Yesterday, feeling frustrated and unfulfilled by the abrupt ending of Generationals’ “Spinoza,” I edited the ending by adding more of the guitar riffs and fading it out. I think it added about 30 seconds to the song.
So that got me to thinking how I eliminated the synth solo from Zep’s “All My Love” and added a whole bunch more ending to Len’s “Steal My Sunshine,” just because I like the groove so much.
I know from a few other posts that others have edited songs, but I don’t recall having a thread about it. So, have you ever edited a song? What did you put in or take out, and why did you do it?
Dream Theater’s “In the Presence of Enemies,” off of Systematic Chaos. I believe the story goes that they felt the song would make a great opener AND a great closer to the album, but couldn’t decide which, and also felt none of the other songs would be as strong as an opener/closer. So they split the song into two parts, to open and close the album. But then, when they played it live, they played the entire song in one go.
I always felt all of this was dumb, so I made my own version of the album. ItPoE is restored to a single track, opening the album. “The Ministry of Lost Souls” works just fine as the closing track.
As far as editing, I’m no expert, but it wasn’t hard. The end of the first part features howling wind, and the beginning of the second part picks up with same. The volumes were different, so I had to “fade it up” going from part one to part two. I also had to fade out the wind sound from the end of TMoLS.
What did you do? Did you just cut a chunk out, did you splice in something else?
Some years ago, I trimmed some of the noodling near the end of, “For the Love of God”, by Steve Vai. Thought it ruined a great song. The song was created in such a way that there was an opportunity for me to excise the offending ten seconds or so and make it sound like it was recorded that way. I don’t mind it as much these days, but I still listen to my edit by preference.
Not quite the same, but when I transferred my VHS copy of “Gumball Rally” to a DVD - this was several years before it was finally released on disc - I replaced the absolutely horrid title credit music with Blues Brothers, “From the Bottom.” Worked beautifully.
Can’t remember what I put over the end credits now. But I did take the big-ass engine startup and drive-off sound from the WB logo card and mix it so that it went one direction (in stereo) on the opening credits and the other way on the closing ones.
I edited the two lines out of Insane Clown Posse’s “Miracles” that are at complete odds with the rest of the song.
The singer talks in awe about the wonders of nature: animals, children, weather, the oceans, the stars and planets, eclipses and galaxies and “fucking magnets, how do they work?”
then in the middle of rejoicing at all that awesomeness comes the only negative line, and it’s a non-sequitor:
“And I don’t wanna talk to a scientist
Y’all motherfuckers lying, and getting me pissed”
I cannot stand using the word “men” to mean “people.” A prime example is “I’m proud to be an American/where at least I know I’m free/And I won’t forget the men who died/who gave that right to me.” Uh, Alan, a lot of those people were women."
Chicago’s “Only the Beginning” is a great, great song that ends with two minutes of entirely unnecessary drum solo. I cut it and improved the song immensely.
So Anne-Xmas, the rest of us are talking about just cutting out a section of a song. What software are you using that can actually change the lyrics? Does it still sound like the original singer?
Edited out the spoken-word intro to Social Distortion’s live version of Prison Bound off Live at the Roxy. Love that song.
Edited out most of the minute-long guitar-feedback intro to Gang of Four’s Love Like Anthrax. I only need about 10 seconds of that caterwaul before the massive drums kick in and the hypnotic bass pattern starts. It doesn’t help that the guitar is feeding back through what sounds like a solid state amp so it is really ice-picky. Love that song, too.
You may have noticed that Paul McCartney’s 1985 ends with a quick reprise of Band on the Run. I figured, why bother with a reprise when I could just tack one song on to the other.
Aside from a few songs I’ve trimmed for time and easier listening (mostly ones with a period of “dead space” and/or an obnoxious “hidden track” at the end), I think the most elaborate one I’ve been tinkering with lately is an edited version of an Ink Spots song for a slightly macabre upcoming video project of mine…
“I just want to set the world on fire…I don’t want to start a flame in your heart…”
In edition to various mash-ups where I’ll combine vocals with another track, I edited Shakira’s “She Wolf”.
I do a little mixing and I didn’t like the remixes of She Wolf and I couldn’t find an extended version of the album version, so I bought the English version and the Spanish version (called “Loba”) and combined them into one track. I also looped the intro to allow me to mix-in and looped the outro to allow me to mix-out.
For the car USB stick, I faded out Hey Jude after a few minutes. Far better.
In line with the Dream Theater comment earlier, I combined Pink Floyd’s Shine on you crazy diamond into one song. Simple editing with Audacity Freeware.
I’ve edited a few songs, just to remove obnoxiously long intros or extended endings that degenerate into studio noise for five minutes and the like. I haven’t fiddled with cutting out actual verses or otherwise changing the “meat” of the song.
