Err, forgive the long post, but man, I completely disagree. I think they SHOULD be considered differently because of that, personally. For me, how good an album is sort of adds a noticable greater-than-the-sum-of-its-parts bonus to how good the artist is. It's just another additional quality/creative decision to assess that makes the artist more complete and rewarding when satisfied, IMO. In a weird way, I would also say that when songs are a part of a great cohesive album that stands on its own as a singular thing, it also makes every single track on that album notably better than it otherwise would be (for some reason). I even find myself preferring (supposedly) lesser tracks on great albums over stronger tracks on lesser albums a lot of the time, because the context of it being a part of a greater whole can add so much to it. (I find myself more satisfied listening to 'Lady Godiva's Operation' than I do 'Rock and Roll' or 'Sweet Jane', for example, because I'm entranced by everything about White Light White Heat)
I'd definitely have a higher opinion of New Order if they had another great album to their name, even without adding anything to their catalogue of songs.
On a similar note that I can relate more to than with New Order, I've had a nagging thing that kept me from putting The Beatles on the untouchable pedestal that I want to, almost entirely due to the fact that I feel that most of their great albums are only near-perfect creations that unfortunately usually have at least one or two glaring holes in their track selection (Octopus' Garden, Maxwell Silver's Hammer, When I'm 64, and What Goes On, for example). Even though they have dozens of great songs (usually released at the same time) outside of these albums that, on quantity, should easily be able to make up for it. In practice, if you could somehow shove the singles they had during those periods into the glaring holes in a way that fit the albums perfectly, I'd be hard-pressed not to consider them my favorite band. But I don't, because those holes are still there (according to me).
In the same vein, there are tons of tracks on The Beatles' self titled white album that I wouldn't have thought are that amazing by themselves, but that I actually end up loving because of how well they work and how inspired they feel on that album.
That's also the reason why I struggle to put undeniably great and massively influential artists from the 40s and 50s (before albums were much of a thing) on that same pedestal. The only way they can compete, for me, is through the strength of their live albums, personally.
I don't know the science behind it, and it's not as simple as matching the tone up alone (Love Will Tear Us Apart is REALLY out of left field compared to the rest of Closer, though), but I definitely think its impact is significant.
