This has always seemed like a bit of a taboo, but there must be many acts who've done it. No doubt it's often due to record company pressure but it never fails to shock me. Here are two examples - I'd love to hear more. Surely this must have happened in the 60s?

Sparklehorse - Dreamt For Light Years In The Belly Of A Mountain reuses a b-side from a single off the previous album and renames it to become the title track, and reuses (albeit a different version) a Japanese bonus track also from the previous album. In total, nearly 20 minutes of material is reused!

Weezer - Maladroit's UK version reuses "Island In The Sun" from the previous album. Why? I would have felt so cheated at the time if Maladroit hadn't been pretty crap anyway.

Who else? Let's expose this shocking practice!

Everyone's favourite money-grubbing socialists PRML SCRM did this on "XTRMNTR" There 2 mixes of "Swastika Eyes" and a remix of "If They Move, Kill 'Em" from the previous album.

I too used an upbeat sort of remix of a song from my old band's first album on my old band's second album.

You did?? I'm afraid you're off the creative roll call.

radiohead - morning bellend

edit: i already know someone will go ahh but both of those were recorded at the same time. yes. i know. i know that

Quote from: lazyhour on January 18, 2024, 09:37:14 AMWeezer - Maladroit's UK version reuses "Island In The Sun" from the previous album. Why? I would have felt so cheated at the time if Maladroit hadn't been pretty crap anyway.

It was a massive hit in France and stayed around in the charts for ages.  As Maladroit came out surprisingly lightning fast after The Green Album, someone decided it was a good idea to tag it on the end of all European copies of the new album.

'Living Without You' was also an EU bonus track though I don't think it was clearly marked as such, so really the album should end with 'December'.

The dB's 'Amplifier' got added in slightly remixed form on Like This, the follow up to Repercussion where it originally appeared, again due to being something of a hit that stuck around, meaning it's on two albums where I skip it every time.

Live version of Maggot Brain appears on Funkadelic's One Nation Under a Groove, albeit originally as a bonus EP.

Jonathan Richman did this often, though he would always rerecord and rearrange the songs.  I think this was due his 'uniqueness' in wanting to try songs in different ways, even if it had been on the previous album, or in the case of 'That Summer Feeling', not liking how the first version turned out.

Comsat Angels did a new version of 'Independence Day', from their debut album, for their fourth. Both times released as a single too.

Modern English did the same re 'I Melt With You', with more (commercial) success.

Deerhunter's song Calvary Scars, 1:30 in length on Microcastle and then stretched out to a 10 minute twinkly krauty jam at the end of accompanying album Weird Era Cont.

So, not really a case of "old" and "new" albums, but since Weird Era was the band's response to the super advance leaking of Microcastle it sorta works I guess ahh I don't fucking know I didn't write the bastard song. Anyway it's really good. Both of those albums are really good. Weird Era is their best IMO.

Gren Day done Welcome To Paradise twice.

The Fall used the chord progession from Everybody But Myself to conclude 2 albums in a row, then ended the next album with a rework of Free Range

Quote from: markburgle on January 18, 2024, 12:48:57 PMGren Day done Welcome To Paradise twice.

Also the single Good Riddance (Time Of Your Life) was a re-record of a b-side from the previous album.

Never got why REM bothered recording and releasing Bad Day as a single, the original incarnation of It's The End Of The World As We Know It. Felt like them virtually admitting they were creatively bankrupt, oh there you go I've answered my own question

If Stipe's song is recent - who knows, could be decent
If it's an old reheat - best keep the receipt

Quote from: Petey Pate on January 18, 2024, 11:07:39 AMLive version of Maggot Brain appears on Funkadelic's One Nation Under a Groove, albeit originally as a bonus EP.

There's also a live version of 'Cosmic Slop' on Hardcore Jollies. Parliament redid a few The Parliaments singles too, such as 'I Wanna Testify' on Up for the Down Stroke.

Flo and Eddie put a live version of the old Turtles hit 'Elenore' on their album Moving Targets for some reason (possibly 'encouragement' from the record company) and it sticks out like a sore thumb.

"Lodger" by Dave Bowie has got a few things like this on it.

"Fantastic Voyage" and "Boys Keep Swinging" have the same chord sequence. "Red Money" is just new words sung on top of Iggy Pop's "Sister Midnight" and
"Move On" is "All The Young Dudes" backwards.

Some brilliant examples so far! Thanks everyone. Jonathan Richman is definitely an example of someone who gets away with it, where it doesn't seem cynical.

Can anyone suggest an example from a 60s act?

Edit: three "examples". What a shit bit of writing.

Will Oldham took some of his beautiful old palace songs and made them shit shit shit on "Bonnie Prince Goatboy bleats the classics" for some unknown reason, probably a combination of his gigantic cocaine handlebar moustache and a desire to be a twat.

Quote from: mechanical blood goat on January 18, 2024, 01:52:36 PMWill Oldham took some of his beautiful old palace songs and made them shit shit shit on "Bonnie Prince Goatboy bleats the classics" for some unknown reason, probably a combination of his gigantic cocaine handlebar moustache and a desire to be a twat.

What a bizarre coincidence - I listened to that very album this morning. I think it's 40% grrrreat.

Clutch using One Eyed Dollar from Jam Room to From Beale Street to Oblivion.

There are probably others my mind hasn't come to, they do seem to jam quite a lot and it shows how tight they are when they do play. It wouldn't surprise me if some older songs come into fruition later on with making albums.

Pixies re-recorded Vamos from Come on Pilgrim on Surfer Rosa.

The Durutti Column went through a bit of a phase of this in some of their later albums. LC, from 1981 though, has two recordings of Sketch For Dawn opening and closing side 1.

Similarly the second Red House Painters album has two versions of Mistress on it and their third LP has a new version of New Jersey that originally appeared on the second album.

Luke Haines did Das Kapital, an album of old Auteurs songs accompanied by an orchestra, at the end of his time on Hut. He didn't murder them like Bonnie Prince Billy, but the new songs were by far the best tracks on the album, particularly the below:

The Beatles had a go at this possibly for a B side or for use on With The Beatles, but canned it until they were scratching around for material on Get Back.

Lou Reed has also got form for this:

Neil Hannon put a very similar version of "Timewatching" from Liberation on A Short Album About Love albeit it had also been a rockier version on the pre-Liberation EP (called Timewatch EP).

Also, "Europop" also appeared on an earlier EP and again in a rockier version before Liberation.

In the '00s Elvis Costello re did Complicated Shadows originally from 1996, no idea why

Quote from: Johnboy on January 18, 2024, 03:18:36 PMIn the '00s Elvis Costello re did Complicated Shadows originally from 1996, no idea why

Remove all traces of Bruce Thomas?

Val Doonican was notorious for this. Oh this one also has Paddy McGinties Goat, silly old Val.

One of the songs on Orbital 2 is actually a remix of a Meat Beat Manifesto song the Hartnolls did a few years earlier, with a bit of tweaking.

The Orb's "Toxygene" was submitted as a remix of Oxygene by Jean Michel Jarre but he rejected it so they released it themselves.

Cradle of Filth's second release features a re-recording of a song from their first (and part of another), and their third album has a re-recording of a song from their second, due to label/contract shenanigans. They would later re-record three more tracks from their debut on their sixth album.

TV, the Drug of a Nation was done by the BeatNigs and then by the Disposable Heroes of HipHoprisy...

I also enjoyed discovering that the opening noises on I'm Mandy Fly Me are sampled (or whatever it was called in 1976) from another 10cc song I'd never heard before (Clockwork Creep)

Quote from: non capisco on January 18, 2024, 12:56:43 PMNever got why REM bothered recording and releasing Bad Day as a single, the original incarnation of It's The End Of The World As We Know It. Felt like them virtually admitting they were creatively bankrupt, oh there you go I've answered my own question

If Stipe's song is recent - who knows, could be decent
If it's an old reheat - best keep the receipt

I think the record company wanted something unreleased to chuck on the greatest hits as a bonus.
They had Bad Day in the vault, but IRS owned the tape and wanted silly money, so they rerecorded it.
A lot of hassle for the song least likely to be wanted by anyone buying that album.

Quote from: The Culture Bunker on January 18, 2024, 12:06:58 PMComsat Angels did a new version of 'Independence Day', from their debut album, for their fourth. Both times released as a single too.

Modern English did the same re 'I Melt With You', with more (commercial) success.

Pretty In Pink is another similar example.