This is how you make an album:

https://megadrive.bandcamp.com/album/198xad

My ambition is to release albums that are 3-7 songs long. I won't use the term EP, since it traditionally implies it's a "lesser" or "in-between" release. Albums were long back when they were mainly sold in physical formats, so the artist would get out more music per pressing, and so the buyers should feel they got a lot for the money.

Today, in the digital age where none of that matters, the ideal should be to bundle whatever number of tracks that make sense together (artistically), and label that an album whether it's 10 minutes or 150 minutes long. With the attention span we have these days, the shorter album should have a bigger chance of being listened to, at least in full (obviously). And if people like that one, they might also check out the next short album that you release. And the next one after that. Whereas if you released the material as one 10-track album, people would perhaps listen to half of it, if looking at the track list didn't discourage them from listening altogether.

My advice is to write a ton of songs so that you can throw away a lot of songs, your best songs will rise to the top.  Sometimes it is hard to cut songs, but artists will rarely write good songs every single time.  Also, don't be afraid to get some honest feedback from people you trust, this can help you lift the blinders on what is working an what isn't, but you're the boss, so your opinion matters to, so don't let anyone walk all over you.

Especially for your first release I'd go with an EP (maybe 5 songs), like others have suggested.

I prefer to write concept albums over compilation albums, where I plan out a theme or musical idea that shows up in every song.  On my newest album I wrote and created a comic book and used the story from that as a guide for the music I was writing.

Since you already have songs that you want on an album, your album will most likely be a compilation-style album, so consider what I've written below about album flow.

As far as my personal preference on album flow, I generally do this:
(1) Start with a short energetic song that throws people into the album, and leaves them wanting more.
(2) Start to mellow out a bit until your middle song is the least exciting song on the album (but still well written).
(3) Build the album back to an exciting ending and possibly place your longest song at the end.

I don't write all albums this way, but I find myself doing this more than not on both compilation-style albums and concept-style albums.  As stated above, album flow is interpretive... so go with your instincts.

I hope this long post helps.  Good luck!

Joshua

There are a lot of ways to do an album, too. Some are just collections of songs written around the same period and with a general sound to them, some albums were conceived before any of the music was written as a way of designing an experience. There's no wrong way to do it as long as you're happy with the finished product.

Cheers for all the information, I do have a different couple of styles that I make, thank you for sharing your process.

Also thanks for the EP idea too, probs go with that first off to get the feel for doing this sort of thing.

+1 on the EP idea.

It's more digestible than a full album, and on longer releases you'll generally see that it's the earlier tracks that get listened to the most, with many of the later tracks not even getting the same number of plays.

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Album flow is difficult because it is subjective. I quite often listen to records and think they are too long and should have gotten rid of 4-5 songs and made a better shorter release (i like 60s 70s style where you could only fit around 40 mins on a piece of vinyl.)

i always spend ages arranging songs ive written into a cohesive series of traxx for a release. and it can take over a year for me just to put together a nice EP kinda thing.

i normally write a series of traxx over a period of time, and some of those will be discarded, and others seem to naturally form a narrative that i can then use as a release.

have you considered not doing a long 30 min+ record and keeping it short?

have you played with different song orders, putting them on CD/MP3 playa and listening to them in a setting outside of your studio?

listening to your songs, some of them are very textured dissonant pieces, but others are very pop and melody. does the juxtaposition of these 2 styles jar you?

Can you just give all your songs to a trusted friend and get them to chose the order?

Hi, I have been making chip tunes for a bit and looking into creating an album of some of my songs https://soundcloud.com/aisjam

I haven't made one before, however been at a stand point. I have gotten as far as band-camp, but finding extra information on the album process has been elusive.

Would you have any pointers on things to keep in mind, good album flow or any experiences when you created yours. I would be greatly appreciative.