To drag that back even further, albums were named that because 78s were generally held in albums (like photo albums).
78s were an A and a B side, they could be released as singles/one offs and generally weren't cohesive. Eventually you had people releasing related works or having longer recording sessions.
It sounds like a scenario of "What is old is new again", not that singles ever faded but all mediums outside of digital required the same amount of effort from the user for 1 track as it did for an album (put on an LP vs 45, cassettes had singles too but it's the same effort, CD changing would be difficult for a single song).
78s were an A and a B side, they could be released as singles/one offs and generally weren't cohesive. Eventually you had people releasing related works or having longer recording sessions.
It sounds like a scenario of "What is old is new again", not that singles ever faded but all mediums outside of digital required the same amount of effort from the user for 1 track as it did for an album (put on an LP vs 45, cassettes had singles too but it's the same effort, CD changing would be difficult for a single song).