Hidden track

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

In the field of recorded music, a hidden track (sometimes secret track or ghost track) is a piece of music that has been placed on a CD, audio cassette, vinyl record or other recorded medium in such a way as to avoid detection by the casual listener. In some cases, the piece of music may simply have been left off the track listing, while in other cases more elaborate methods are used. In some rare cases a "hidden track" is actually the result of an error that occurred during the mastering stage of the record's production.

Contents 1 Reasoning 2 Notability 3 See also 4 References 5 External links

[edit] Reasoning

Most bands that decide to include a hidden track do so simply to surprise their fans. Sometimes, the tracks are hidden for specific reasons:

• In some rare cases, it is used to put forbidden (by law) songs on live discs. An example is Ramones' Loco Live American version, which has the song "Carbona Not Glue" hidden after "Pet Semetery" on track 17. It was originally recorded on their album Leave Home, but the makers of the spot remover Carbona, a registered trademark, objected. Therefore reference to the song was removed from the album and cover.^[1]
• "Train in Vain" by The Clash, which appears at the end of London Calling, was left out of the vinyl's track listing simply because it was a last-minute addition to the album, when the sleeves were already printed. It is thus not a real hidden track. It was originally intended for a compilation album. The later CD versions list the track on the sleeve.^[2]
• "Weird Al" Yankovic's "Bite Me" was put on after ten minutes of silence to scare listeners who had forgotten to turn off the CD player.^[3]

[edit] Notability

Sometimes hidden tracks have become quite popular and received heavy radio airplay, and occasionally climbed the charts.

• The Beatles' track "Her Majesty" off their 1969 album Abbey Road is considered the first hidden track in recording history. The original pressings of Abbey Road did not list "Her Majesty" on the back cover song title listing, nor the record label; subsequent LP pressings and then CD issues were issued revealing the track. However, two years prior, in 1967, on the UK version of the Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band album, there was the now-famous "inner groove" that appeared after "A Day in the Life" at the end of side 2. While not ever being specified as a track or piece with any title, it is an unexpected, untitled, and uncredited Beatles recording - so this might be deemed a pre-cursor to the hidden track.
• Tool's album Undertow has a hidden track that can be found by letting the CD play itself out to track 69 called "Disgustipated".
• On some pressings of Nirvana's Nevermind, a hidden track, "Endless, Nameless," begins after 10 minutes and 6 seconds of silence after "Something in the Way". "Weird Al" Yankovic's song "Bite Me" was a parody of this and is a hidden track on his album Off the Deep End.
• Think Tank, the seventh studio album by Blur, contains a hidden track entitled "Me, White Noise". Unusually, the listener has to manually rewind the disc using the seek/search backwards button (on a CD player) in the first track to move beyond the beginning of the CD, with "Me, White Noise" effectively being track '0' on the album (more correctly the CD's pregap). Not all CD or DVD players will allow you to "rewind" back this way.
• Songs in the Key of X, a soundtrack for the TV series The X-Files also used the same technique to hide two tracks before the the first listed track of the CD: "Time Jesum Transeuntum Et Non Riverentum (Dread the Passage of Jesus, For He Will Not Return)" by Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds and "The X-Files Theme" by Dirty Three. This is hinted at in the CD booklet - "Nick Cave and the Dirty Three would like you to know that "0" is also a number."
• The Eels album Daisies Of The Galaxy contains a hidden track "Mr. E's Beautiful Blues", which was released as a single and not featured on the sleeve notes though it was "radio-popular".^[4]
• Counting Crows' hidden cover of "Big Yellow Taxi" on Hard Candy.^[5]
• Cracker's "Eurotrash Girl", an original, was one of their biggest radio hits despite being a hidden track on Kerosene Hat.^[6]
• "Skin (Sarabeth)" by Rascal Flatts, a hidden track from their 2004 album Feels Like Today, received enough airplay to chart in the Top 40 on the country charts. By mid-2005, the album was re-issued with the song officially listed as a track, coinciding with the song's release as a single.^[7]
• Of the two hidden tracks on Lauryn Hill's The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill, one of them, the cover of "Can't Take My Eyes Off You" was nominated for a Grammy in 1999 in the category of "Best Female Pop Vocal Performance". It was the first time a hidden track was nominated for a Grammy.
• Pearl Jam's song "4/20/02", about the fellow friend and grunge singer Layne Staley's overdose, is titled with the date that Eddie Vedder heard about the Alice in Chains singer's death. It begins exactly 4:20:02 after the conclusion of the song "Bee Girl". The song was not featured as a listed track on Pearl Jam's album Lost Dogs because Pearl Jam lead singer Eddie Vedder did not wish for it to be exploitative.^[8]
• On Coldplay's album Viva la Vida or Death and All His Friends, there are hidden tracks on 2 of the tracks. The track "Yes" is immediately followed by the hidden track "Chinese Sleep Chant". The final track, "Death And All His Friends" is followed by a closing hidden track titled "The Escapist". Also, the track "Lovers In Japan/Reign Of Love" includes two separate songs, but "Reign of Love" is most often not considered a hidden track, as it is part of the title and track listing. The band's album X & Y also contains a hidden track, "'Til Kingdom Come" (although this is indicated on the album sleeve by a "+" symbol), the Parachutes album also contains a hidden track—after the song "Everything's Not Lost"—called "Life Is for Living".
• Though not necessarily popular by airplay, The X-Files: The Album, includes a vocal track explaining the X-Files mythology up to the point of the film, starting at 10th minute 13th second, in homage to the name of the producing company of the series, Ten Thirteen Productions.
• The LP of The Monty Python Matching Tie and Handkerchief album had two grooves on one side hiding half the content.
• On Slipknot's self-titled album and the reissue, the track Scissors is followed by 2 hidden tracks, the Extra Secret Track and Eeyore. In the US digipak bonus tracks, they follow Surfacing. On the International digipak and Original digipak bonus tracks they follow Dispise.
• KoЯn's 1998 album "Follow The Leader" could be considered to contain only hidden tracks. The album contains 25 tracks of which the first 12 are tracks containing five seconds of silence. This makes for a full minute of silence before the first track plays. The first track on the back of the album is mentioned as:"13. It's On!", so it in that sense is mentioned that the CD begins at track 13. There have been record shops that returned the album to the record company for thinking they received a bad batch of CD's.
• On the Mamma Mia sound track you have to wait for 5 minutes after the last song and then the song THANK YOU FOR THE MUSIC starts.

[edit] See also

• Easter egg (media)
• B-side
• List of albums containing a hidden track
• Backmasking
• Bonus track
• Pregap

[edit] References

[edit] External links

• Hidden Songs A user submitted database of hidden song listings.