Epic songs: two Dreams sorrounding one Reality?
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Topic: Epic songs: two Dreams sorrounding one Reality?
Posted By: sohraab
Subject: Epic songs: two Dreams sorrounding one Reality?
Date Posted: October 10 2010 at 06:24
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From the literature that I have, it was king crimson who did it first: writing an epic song, dividing it to two halves, one half as the first song of the album, the other as the last song. Lark`s tongues in aspic was the album from king crimson which released in 1973 and for the first time (I think by far) provided an epic song in the above mentioned way. The second sample arrives with Shine on you crazy diamond, 1975 by pink Floyd which introduces the title epic track in a divided form at the beginning and the end of the album. From the more recent bands maybe the most significant case for the application of such structure is systematic chaos, 2007 by Dream Theater which divides the almost 26 minute epic, in the presence of enemies again to two parts, opening and closing the album. In all these three mentioned cases we see a number of tracks between the two parts of epic which offer different atmospheres and concepts for the listener. In fact the listener begins the journey in the album in an epic-minded manner but suddenly finds himself in another place as the first half of the epic finishes. Going through technically and emotionally diverse songs, back again to the story of the epic to conclude the structure of the album. This may be considered as an amazing or even important case in the field of song arrangement and album structure making for progressive music. The question is that, where does this idea come from to not to introduce an epic song as a continuous one but instead, as a separated form. The first thing that may comes to one`s mind is that maybe such method is used to avoid having a too long song in album. But this reason is not logical enough since we see some cases which denied it, say Octavarium by DT and Echoes by PF So there should be a more conceptual reason for such kind of album structure. For the writer, this idea seems to be a little deeper and more original that we look at it. In fact, this is the structure which resembles the timeline of `human existence` … a line, which begins with some kind of unconscious existence in a hallucinating unknown environment, the body of mother, continues with the `birth` introducing the `life` on the earth with whole of its realities, dreams, diversities, feelings, ended by `death` which is again as mysterious and unknown as inside of mother`s body… The time line for existence of mankind resembles something like `a dream between two realities` or as well `a reality between to dreams` which may be arguable philosophically. The interesting thing about some progressive albums which have mentioned above is that in fact, they follow exactly the same time line. I hope that the matter has been discussed in a
clear form. This is in fact a matter of inter-relationship of Art, philosophy
and psychology. The artists of those works could have applied such kind of
structure unconsciously or, for another conscious reason that they have
concerned. In fact we know that all of the artistic actions of the brain takes
place in its right side which is regarded of course as the more unconscious
side. The thing
that was so amazing for the writer of the note, is the deep and meaningful
connection of `real life` and `artistic structure and form` in the work of such
progressive giants like PF, KG and DT. No matter it has been done consciously or unconsciously,
this can be regarded as one of the signs which verifies the unique and well
processed understanding of `life` and `art` for an artist. The writer
hopes that more broad discussions on such cases which may result in
better understanding of the philosophy of art and specially progressive music
as well. thx PA. |
Replies:
Posted By: fuxi
Date Posted: October 10 2010 at 09:05
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In King Crimson's case, I don't believe the band were thinking of "a dream between two realities" or "a reality between two dreams". I think they were just trying to gather a lot of disparate material, some of which happened to be based on the same musical theme. At the same time, the principle you are trying to describe had a precedent in one of rock's earliest concept albums, SGT. PEPPER. Although "Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Heart's Club Band" cannot be called an "epic song", it introduces ALMOST all the material on the album, and it finally waves that material goodbye as well. You could say the song helps to establish the band's "alternative reality" (i.e. Beatlesque reality, as opposed to the boredom of ordinary, humdrum lives). Only "A Day in the Life" lies outside this reality. And surely that's not just a coincidence, since the song is meant to evoke a dreamlike state. Having said all that, there must be operas, string quartets, masses etc. etc. which were composed using similar "bookend" methods. |
Posted By: sohraab
Date Posted: October 10 2010 at 10:03
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seems that u get the point, not completely but very close... however, my note has a little to do directly with technical issue of prog. music but instead, i`m trying to figure out some significant characteristics of prog musicians ideology which results in a specific artistic form in their works. specially, such characteristics are more touchable when one looks to 70`s bands. the reason may be due to their unique period of time regarding the cultural and social condition of those days and more important, the fact that they were all the children of second world war, carrying some special consequences which guides them through a very narrow and accurate artistic movement. a nice post indeed, |
Posted By: sohraab
Date Posted: October 10 2010 at 23:46
| 190 views and only 1 reply?! ok. maybe this one is a little deep and complicated one for most of the readers. but in fact it`s quite simple... and i expected the people have kinda reaction at least. i think these kind of discussions may be amazing and also fundamentally helpful to figure out some social aspects of progressive music. not agree? |
Posted By: Any Colour You Like
Date Posted: October 11 2010 at 00:10
Be warned, this is not deep. Enter Moshkito. |
sohraab wrote:Posted By: sohraab
Date Posted: October 11 2010 at 00:19
thank uuuuuuuuuuuuu! at last someone said something!!! of course it is not deep for me as i told but for others maybe... and if not also deep for u, so i`m waiting for anything which ignites the flame of discussion! u r more than welcome. |
Posted By: Any Colour You Like
Date Posted: October 11 2010 at 00:25
| If you want my opinion, you're overanalysing it. All art is inherently subjective, and any attempt to describe, categorise or analyse is bound by limited human conciousness. Life and art are essentially the same thing, for without either they can have no interpretive meaning. |
Posted By: sohraab
Date Posted: October 11 2010 at 00:41
ok your idea is respectable. but i can not agree with that art is bound by limited human consciousness. it is proven many years ago by the very basic physiological science studies that almost all of the artistic activities and thoughts are promoted by the right half of the human`s brain which is indeed the responsible half for unconscious acts; ves. left half which rules the logically driven consciously activities. (see Ernest Jones and also Zigmund Freud works if interested). if you like i`ll be glad to provide more information for you. |
Posted By: Any Colour You Like
Date Posted: October 11 2010 at 00:51
Ok. If art can be unconciously analysed, recognised or even perceived, how does this manifest itself in concious thought or perception? |
Posted By: sohraab
Date Posted: October 11 2010 at 02:46
it`s simple. right half and left half of the brain are connected to each other via a thin layer. that`s how they transfer data to each other. in fact, any action that we do, which is in our case music composing, is the product of both parts of the brain. the share which is processed by left part is mostly ruled by conscious abilities which is in our case say, musical profession in terms of theoretical education of music composing. but the more important part of music composing flows out of our right brain, say unconscious. i give u a simple example. IMPROVISATION. this is exactly a part of music which is totally unconsciously driven. the proof is that u see Robert Fripp improvise, if u ask him to do it again in next 24 hours he can not do the same improvisation. because this is exactly a `particularly unconscious product of brain` which can not be resembled! the interviewer asks Dave Gilmour about the opening strings of shine on you. where did it come to your mind? he answers no where! it just came in one moment! this is what is called unconsciously composed music and in a broader definition, unconsciously created Art. |
Posted By: Any Colour You Like
Date Posted: October 11 2010 at 03:04
| If improvisation is unconciously driven, why do we have control over the ability to differentiate between the concious and the subconcious. In the moment you perceive anything and react accordingly, the subconcious is lost. Does that not create the perception of conciousness? |
Posted By: octopus-4
Date Posted: October 11 2010 at 09:09
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I'm not sure to catch the question: Is ELP - The Endless Enigma a valid example? ------------- Curiosity killed a cat, Schroedinger only half. My poor home recorded stuff at https://yellingxoanon.bandcamp.com |
Posted By: sohraab
Date Posted: October 11 2010 at 09:15
i`m sorry my friend but since ELP is not my cup of tea, i can not judge or even analyze their music as well. so if u consider PF shine on u it`s better for me. anyway it is not a question. i`m just trying to figure out kind of psychological reason for two-halved epics at the beginning and end of the albums. i introduced my own theory. waiting for others opinions. thx. |
Posted By: octopus-4
Date Posted: October 11 2010 at 09:25
Now it's a bit clearer. The ELP song is a long track divided just by a short piano instrumental instead of a whole album, but the 3 parts flow quite good one into the other. About Shine on, there are a couple of boxsets on which you can listen to it without any split. I suppose they have decided to split it only because of technical reasons, then, instead of just splitting they did something more original by putting the second part at the end of the B-side as album closure. I'm quite sure that the idea came after the song was completely written. Wish You Were Here is not a concept album like The Dark Side of the Moon. On Dark Side, we have the heartbeat that opens and closes a story, and has a sense. There's nothing to close on WYWH. ------------- Curiosity killed a cat, Schroedinger only half. My poor home recorded stuff at https://yellingxoanon.bandcamp.com |
Posted By: sohraab
Date Posted: October 11 2010 at 09:31
i got u. u mean this is just for technical reasons. but how about king crimson`s lark`s tongue? if we consider it again from technical point, then what about dream theater`s `in the presence of enemies` which is composed in our age without any technical problem forcing them to split it. i think there IS SOMETHING about the matter. something beyond technical stuff. as i introduced in my original post... |
Posted By: octopus-4
Date Posted: October 11 2010 at 09:39
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I'm not so expert of KC and DT so I can't say. I have to think to something else. Staying on "Shine on": that song has very few of the dream and the whole album is very connected to reality. Waters is not a dreamer. The only dreams that you can find in Pink Floyd came from Barrett (The Scarecrow, The Gnome, Mathilda Mother....) ------------- Curiosity killed a cat, Schroedinger only half. My poor home recorded stuff at https://yellingxoanon.bandcamp.com |
Posted By: sohraab
Date Posted: October 11 2010 at 09:46
exactly! and the interesting point is that `shine on` is written for Syd! i`m not trying to figure out something just with making nonsense relationship between statements. but trying to assess the musical tendencies of 70`s composers from a non-technical point of view, more concerning their society situation of that time and their effects on psychological characteristics of artists. i opened this broad discussion with a very narrow and particular view regarding epic songs. but in fact discussion may be broaden to other areas as well. |
Posted By: octopus-4
Date Posted: October 11 2010 at 10:17
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It's a coincidence. I was listening to Senmuth's "RXG-242-11". The opener is Megiste Syntaxis 1 and the closer "Megiste Syntaxis 2. Thos tracks are effectively different from the rest of the album. It's downloadable for free on www.senmuth.com as all the other 79 albums that he has published in the last 5 years. Give it a try. ------------- Curiosity killed a cat, Schroedinger only half. My poor home recorded stuff at https://yellingxoanon.bandcamp.com |
Posted By: sohraab
Date Posted: October 11 2010 at 10:21
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[QUOTE=octopus-4]It's a coincidence. I was listening to Senmuth's "RXG-242-11". The opener is Megiste Syntaxis 1 and the closer "Megiste Syntaxis 2. Thos tracks are effectively different from the rest of the album. It's downloadable for free on www.senmuth.com as all the other 79 albums that he has published in the last 5 years. Give it a try. [/QUOTEthx for suggestion. i`ll check it by sure. but if you think so tough that all these are coincidence, means that u r completely rejecting my theory! i never consider anything 100% percent on this world! maybe we have the possibility to look at the matters from another angel... agree or not? |
Posted By: npjnpj
Date Posted: October 11 2010 at 10:25
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Much too heavy for my way of thinking. In my mind there are two connected reasons for the split: 1) Simply to avoid the song getting to be too long. I have the feeling that for some people PF's Shine On or Lark's Tongues would start to drag a bit when played as a continuous song. In the early 70's, with people not really used to such mammoth tracks, it was a sensible decision. 2) It's a neat idea to do it that way. |
Posted By: octopus-4
Date Posted: October 11 2010 at 10:25
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let's see if that album fits in the conversation, first. Senmuth is "Industrial Metal", so if you come from Pink Floyd there's a 50% of possibilities that you don't like him, but if you like him his website is a gold mine. ------------- Curiosity killed a cat, Schroedinger only half. My poor home recorded stuff at https://yellingxoanon.bandcamp.com |
Posted By: ExittheLemming
Date Posted: October 11 2010 at 10:35
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The humanoid critter's love of symmetry is well documented. Even a casual glance at the classical symphonic tradition might just give us an inkling that popular music strives for the same aesthetic satisfaction as that found in something like the golden mean/ratio etc. It's just another example of a pleasing structure that has been around since powdered wigs were considered the preserve of 'longhairs' ------------- 
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Posted By: octopus-4
Date Posted: October 11 2010 at 10:35
Much too heavy... do you mean Senmuth? He's heavy effectively but his sound is very original, that's why I like his music. I'm not sure about your first point. This may be a major's decision. Why should an artist write something long to split it ? In 1976 Renaissance released the live at Carnegie Hall that contains two tracks over 24 minutes, Klaus Schulze, Tangerine Dream and Edgar Froese were not scared by track's length, Also Cat stevens released a full album track. And what about Tubular Bells? At the time of WYWH I think people were used enough. At least I was looking for this kind of tracks. I wasn't happy to buy a disc with no tracks over 10 minutes lenght. ------------- Curiosity killed a cat, Schroedinger only half. My poor home recorded stuff at https://yellingxoanon.bandcamp.com |
Posted By: octopus-4
Date Posted: October 11 2010 at 10:36
Good idea.  symmetry is always a driver in art.------------- Curiosity killed a cat, Schroedinger only half. My poor home recorded stuff at https://yellingxoanon.bandcamp.com |
Posted By: sohraab
Date Posted: October 11 2010 at 10:37
how about `in the presence of enemies` of DT? it has nothing to do with the people of 70`s... but still divided to 2 parts. to make the discussion more simple, i would like to remake my statement as this: i find two-part epics the more conceptual, imaginative and musically improvised compared with other tracks on considered album. say, in the presence of enemies takes almost the whole concept of `systematic chaos` album by DT which makes me THINK about album rather than just headbanging with it! also the same with shine on which includes a nostalgic thought comparing to welcome to the machine or have a cigar which are more into realistic social matters (of course with an exception of wish u where here which has it`s own category!). |
Posted By: sohraab
Date Posted: October 11 2010 at 10:43
nice idea. but where does this specific `satisfying structure` come from? is it completely a conscious-driven act? or it has the flavor of instinct inside as well? this is the critical point of my mind... |
Posted By: Catcher10
Date Posted: October 11 2010 at 12:56
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I don't think prog has anything to do with it. I cannot fathom how many books are written in this manner...Start the reader off with a thought...end it...go thru the story...come back to that original thought and complete the circle, making the 3 parts complete.
From a musical perspective I like the reference to classical writings, operas. I think writing music lyrics is very much based on writing novels.....I mean almost all rock writers are influenced by the written book, novel.....so I expect that style will also come thru in their music lyrics.
I don't think PF, KC or DT are doing this for the first time......you will find this in all genres of music.
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Posted By: sleeper
Date Posted: October 11 2010 at 14:16
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In the cases of KC and DT that you mentioned, I think its primarily a case of having two sepperate compositions that are both based around the same themes, but wont work together at all. In this way I dont consider it as spliting up a single indavidual track but as making it clear that these two or more tracks are themetaically linked and should be considered as such. I've yet to hear the live version of DT's In the Prescence of Enemies where they play both parts back to back, but the studio versions definitely dont work as a single piece, the same goes for Larks Tongues' in Aspic.
Tracks like Wish You Were Here and Karn Evil 9 are a different matter, as the constraints of vinyl meant that they couldnt appear as a single epic. How they arrange the seperate parts of the epic after that is entirely down to how the band wants to construct the album from the individual compositions they have. ------------- Spending more than I should on Prog since 2005  |
Posted By: O666
Date Posted: October 11 2010 at 15:26
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100% conscious . In serious music as KC's music everything have reason and philosophy. Maybe when one musician play "Improvise piece" you can tell unconscious playing but in prog music structure specially bands like KC this not work. If you want to find "The reason" of this split, You must know about music rules and structure completely. Psychological reasons not enough without musical reasons. Many bands have their own map like flowchart or screenplay specially in concept albums. They think about all things before start to play. I think we cant talk about this with only 3 samples.We must listen more and analysis many of splits then talk about reasons of this split (as you call it). |
Posted By: moshkito
Date Posted: October 11 2010 at 20:01
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Hi,
I hardly think that "Wish You Were Here" was an epic piece ... it was something that was put together as requested by the record company and "Welcome to the Machine" is PF's finger to it. And then, right after to make matters even stronger ... "Have a Cigar" ... with one of the all time anti-establishment poets and writers singing it!
During DSOTM, Pink Floyd was playing 2 things that many of us thought would make the new album ... they were called "Raving and Drooling" and "You Gotta Be Crazy", and they were excellent. It is now out of the realm of possibility that the record company declined this new material and they wanted something closer to DSOTM in order to capitalize on the sales and strength of it. And PF might not have a choice at the time, and they came up with Shine On You Crazy Diamond easily enough, and then the 2 new pieces, and the rest of the album is almost verbatum copy of DSOTM.
If that makes it a concept ... that's stretching it quite a bit. DSOTM would fit better in the dream area, but believe it or not, I think that it would sound better and closer to "dream" (just like the movie during the show), if it had been the original, which was a bunch of priests sermonizing and Syd Barrett yapping right over it ... which likely was rejected by the record company for being ... a bit obtuse and weird ... which would have been more consistent with PF's earlier material! I'm on record as stating that the "original" DSOTM was almost ALL of it about Syd Barrett ... which somewhere along the way was disguised and "removed" and became something else. That's not to say it is not good, or better ... but the bootlegs show a sizeable difference on these. And Syd's voice on it in the boots, actually clarifies this album and it's concept much better ... since Syd, indeed went to the other side of the moon!
And I would think that there are better albums to discuss dreams and concepts, but PF, other than "The Wall"! Even The Who's "Tommy" would be a better discussion, but ... we don't seem to like the idea of the word "opera" mentioned here. ------------- 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: Dellinger
Date Posted: October 12 2010 at 22:31
| As for Shine on You Crazy Diamond, they created all the song as one piece, and then it happened to not fit one side of the vinyl and they were forced to split the song, and so it ended up being half at the beginning of the album, and half at the end, but it was not initially inteded so. As for Lark's Toungues, I don't find any musical theme linking both songs together, except for the chaotic nature of both. |
Posted By: moshkito
Date Posted: October 13 2010 at 14:33
I would disagree with this -- sort of -- the stuff was "band'ed" for radio station use, and there are copies of the albums cut-up in pieces for you to listen to, and almost all of them called "Promotional Copy Only" and portions of the music were deliberatly cut up so radio would have an easier time fitting them in ... as long pieces tend to cut into the commercial stations budgets and per minute quota of commercials. (I think it is 14 minutes per hour now). AND, above all, it was one of the reasons why you got the English import ... which was not cut up in Part 1 or Part 2 and Part 3 like YES was way too much! It gives you a different perspective on the work and the sales and what fans KNEW and went after. ... you need to come over and see how many "promotional copies" I have! One of them has Echoes in 4 parts!
Some of the albums that you might find cut up ... Yes - Close to the Edge/Yes- Tales From Topographic Oceans/Yes - Relayer/Jethro Tull - Thick as a Brick/Boston - That first album/Kansas/ ... it was an endless list. And many artists didn't like it and even Jon Anderson said something about it in Melody Maker, but that there was nothing he could do, since, in the end, it said it all about the "fans" ... they still went for the music.
Nowadays, there is much more freedom for the music and the lentgh is not as big a deal, and anyone that is serious about music is not going after Lady Gaga's audience or Martin's audience, or JenLo's body pictures. And they sell much better and have better support and attention via Utube, Facebook, and other methods of Internet presence.
But in those days, we're talking 40 years ago, it was NOT the same thing, and long cuts were what the new FM radio was about ... until FM radio became just another commercial AM station with cuts a minute longer! AND, it is important that you see this, Pink Floyd did NOT make it big until the song "Money" went out and became a huge hit in radio ... and of course, try finding the single with a couple of words muted out ... you do know that single is worth about $400 dollars today, right?
It is important that we remember that we are talking about a different place and time. There was no internet then, or any kind of matrix to help a lot of these different bands make it ... and one of the biggest killers on the scene of "imports" and specialty bands, was when one man got both Rolling Stones and Led Zeppelin fir hundreds of millions of dollars, and on that day, over 500 bands got dumped from distribution systems because they were not "sellers" like the big ones were. Pink Floyd was not "up there" bot got there and then some within a year. ------------- 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: octopus-4
Date Posted: October 13 2010 at 14:43
You made me remember the dark side of the seventies. Can you see how many "one album bands" are on PA and how many of them are from that period? What a pity. ------------- Curiosity killed a cat, Schroedinger only half. My poor home recorded stuff at https://yellingxoanon.bandcamp.com |
Posted By: sohraab
Date Posted: October 13 2010 at 14:48
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no one still answered my question! ok u say that the splitting of epics at 70`s was just because of technical restrictions. and i ask: what about now?! do DT have technical problem also to publish `in the presence of enemies` as a complete track rather than divide it to two? i don think so! so there should be something... something that makes them arrange the album like this... |
Posted By: moshkito
Date Posted: October 13 2010 at 15:23
I don't think that it is an issue today.
It was 20 years ago. Klaus Schulze had massive pieces that were several CD's big which would not have happened in the LP format, even though he was the pioneer of the 30 minute LP side. And when the CD came of age, I doubt that any band has major issues with it.
While today is quite strongly a market based on top ten, Dream Theater has already established enough of its work that long pieces are not an issue, and they have always had a long piece before anyway.
Today, I don't think you have to "compromise" as much as you had to in those days, which was what part of the "revolution" and "hippie" thing was all about ... you had very limited freedom for the short cuts then ... and I forgot to mention ... In a Gadda Da Vida, had 4 parts also in the readio version of it ... well, we don't even have to discuss the 3 minute version of "Light My Fire" ...
CD's, today, allow you to do a whole piece that is an hour or more long ... and believe it or not, this is something that the world of classical music has not taken advantage of, but the likes of Mike Oldfield and Vangelis, Sakamoto, and other more classically oriented composers, are still doing 20 minute pieces which kinda suggests that the LP limitations are kind of ingrained still, but these should become less and less of a problem as time goes by. ------------- 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: sohraab
Date Posted: October 13 2010 at 15:30
i get u man. `n i should think twice this time maybe... |
Posted By: O666
Date Posted: October 13 2010 at 15:46
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Posted By: Paravion
Date Posted: October 13 2010 at 15:46
The way I read it, he's talking about albums where large songs are spilt up so that "part one" is the album opener and "part two" is the album closer. His point is, that this makes the structure of the album circular and that it reflects the circle of life - wherein he equates birth with death in the sense that they both are mysterious and unknown and can be viewed as either dream or reality? Academically - it's difficult to get any sense out of. But it is a display of unrestricted and ungoverned thinking. Impossible topic. |
Posted By: moshkito
Date Posted: October 13 2010 at 19:07
And often impossible discussion as well.
But a lot of "progressive" music got cut up for radio play ... it was a given. Nowadays Dream Theater couldn't give a damn about radio at all ... since they can make it on their own without radio, just on Internet Radio and play alone ... so you can see how massively different this is from the early days from music business to radio control.
Remember that the majority of "radio stations" these days are owned and operated by the same conglomerates that own the media and movies and newspapers ... thus, the only stuff they will discuss and give good reviews to are strictly the ones that improve their checkbook ... which is another thing that a lot of people here sometimes don't see ... the media control.
That's why the Internet is so important and the hope for the future ... for the sake of the art ... or guess what we have? ... yeah ... Blade Runner! ------------- 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: moshkito
Date Posted: October 13 2010 at 19:20
Yep ... and one of my favorites ... you know what is sad? Mike has stated that he fooled around the whole time just to finish off that record contract ... and I happen to think it is one of his best pieces ... of all of them! But I think that he is now stuck on his "star" thing and his best days of creativity are totally gone. What I heard recently done with the orchestra is not that good and sad. You would think that it would have new things, instead it was just old themes ... that's not very original Mike!
Can I say that Amorok, doesn't count, now?  ------------- 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: O666
Date Posted: October 15 2010 at 06:12
I am very happy for your reply and appreciate. Thanks.
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Posted By: Gerinski
Date Posted: October 15 2010 at 23:48
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I think the subject is not so philosophical. The "musical resource" of making a song and then a "Reprise" was already common. In some cases such as Sargent Peppers the band thought it nice to open with the "1st" song and close with the Reprise (ok, we still have A day in the life but the Reprise feels nearly as a closing).
Prog bands started to employ also the resource of defining tracks as splitted into Parts or Movements. It was only a matter of time that someone would combine both ideas and open an album with a certain theme and close it with other Movement(s) of it. I guess it felt kind of cool, even if sometimes the 2 parts have not much to do with each other musically.
Another example is the excellent debut album of the spanish band Iceberg, "Tutankhamon", which starts with the instrumental "Tebas" and closes with "Tebas Reprise" (in this case they are really slightly different versions of the same musical theme).
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Posted By: Nathaniel607
Date Posted: October 22 2010 at 14:48
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Dream Theater stated they did it because they didn't want an epic closer like Octavarium again. That's all there is to it.
------------- http://www.last.fm/user/Nathaniel607" rel="nofollow - My Last FM Profile 
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Posted By: sealchan
Date Posted: October 25 2010 at 16:53
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Alan Parsons has used the open-close theme method many times on his albums. Of course, these are more framing themes with a full song at the front and a shorter reprise at the end rather than an epic divided but I think he has practiced this form enough to show some skill with it.
From a literary stand-point, is there an album with lyrics that achieves what sohraab is pointing at? That the first song sets up a theme, the album develops a series of examples or events and then the album concludes with the same theme and perhaps an ironic twist or a deeper sense of meaning?
Sohraab I think that what you are getting at maps nicely to the basic myth form of the Heroes' Journey as described by Joseph Campbell. It is a basic archetypal form that underlies art that describes the mystery of life and the unknown that surrounds it. It involves a "journey" where the hero becomes something that he/she was not originally through contact with forces greater than themselves. Whether the artist intends this or not the effect can be deeply stirring.
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Posted By: jean-marie
Date Posted: October 27 2010 at 08:25
| One album has been forgoten , 666 from aphrodite'schild with occasional flashback from various tracks through the long last piece ALL THE SEATS WERE OCCUPIED |