50 Great Songs Over 7 Minutes Long That Didn’t Make Rolling Stone’s List
Posted by Jim Connelly in Actual Mileage, Music on Dec 04, 2007
Yesterday, Rolling Stone online put together a list of what they called “The Fifty Best Songs Over Seven Minutes Long.” Not so much. Sure, there were some all-time great songs on that list, but other songs weren’t even the best long song by the particular artist, much less on a 50 best ever list.
So, I figured that I’d do my own. Thanks to the magic of an iTunes playlist sort, it didn’t take very long to put together. Here are my rules: because some artists (Neil Young, Velvet Underground) work better with long songs, I figured that it was OK to have multiple songs by individual artists. I did, however, discount anything that had never been commercially released, which wiped out a lot of Bruce Springsteen songs.
Like Rolling Stone’s list, this is alphabetical by artist.
50 Great Songs Over 7 Minutes Long That Didn’t Make Rolling Stone’s List of the Fifty Best Songs over Seven Minutes Long
- Ryan Adams – Nobody Girl
- The Beatles – I Want You (She’s So Heavy)
- Belle & Sebastian – This Is Just A Modern Rock Song
- Dan Bern – Simple
- Bettie Serveert – The Ocean, My Floor
- Boston - Foreplay /Long Time
- James Brown – Cold Sweat
- Buzzcocks – I Believe
- Creedence Clearwater Revival – Ramble Tamble
- Miles Davis – Shhh/Peaceful
- Death Cab For Cutie – Transatlanticism
- Deep Purple – Smoke on the Water (Live)
- The Dream Syndicate – The Days of Wine and Roses
- Drive-by Truckers – The Living Bubba (Live)
- Drive-by Truckers – Angels And Fuselage
- Bob Dylan – Idiot Wind
- Bob Dylan – (Stuck Inside of Mobile with the) Memphis Blues Again
- Bob Dylan – Visions of Johanna
- Grandaddy – He’s Simple, He’s Dumb, He’s The Pilot
- Guns N’ Roses – Breakdown
- Hüsker Dü – All Work and No Play
- Led Zeppelin – In My Time of Dying
- Led Zeppelin – Achilles Last Stand
- Bob Marley & The Wailers – No Woman, No Cry (London 1975)
- Van Morrison – Astral Weeks
- New Order – Temptation (12″)
- Pink Floyd – Shine On You Crazy Diamond Pts 1-5
- Preston School of Industry – Encyclopedic Knowledge of
- Prince - Let’s Go Crazy (12″)
- The Rolling Stones – Miss You (12″)
- The Patti Smith Group – Land
- Bruce Springsteen – Rosalita (Come Out Tonight)
- The Stratford 4 - Telephone
- The Temptations – Papa Was A Rolling Stone
- Tonio K - The Ballad of the Night the Clocks All Quit (And the Government Failed)
- U2 – An Cat Dubh / Into the Heart
- UB40 – Don’t Let It Pass You By
- The Velvet Underground – Sister Ray
- The Velvet Underground – Ocean (Live 1969)
- The Velvet Underground – What Goes On (Live 1969)
- Joe Walsh – Life’s Been Good
- The Who – A Quick One, While He’s Away (Live)
- Stevie Wonder – As
- Yes – Close To The Edge
- Yo La Tengo – Pass The Hatchet, I Think I’m Goodkind
- Neil Young – Down by the River
- Neil Young – Over and Over
- Neil Young – Natural Beauty
- Neil Young – I’m The Ocean
- Neil Young – Like a Hurricane
Brand New – Limousine
also
Don McLean- American Pie
Alice’s Restaurant – Arlo Guthrie
Excellent list, thanks for including Sister Ray.
Blue Room by The Orb brought ambient to another level. Full length version comes in at a whopping 40:00 but in order to qualify for the British charts as a single rather than an EP they did a 39:57 version and promptly charted at No.8
What a great list. I’m sure there’ll be a few arguments but I wont quibble with a list that includes the astounding Beatles – I Want You (She’s So Heavy) AND the Stones – Miss You.
Your list is way more entertaining and much more relevant than the Rolling Stones list. These songs are good too.
1. Pink Floyd- Interstellar Overdrive
2. The Died Pretty- Mirror Blues
3. Van Morrison- Almost Independence Day
4. Eleventh Dream Day- Tenth Leaving Train
5. Rainy Day- Rainy Day, Dream Away
6. Television- Little Johnny Jewel
All of the suggestions that people have left above are really good. A couple were on early versions of the list, and might have made it had I decided to limit each artist to a single song.
I’m not big into techno, so I’ve never heard that Orb song, but I really love the story about how they gamed the U.K. charts.
Here are some others that I might have added:
Genesis – Supper’s Ready
The Seeds – Up in Her Room
Jethro Tull – Thick as A Brick
Flipper – Sex Bomb
Echo & The Bunnymen – The Killing Moon (All Night Version)
Kraftwerk – Computer Love
David Bowie – The Width Of A Circle
The Doors – When The Music’s Over
The Doors – The Soft Parade
The Doors – Riders on the Storm
Neil Young – Cowgirl In The Sand
Chemical Brothers – It Began In Afrika
I used to listen to at least ten of those songs over and over and over. “Sad-Eyed Lady of the Lowlands,” “When the Levee Breaks,” “Layla,” “Heroin,” “Won’t Get Fooled Again,” “The End,” “Only in Dreams,” “Hey Jude,” etc. I had no idea how much the seven-minute song has meant to me over the years. Alas, who has the time anymore?
SHAME ON ROLLING STONE for leaving out:
Catherine Wheel: “Black Metallic”
Bruce Springsteen: “Rosalita,” “Incident on 57th Street,” “New York City Serenade”
Bob Marley: “No Woman, No Cry”
Stevie Wonder: “Living for the City”
Bob Dylan: “It’s Alright Ma (I’m Only Bleeding),” “Visions of Johanna,” “Idiot Wind”
Boston: “Foreplay/Long Time”
Don McLean: “American Pie”
Jackson Browne: “The Load-Out/Stay”
There are some others that I also would’ve overlooked, but Rolling Stone has more time to research this stuff and therefore should not be excused for passing over these brilliant gems:
The La’s: “Looking Glass”
Peter Gabriel: “Come Talk to Me”
Joni Mitchell: “The Sire of Sorrow”
Sade: “No Ordinary Love”
David Gray: “Say Hello, Wave Goodbye”
Dave Matthews Band: “Proudest Monkey”
Chris Blake: “Harbor” (it probably just missed the cut, right?)
What about Mew – Comforting Sounds?!!
This is a futile effort, there are just too many good songs to be included on such a list. The list needs to be at least 300 songs long to do justice to all the great 7-minute-plus classics out there. Here are just a few of my favourites not mentioned on either list:
The Allman Brothers – You Don’t Love Me (Live at Fillmore East, 1971), Jessica, Mountain Jam (Live at the Atlanta International Pop Festival, 1970)
David Bowie – Heroes
The Rolling Stones – You Can’t Always Get What You Want, Midnight Rambler (from Get Yer Ya-Yas Out!)
The Who – My Generation (Live at Leeds, 1970), We’re Not Gonna Take It
Bob Dylan (There are soooo many!) – Chimes of Freedom, Ballad in Plain D, With God On Our Side, Desolation Row, Lily, Rosemary and the Jack of Hearts, Hurricane, Black Diamond Bay
Deep Purple – Child In Time (studio original/Made in Japan version), Strange Kind of Woman (Made in Japan version), Lazy (Made In Japan version)
The Doors – L.A. Woman, Light My Fire
Eagles – The Last Resort
Guns ‘n’ Roses – November Rain
Janis Joplin – Get It While You Can (Live), Ball and Chain (Live)
Jimi Hendrix – Voodoo Child (the 15-minute one), 1983… (A Merman I Should Turn To Be)
Led Zeppelin (again, quite a few) – How Many More Times, Since I’ve Been Loving You, Stairway to Heaven, Kasmir, In the Light
Meat Load – Bat Out Of Hell, Paradise By the Dashboard Light, For Crying Out Loud
Pink Floyd – all the long ones from Animals, Us and Them
Santana – Soul Sacrifice (Live at Woodstock)
Supertramp – Rudy, Cannonball, Another Man’s Woman (Live)
Thin Lizzy – Black Rose
Van Morrison – Cyprus Avenue, Madame George, Ballerina
Shakti – Joy
Rush – 2112
Grateful Dead – Turn On Your Lovelight (Live/Dead version)
Dire Straits – Tunnel of Love, Telegraph Road
New Order – Blue Monday
Crosby, Stills & Nash – Suite: Judy Blue Eyes
Ten Years After – I’m Going Home (Live at Woodstock), Love Like a Man (Live at the Fillmore East), Good Morning Little Schoolgirl (Live at the Fillmore East)
And there’s plenty more where that came from… Now, back to my homework…