The following list of best-selling music artists includes those music acts from the 20th century to the present with claims of 75 million or more record sales worldwide. This information cannot be listed officially, as there is no organization t ...
Notes
References
{{Lists of best-selling albums
Album types