In the age of streaming and every song ever recorded being available at the poke of a touchscreen, the idea of curating an album seems odd. The notion that artists put tracks in a specific order for good reason might be entirely lost on some; they all get played anyway, so why does it matter where or when you find them?
Curation, however, matters. There's a reason why most decent artists put songs in given places, be they explosive openers or an oasis of calm at around Track 5. It's tempting to think of closing tracks as being the unwanted oddballs of a given record, and while that's true in some cases, many stone-cold classics are to be found lurking at the bottom of the track listing, lying in wait so that the record can go out with a bang rather than a whimper.
