Comment by tom_
2 days ago
Aphex Twin's Selected Ambient Works 2 had a track listing that was 6 pie charts, one image per slice, 1 slice per track. I assume it came on 3 LPs, but I had the 2 CD version, and there were corresponding pie charts printed on the face up sides of the CDs... as if it made it any clearer.
I ripped them about 15 years ago and cddb came up with track names for them, matching the ones in its Wikipedia page (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Selected_Ambient_Works_Volume_...). I wonder if we have any evidence that the mapping from tracks to images is remotely correct.
I came up with the first CD DB for Windows 95 just before it came out. I realized Media Player had an .ini file with the track names and so I had people on Usenet send me all their listings and would reintegrate it and publish it frequently for the first few weeks until I realized .ini files had a 64KB limit and that was the end of that.
If I did it again, which I have planned for a long time, I would require citations for every track listing. Sure, it's a big barrier, but it'd nice to get it right where possible. The primary citations would generally be to the album cover, but in cases like the Aphex Twin insanity, cites to things like interviews and label demo releases etc could definitely be valid.