iPod Can I "merge" tracks to play in order even during random play?

[zombieflanders]

Does iTunes have a setting to only play certain tracks together with other ones, both in the app and on iPods/iPhones? In other words, if Track A comes up as random, the next track will always be Track B, not another random track. Some good examples would be:

• Live performances with fade-ins or conversations (like Johnny Cash's Folsom Prison sessions and most electronica)
• Radio shows (like BBC Radio's Essential Mixes)
• The Star Wars soundtracks, where I want the Fox Fanfare to always lead into the opening theme
• Soundtracks with dialog included, such as Lock, Stock, and Two Smoking Barrels or Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas
• The Abbey Road medley of "You Never Give Me Your Money" through "The End/Her Majesty," or "Back in the USSR" fading in to "Dear Prudence"

I know this is an odd question, seeing as how random is supposed to be totally random, and I know it's a long shot, but I don't want to smoosh tracks together with an editor or anything like that. I can live with total random play, but I'd love it if there was a method of doing this.

 

[jzuena]

I've always wondered the same thing. Since when you add music iTunes does its gapless playback scanning, it has an idea of what songs should have no gap when played back-to-back. So why can't it use that info to play them back-to-back when playing randomly? The closest setting I can find is "Part of a gapless album" under a song's options. I don't know what checking this will actually do, though.

 

[Muncher]

I've always wondered the same thing. Since when you add music iTunes does its gapless playback scanning, it has an idea of what songs should have no gap when played back-to-back. So why can't it use that info to play them back-to-back when playing randomly? The closest setting I can find is "Part of a gapless album" under a song's options. I don't know what checking this will actually do, though.

I think it may have to do with how iTunes loads the songs before playing (i.e. no break in between). The free live Coldplay album is gapless, but I never checked that option because when playing the songs in order I never hear a break.

 

[jzuena]

I think it may have to do with how iTunes loads the songs before playing (i.e. no break in between). The free live Coldplay album is gapless, but I never checked that option because when playing the songs in order I never hear a break.

Even studio albums like the first Van Halen album, which I ripped myself external to iTunes will play Eruption / You Really Got Me without a gap, and that option isn't checked. But it has to do something. It might be worth trying it with a lightly loaded iPod to see if it can get songs that belong together to play together even during shuffle play.