In my experience, most songs put out these days rarely seem to top three minutes. Sometimes a band’ll put out a five-minute song.
Me, I like a song that goes on. And on. It’s one of the reasons I dig classical music, for instance. I like sitting down and going through a single song and feeling satisfied at the end. That’s also why one of my favorite albums is Pink Floyd’s Animals… the bulk of the album is three songs, Dogs (17 minutes), Pigs (11 minutes), and Sheep (10 minutes)… each song has several different movements while maintaining cohesiveness.
What other awesome, long songs are there? By “long song”, I mean one that tops out at around 8-10 minutes… again, Pink Floyd has a crapload of 'em (Echoes, Shine On You Crazy Diamond, etc.)… how many other bands have regularly delved into this style?
Genesis: Supper’s Ready, 23 minutes; The Battle of Epping Forest, 11+ minutes; One for the Vine, about 10 minutes; Firth of Fifth, 9 minutes; and many others; those are the ones I like the most. They did a lot of songs longer than 8 minutes on the old days when Peter Gabriel was part of the band.
Yes had a lot of them too: Close to the Edge & And You And I were around 10 minutes each, and Heart of the Sunrise was nearly 19 minutes long. There are a lot more from the early seventies.
Traffic has a great tune called “Roll Right Stones” that’s over ten minutes long, and “The Low Spark of High-Heeled Boys” is also long (at least 9 minutes IIRC).
The Revolting Cocks put a couple of extra-long tracks on their Beers, Steers and Queers and Linger Fickin’ Good albums - they were just fairly extended regular songs and I chalk it up to the drugs.
Come to think of it, most of the Wax Trax! era industrail bands put a 7-13 minute song on their albums.
One that I really think is impressive is Nile, who put a 7 or so minute song (To Dream of Ur) on their Black Seeds of Vengeance CD and have the mind-blowing Usan, Slayer of the Gods which they apparently have only performed live once and I happened to catch them that night! Of course, they’re death metal songs and not everyone’s cup of tea, but the accomplishment is quite astounding.
I’ve always been partial to some of Phish’s long songs from their early releases. They, as a band, have a habit of jamming an 8 minute song into a 20 minute song. On my mind right now are the tunes “You Enjoy Myself,” “Harry Hood” & “Divided Sky.” These songs clock in around 8-10 minutes each, chock full of great changes. Oh…include “Reba” in there as well.
I need to mention Genisis in here too. “Supper’s Ready” off of Foxtrot clocks in around 23 minutes. Some of their early work was great prog stuff.
Rush used to be great with the long song as well. I’ve always loved “Cygnus X-1” and “The Trees”
There’s probably a million Yes & ELP songs that qualify too.
Fates Warning has a CD called “A Pleasant Shade of Grey” which is one hour-long song. It’s divided into chapters though, so they kind of cheated.
Ten minutes? You’re a piker. I know some great 20 minute long songs.
The Allman Brothers Band have some terrific long live jams: “In Memory of Elizabeth Reed,” “Whipping Post,” “Mountain Jam” (some versions of that run 30-45 minutes).
Soft Machine’s album Third was originally released as a double disk. It had four songs on it, one for each side.
And there’s always Thick as a Brick by Jethro Tull, which consists of one song. (There is a radio edit that cuts the 40+ minutes down to a single piece of about 5 minutes, though).
Tales from Typographic Oceans by Yes – Shortest cut clocks in at over 18 minutes.
Love the extended version of Peter Gabriel’s “In Your Eyes”
Animals is my alltime favorite album (and Floyd is my alltime fave group), and to me, it’s just one song. There’s no way I can listen to any one track off that album - it’s got to be from beginning to end.
The full version of “Layla” is (as the DJs always seem to say at the end of it) good to the last drop.
Same applies to John Cougar Mellencamp’s (or whatever form of his name he was using at the time) “I Need a Lover”. The intro to that just rocks. And I’m not much of a Mellencamp fan.
Traffic’s (already mentioned) Low Spark of High Heeled Boys is also a great one, as well as Yes’ “Long Distance Runaround”
I know that some of these aren’t really particularly long in the grand scheme of things, but they are comparatively long when you consider the length of most radio-played songs.
I used to go drinking at this place that had “Eat a Peach” on the jukebox. I would always spend my quarter and play “Mountain Jam” (33:40). Always got my moneys worth and pissed most everyone else off as a bonus!
So-called “Post rock” artists are the king of this, but especially Godspeed You! Black Emperor and Mogwai do well with this.
Godspeed You! Black Emperor’s Slow Riot For New Zero Kanada is a triumph, and it’s also a 30-minute EP that contains two songs.
Mogwais’ Young Team is incredibly amazing, especially its closer, the 17-minute odyssey Mogwai Fear Satan (it’s a hell of a lot more interesting than it sounds).
That’s hilarious. Due to my Allman Brothers addiction, I can’t call 8 or 10 minutes a long song… once you get to around 15 or 20, I guess that’s long. Anyway I don’t think anybody beats the Allmans in that category, today or 30 years ago. There’s an hour-long version of Mountain Jam out there somewhere, from 1970. I hope I get to hear it someday.
As much as i love the Floyd (they’re also my favorite band,) I’m not a big fan of their longer songs. That said, my favorite three long songs are probably SOYCD, Dogs, and the live version of Echoes.
But the Atom Heart Mother Suite, Interstellar Overdrive (long for an instrumental rock song,) Saucerful of Secrets, and the instrumentals of Ummagumma just don’t really do anything for me. (However, The Narrow Way off Ummagumma is a great song, I just wish it had been produced better, it’s certainly up their with their epics.)
