What are some good "Epic" songs.
 

Epic I mean grandiose, long, and you don't get tired of it. I'm putting together a compilation and I've got:

Neil Young - Cortez The Killer
Led Zeppelin - Kashmir
Rolling Stones - You Can't Always Get What You Want (Long Version)
The Who - Baba O' Reilly
U2 - Bad

What others would you put on a compilation?

From Autumn To Ashes - Short Stories With Tragic Endings (9:24)

Green Carnation -- Light Of Day, Day Of Darkness (60:00)

Dream Theater - A Change of Seasons (23:04?)
The Divine Wings of Tragedy - Symphony X (~21mins)
Spock's Beard - The Doorway (~13)
Spock's Beard - The Light

epic- raith no more

stairway to heaven- led zeppelin

american pie- don mcclean

Sairway to Heaven - Led Zepellin
Free Bird - Lynyrd Skynyrd
One - Metallica
November Rain - Guns & Roses

Are you familiar with Built to Spill? Their Perfect From Now On album is very epic sounding. It's only a few years old, but has a kind of classic rock feeling.

Traffic - The Low Spark of High-Heeled Boys
Frank Zappa - Inca Roads
Television - Marquee Moon
Velvet Underground - Sister Ray
Probably something by Pink Floyd

:up: on these two.

Also...

"Guyute" by Phish
"Three Days" by Jane's Addiction

Radiohead - Paranoid Android

A few more?

Deep Purple: Mistreated
The Doors: The End
Queen: Bohemian Rhapsody
Saxon: Dallas 1 PM

Boingo - Hello Madness
Pink Floyd - Shine On You Crazy Diamond
Rush - 2112

"Day in the Life" - Beatles: The first thing that comes to my mind when I think "epic".

"Desolation Row" or "Idiot Wind" - Bob Dylan: The first being an 11-minute nightmare set to music and the second being a near 8-minute long diatribe. Good stuff!

"Effigy" - CCR: Not the longest Creedence song by a long shot, but very effective nonetheless. And Fogerty's lead work at the end is among my favorite of all time.

"Dr. Jimmy" - The Who: From the magnificent Quadrophenia album, here's where it all comes together for me. Searing guitar work, intricate keyboards and Roger Daltrey howling like a maniac.

"Halo of Flies" - Alice Cooper: It was actually between this and "Black Juju", but Juju kinda drags in the middle. Halo, on the other hand, never lets up once during its 8-minute plus running time.

"Funeral For a Friend/Love Lies Bleeding" - Elton John: Back when Elton could still rock the hizzouse. Also, the original version of "Madman Across the Water" (can be found on Tumbleweed Connection reissue) is definitely epic.

edited to add:
"Shangri-La" - The Kinks: A criminally neglected song from a criminally neglected band (heck, even I almost forgot about it). An epic masterpiece chock-full of great lyrics and nice tempo changes. Highly recommended by yours truly.

And for you metal heads, check out Iron Maiden's "Rime of the Ancient Mariner". That's my 2 cents.

Oh yeah, good call on "Sister Ray" :up: . The only song I have to crank up when I listen to it! -biggrin-

Telegraph Road - Dire Straits

A Quick One While He's Away - The Who

Not sure if this qualifies as "epic," but I really like "Thunderstorm" by Matthew Sweet.

Someone mentioned 2112...here are some other Rush Epics

the Necromancer
Cygnus X-1
Cygnus X-1 book II Hemespheres
Xanadu
By Tor and the Snow Dog
The Camera Eye
Natural Science

My choices:

Pink Floyd - too many to choose here. Just the whole of "Animals", in fact.

Smashing Pumpkins - "Starla", "For Martha", "Thru the Eyes of Ruby"

Radiohead - "Paranoid Android"

The Beatles - "I Want You", "A Day in the Life", "Revolution #9"

Joni Mitchell - the whole album of "Hejira"

Bjork - "Bachelorette"

Faye Wong - the five-song link of "The Cambrian Period", "New Tenant", "Chanel", "Asura", and "Flowers of Paradise", charting the course of modern love through Buddhist principles.

and obvious staples like "Hotel California" and "Bohemian Rhapsody"

Rocket From The Crypt - Glazed
Nekromantix - Nekronomicon
Flogging Molly - Black Friday Rule

"Marquee Moon"... good choice.

Dubya, I first thought "Telegraph Road" as well, but then realized I like the live version of "Romeo and Juliet" the best. I'll go with that.

Pink Floyd - 'Echoes'

Rush: Cygnus X-1 (Parts I and II)
Rush: 2112
Iron Maiden: Rhyme of the Ancient Mariner
Dream Theater: Six Degrees of Inner Turbulence
Dream Theater: A Change of Seasons
Fates Warning: A Pleasant Shade of Gray
Opeth: Black Rose Immortal
Pink Floyd: Shine On You Crazy Diamond (Parts 1-9)

added:
The Orb: darn near everything is over 10 minutes

Yes - Close to the Edge
Blackalicious - Release

Iron Maiden - The Nomad (from Brave New World)
Iron Maiden - Alexander The Great (from Somewhere In Time)

Pink Floyd, Dream Theater & Tool - too many to name! :up:

Understandably - given their alleged tendency for grandiose noodling [:)] - from this thread the "epic" seems to be the special province of the prog-rockers.

I'm now left wondering if there are (m)any good, long songs by artistes <i>other than</i> the hard/prog-rockers....

Now<b> there</b> is a challenge!

How about Kraftwerk... or a lot of techno music? Maybe it's not your traditional epic, but some of these songs are quite long.