30 minute epics on vinyl?
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Topic: 30 minute epics on vinyl?
Posted By: Friday13th
Subject: 30 minute epics on vinyl?
Date Posted: March 09 2015 at 18:41
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I recently acquired a Utopia's debut on vinyl, and the second side is the song "The Ikon" that lasts a whopping 30:22. I had no idea vinyls back then could pass the 25 minute mark, so I'm wondering. You guys know any other old-school "prog epics" originally released on vinyl that run unusually long times? Not like Thick as a Brick or A Passion Play that are split up on each side, but rather on one side. It's no contest, but I'd likely be impressed with anything substantially longer than "Supper's Ready" or "A Plague of Lighthouse Keepers." |
Replies:
Posted By: zravkapt
Date Posted: March 09 2015 at 18:52
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Klaus Schulze had a few I believe. Maybe some Miles Davis from the '70s and possibly the live versions of ELP's "Karn Evil 9" and "Tarkus"(I don't feel like looking all this up right now but I'm about 95% sure of all that). Supposedly once a side of vinyl went over about 25 minutes the sound degraded, so it wasn't done often. Oh, and speaking of Rundgren I think that long track on his Initation album was over 30 minutes too...about 95% sure. ------------- Magma America Great Make Again |
Posted By: Friday13th
Date Posted: March 09 2015 at 19:15
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Oh man, I've heard those Schulze albums and I didn't notice! haha Miles Davis is a jazz genius...and he doesn't count  Not really interested in extended live performances...talk about twice reduced sound quality
 Yeah, Initiation does have a 30+ minute track. I'll have to check it. |
Posted By: Quirky Turkey
Date Posted: March 09 2015 at 20:55
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Mike Oldfield's Amarok got a vinyl release and that album goes for an hour. So that's 30 minutes per side |
Posted By: TeleStrat
Date Posted: March 09 2015 at 22:05
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Not quite 30 minutes but... The 1972 album Gravedigger by the band Janus featured the title track as all of side two at 20:44.
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Posted By: Dellinger
Date Posted: March 09 2015 at 23:17
| I guess this doesn't count, since you said you don't want them split, but Focus had a song that lasted a bit longer than a side... I thin it was the Answers, Questions song, which ends at one side and continues for the last minutes on the other side before the other songs begin. |
Posted By: Catcher10
Date Posted: March 09 2015 at 23:42
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There are not many.....The ones listed are the most popular for prog and jazz fusion. Coltrane may have had some too...Most are in the 22-25min range per side. Generally the sound does not degrade, what happens is you lose some low end response as the groove width gets thinner to allow everything to fit. Sound quality should remain unchanged.... -------------   
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Posted By: Progosopher
Date Posted: March 10 2015 at 00:30
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The live version of Scheherezade from Renaissance's Live at Carnegie Hall clocks in at 28:50. The vinyl records we are most familiar with are what are known as long play, or l.p. for short and are distinct from the e.p. which means extended play. 18 - 20 minutes a side became the convention, probably due to production costs as much as anything else. They can actually handle an hour on a single side but the sound quality will be horrible. Both Genesis and Renaissance regularly exceeded conventional side lengths. Some classical labels would only do about fifteen minutes or so. ------------- The world of sound is certainly capable of infinite variety and, were our sense developed, of infinite extensions. -- George Santayana, "The Sense of Beauty" |
Posted By: floflo79
Date Posted: March 10 2015 at 01:10
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Bayreuth Return is more than 30:00 long. Parallel World by Far East Family Band is 30:00 too. ------------- 
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Posted By: Tom Ozric
Date Posted: March 10 2015 at 02:48
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^ Correct !! Incredible pieces of Prog, too. Transatlantic had their All Of The Above epic on their debut, and some of Magma's epics are over a half-hour too. Pity they are split between sides these days. Sound quality over time quantity I suppose. |
Posted By: Sagichim
Date Posted: March 10 2015 at 02:49
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Wapassou - Messe En Ré Mineur, this album has one track devided into 15 minutes on side A and 25 minutes on side B. |
Posted By: friso
Date Posted: March 10 2015 at 03:17
| If its done really well you can fit 30 min on a vinyl, but you'll loose a lot of volume because of the thin grooves. |
Posted By: octopus-4
Date Posted: March 10 2015 at 03:29
From my old vinyls: The B side of Klaus Schulze "Dune" is exactly 30 minutes long. Renaissance's Sheherazade on "Live at Carnegie Hall" scores 29:50 ------------- Curiosity killed a cat, Schroedinger only half. My poor home recorded stuff at https://yellingxoanon.bandcamp.com |
zravkapt wrote:Posted By: Tom Ozric
Date Posted: March 10 2015 at 04:03
| Todd's Treatise On Cosmic Fire was approx. 36 mins. It sounds fine (mostly just quirky synth noodling - in the true sense). About half is worthwhile to me. Side 1 has a selection of much better things. |
Posted By: Friday13th
Date Posted: March 10 2015 at 22:23
| Thanks, guys. I'll have to check some I haven't heard, though some I've heard and just forgot they were comparably long! Oldfield's Amarok was already on my list so that's double confirmation right there. |
Posted By: RockHound
Date Posted: March 10 2015 at 22:45
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Todd was notorious for half hour album sides - When I saw the thread I immediately thought of Utopia. The International Feel from A Wizard/A True Star is another 30-minute whopper, but is a suite of very loosely connected tidbits rather than a true epic. Rundgren made a lot of great music, but the low end really suffered in the records. Also, the narrow grooves facilitated bleed-through, and this problem is really bad on Ra, where the synth solo in Hiroshima can be heard faintly one revolution before its intended takeoff. It's like a pre-echo effect. I bought the CD versions years ago, but they still sound tinny. I am not sure if the classic Rundgren and Utopia recordings have been remastered from the ground up. I would love to hear that stuff in its true full-frequency glory.
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Posted By: Tom Ozric
Date Posted: March 11 2015 at 01:36
AWATS has a MAGNIFICENT side 1, very good, more 'traditional' Todd on side 2. |
Posted By: jmarkwilson
Date Posted: March 12 2015 at 02:15
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"Wring That Neck" from Deep Purple's Scandinavian Nights is 32.06 minutes and "Mandrake Root" is 28.42. ------------- mark |
Posted By: Hercules
Date Posted: March 13 2015 at 09:04
You also get some "talk through", which is the stylus picking up from the next groove if they are too close together. ------------- A TVR is not a car. It's a way of life. |
Posted By: Hercules
Date Posted: March 13 2015 at 09:06
Genesis did usually exceed 45 mins per album for a simple reason; cassettes were mostly C90s so you couldn't get their albums on one side of a tape, which discouraged home taping. ------------- A TVR is not a car. It's a way of life. |
Posted By: moshkito
Date Posted: March 13 2015 at 10:12
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Hi,
What is weird, is that in the age of the CD, when this can be accomplished easily enough, I can not even list them.
Djam Karet's The Trip is about the only one right off the top of my head! ------------- Music is not just for listening ... it is for LIVING ... you got to feel it to know what's it about! Not being told! www.pedrosena.com |
Posted By: CPicard
Date Posted: March 13 2015 at 13:37
So what? When I used 90 minutes tapes, I just completed the other side with tracks from other albums. I could skip the tracks I didn't like, et hop! 2 albums on a C90. |
Posted By: Svetonio
Date Posted: March 14 2015 at 00:41
| Music For 18 Musicians by Steve Reich, original ECM LP (1978); that B side, Sections V - XI - Pulse is 32 minute long. Although Steve Reich is not a prog rock act, many prog-lovers like his minimalistic music, so I want to mention the album. |