3-Sided Double LPs?

My copy of the Utopia S/T is like that too!

And add The Apples In Stereo Travellers In Space And Time. Can't remember what's on that fourth side. An etching I think.

The Willie Nelson And Friends Third Man LP has an etching of Willie on Side 4.

 

Devo's Now It Can Be Told (Live album) had etchings on the fourth side (album is a second over 60 mins long)

 

I can't remember which LP it was, but I have an LP where the 4th side is a song at 45rpm (already on the album at 331/3).

JG

 

Drive By Truckers - English Oceans
3-sided double LP

 

I prefer a good 20-minute side myself. There was no reason for Dylan's "Together Through Life" to be a double (45 min. at 33.3), and a bit of a pain to flip every 2 or 3 songs.

Other 3-siders:

Grails - Deep Politics
Quasi - Field Studies
Quasi - Sword of God

I use the smooth 4th side of this last one to test my tonearm weight and anti-skating. Useful!

 

Yeah, Junta, Lawn Boy and Joy all have blank/Etched sides. Seems like a missed opportunity.

 

I just remembered, it's David Crosby's latest LP Croz, side 4 has an 'audiophile extra' song played at 45rpm.

JG

 

Donald Fagan's Sunken Condos double LP - three sides!

Can anybody come up with a logical reason as to why side 4 is blank or has an etching?

JG

 

Funnily enough I was just about to say this. Posting about Take Care made me want to play some EintS so plumped for this and I had forgotten about the 4th side of birds until I flipped it on to the Rega.

 

Not sure if this counts, but the movie soundtrack of "Star Trek 3 - The Search for Spock" was 3 sided. Record 1 was most of the movie's music. Record 2, side 1 was a "pop" version of the main title. Side 4 was completely blank, although at least in Japan, it was pressed with blank groves or whatever those are called. Certainly nothing like the etched records many are posting images of.

 

Regardless of the 'why's' there is absolutely no excuse for a 3-sided LIVE double album. I'm referring to Genesis 'Three Sides Live' with the 4th side filled with live tracks from earlier tours or studio material (depending on which side of the pond your copy came from).

OK, I'm bending the definition of 3-sided records but, I mean, they were doing 2 hour shows - couldn't they find enough good material from the current tour to fill a fourth side? Anybody?

I still love it though. Played it earlier today and enjoyed it immensely.

 

Alice in Chains - Sap/Jar Of Flies

 

My 'Zidane - A 21st Century Portrait' by Mogwai is also 3-sided (heh!) although side 4 is filled with music un-credited on the sleeve i.e. track titles only for sides A-C (tracks 1-14) with another 2 tracks on what is/should be side D. Will pull it out for a spin later and do some investigating as to what these two tracks actually are. I've not had it that long.

 

Some runs had Side 3 repeated, but mine too was blank. That disk (and its 5 songs) was later dropped from the LP, but the songs returned for CD.

I just looked it up, and it looks like this was the last of the three 3-sided LPs of the pre-CD era I could find. The others have been mentioned: Second Winter and The Monty Python Matching Tie & Handkerchief in 1969 and 1973.

I definitely remember being annoyed by having only 3 sides of live material from what I thought was a razor-sharp tour....but I liked the idea of adding the b-sides and previously import-only extras. Three in particular (Evidence of Autumn, You Might Recall and Paperlate) are among my favorites from any era of the band, and it drove me crazy that all 5 didn't show up digitally until the 1976-1982 box in 2007.

Is that the on you have? Because the one with the fourth side live would have more than annoyed me at the time. Why even bother with the album title at that point?

What I wound up doing was recompiling the first 3 sides with the fourth side of studio tracks so I could play it what I still think is the "right" way...and I agree, I think it's terrific.

 

Well, to be honest, the first issue of the album over here in Europe had the original track listing with the 5 studio tracks of LP-side four on disc 2. I have it, it's a Dutch release on Phonogram. It dates back from the 80s or early 90s and I don't remember how long it was available, but it appears to be HTF by now.

 

I admit that it depends on the gtracks themselves. Sometimes three tracks on a side make for a good running order, sometimes 4 tracks hang together better. But in general I agree, esp. when the album is cut on 45 RPM.
From the early days of CD I remember that Sting's second solo album '...Nothing like the sun' come as a double vinyl album with very short playing times on each side. Each side had only 3 gtracks or so IIRC. At the time I found it a waste off space and materials, by now I like this option. It's 33 RPM, by the way.

And maybe not exactle what the OP is looking for, but I remember an oddity by Joan Armatrading circa 1980 - a 12" record at 33 RPM with only 4 short songs on one side. It had a total playing time of circa 13 minutes. IIRC, the record rompany explained this as a 'rush release' - the songs were so good that they couldn't wait until Joan had finished a whole album's worth of songs. At the time, one of these songs (Rosie) sped up the charts in Holland, so I can see why they did it.

 

The last Ben Folds Five album "The Sound of The Life of The Mind" is another 3 sided LP with an etching on side 4.

 

That's a regular single-LP. The second, single-sided LP is bonus tracks. You have the deluxe version, but they did release a regular version that was just the one LP.

 

If the album can fit on three sides with little to no compromise in sound quality, I say why not? I much prefer it to 4-sided double LPs with super short sides where you have to flip after like 10 minutes. One of the worst offenders in my collection is Grizzly Bear's "Shields": side D is ONE SONG! Should have just made it three sides and called it a day.

Of course, this leads to my opinion that most rock (and I am using this as a very big umbrella term) albums should only be around 40 minutes or so and fit on a single LP anyways. But I guess that's a whole other discussion.

 

I think it's just a matter of convenience for the listener not to have to get up
and turn the record over too often. If there are 48 minutes of music that
is 3 sides at 16 minutes per side or 4 sides at 12 minutes per side (assuming
the songs plot evenly).

 

I saw that album and it looked to me like they thought it would be funny to have 4 songs on side 1, 3 songs on side 2, 2 songs on side 3, and 1 song on side 4.

I wonder if there's an assumption that half the people buying LPs are just buying them to collect them and don't actually play them.

 

Yup that's the one I was thinking of. I get the whole artwork on side 4 thing, but I wish the songs on side 1 were spaced out over two sides to give them more room to breathe.

 

Did I imagine this or was the Thank God It's Friday soundtrack a 5-sided album? I seem to remember a Donna Summer song called "Je t'aime" on side five and nothing on side six.

 

My favourite, not popular amongst his fans though

 

The Flaming Lips - The Terror.

Side four is a mashup-remix of the first three sides.