Locked Grooves Lost on CDs

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Another reason I miss vinyl (besides the big beautiful covers); the locked groove. Some favorites...

SPK's Leichenschrei
Sonic Youth's Evol
Lee Ranaldo's From Here -> Eternity (Slo Drone's my favorite)

In the CD age it seems these lost grooves aren't making the transistion to the digital realm. Who else thinks a locked groove on an LP should be reproduced on CD, filling up the remaining available space on the disc? Got any favorite locked grooves?

― Edward III (edward iii), Thursday, 27 October 2005 16:28 (twenty years ago)

Suddenly it occurs to me that younger members of this board might not even know what a locked groove is. Now I feel old.

― Edward III (edward iii), Thursday, 27 October 2005 16:31 (twenty years ago)

i am among the younger members of this board, and i know what locked grooves are, golly gee i do.

i can't actually think of that many, though. most of the ones i can remember don't have a digital counterpart. i guess they probably cut the one on Unwound's "love and fear" for the singles comp. meerk puffy's "nung" LP has a bunch of locked grooves (three maybe?), but no cd of it.

have you heard ths 500 locked groove LP on RRR? Kinda fun. Good for DJing!

― Special Agent Dale Koopa (orion), Thursday, 27 October 2005 16:34 (twenty years ago)

I should get that RRR thang.

― jdubz (ex machina), Thursday, 27 October 2005 16:35 (twenty years ago)

It is fun for sure.

The lock groove at the end of Sgt. Pepper was dealt with on the CD reissue by playing about a minute of it and then fading out. I could see that being the case w/others if the labels were interested.

― Matos-Webster Dictionary (M Matos), Thursday, 27 October 2005 16:42 (twenty years ago)

there's also a 7" with, i think, 100 locked grooves. not sure if the 7" is still available though. have you ever ordered from RRR, jon? good catalog!

― Special Agent Dale Koopa (orion), Thursday, 27 October 2005 16:45 (twenty years ago)

Yeah, I remember that RRR one, never got around to picking that up. Locked grooves were big among the noise / industrial scene in the 80s, there a number of them that I can't remember anymore.

The lock groove at the end of Sgt. Pepper was dealt with on the CD reissue by playing about a minute of it and then fading out.

Well, if Sgt Pepper is about 40 minutes long, you could get an additional 40 minutes of locked groove action on a CD. Isn't that the point? Fading out after a couple of minutes seems like a half measure intended for timid souls...

― Edward III (edward iii), Thursday, 27 October 2005 16:47 (twenty years ago)

Was there ever an LP where every revolution was a separate, locked groove? So an LP could have like 300 (how many grooves on an LP?) grooves and it would be nearly impossible to find the one you want, so each time you listened it would be a new experience .. and also a pain in the ass, but that's the price you willingly pay for avant-garde art.

― when something smacks of something (dave225.3), Thursday, 27 October 2005 17:10 (twenty years ago)

have you heard ths 500 locked groove LP on RRR? Kinda fun. Good for DJing!

― Special Agent Dale Koopa (orion), Thursday, 27 October 2005 17:18 (twenty years ago)

Oh. Must learn not to skim. Although randomly reading threads means each visit is a new experience.

― when something smacks of something (dave225.3), Thursday, 27 October 2005 17:21 (twenty years ago)

Double Nickles on the Dime: each side ends with a locked groove of car engine sounds

― sexyDancer (sexyDancer), Thursday, 27 October 2005 17:21 (twenty years ago)

Nibbled to death by an okapi
Nibbled to death by an okapi
Nibbled to death by an okapi
Nibbled to death by an okapi
Nibbled to death by an okapi
Nibbled to death by an okapi
Nibbled to death by an okapi
Nibbled to death by an okapi
Nibbled to death by an okapi
Nibbled to death by an okapi
Nibbled to death by an okapi
Nibbled to death by an okapi
Nibbled to death by an okapi

― Stewart Osborne (Stewart Osborne), Thursday, 27 October 2005 17:29 (twenty years ago)

Sandy Duncan's Eye put a locked groove in the MIDDLE of one of their album sides for "Polsen Petroleum"... on the CD, they shifted the song to the end and let the car-alarm lock groove go for at least 20 minutes.

― iDonut B4 x86 (donut), Thursday, 27 October 2005 18:43 (twenty years ago)

also, Speedy J's Loudboxer to thread..

I only have the vinyl, which is ALL locked grooves. What does the CD version do?

― iDonut B4 x86 (donut), Thursday, 27 October 2005 18:44 (twenty years ago)

Other mid-side lock grooves:

Hafler Trio "The Sea Org" 10"
23 Skidoo "Culling Is Coming" original LP version
Swimming Behavior Of The Human Infant's track on the RRR "Testament" comp LP

I agree that the space on the CD should be filled out with the loop. Supposedly the Lee Ranaldo CD version did something like that?

Also like to throw in props for Flipper's "Brainwash".

― sleeve (sleeve), Thursday, 27 October 2005 18:49 (twenty years ago)

here's a great investigation of various albums with locked grooves (not much on the cd versions, but cool reading nonetheless):
http://www.kempa.com/blog/archives/000046.html

― patita (patita), Thursday, 27 October 2005 18:59 (twenty years ago)

The vinyl version of For Your Pleasure did this at the end of Side One with "In Every Home A Heartache".

If I ever got Lou Reed on my listeners and wanted them to listen to my album straight-through with no skipping or shuffling, I'd cut my album up into 99 cuts. A new cut every fifteen (or whatever) seconds.

― Pleasant Plains /// (Pleasant Plains ///), Thursday, 27 October 2005 19:01 (twenty years ago)

Didn't Metal Machine Music end with a lock groove? Not that you'd notice. I've got that at home, so I guess I should try it out myself...

― Edward III (edward iii), Thursday, 27 October 2005 20:03 (twenty years ago)

My roommate had that RRR thing! It was cool.

Locked grooves >>>> 99 tracks of silence before a bonus blip or song on a cd

― Jordan (Jordan), Thursday, 27 October 2005 20:06 (twenty years ago)

Didn't Metal Machine Music end with a lock groove?

Yep, side 4 of MMM had a locked groove.

― nickn (nickn), Thursday, 27 October 2005 20:11 (twenty years ago)

I don't know about the LP, but Flaming Lips' "Hit to death on the future head" CD ends with a panning feedback loop that goes on for upwards of 30 minutes.

― Sparkle Motion's Rising Force, Thursday, 27 October 2005 20:45 (twenty years ago)

The Hit To Death loop is amazing.. but it's far too long to contain as a locked groove on a record.. so if there was any vinyl release of the album, it cannot have that exact loop as a locked groove.. (proved by science!)

― iDonut B4 x86 (donut), Thursday, 27 October 2005 20:56 (twenty years ago)

Also, handy to note.. if you want to force any loop into anything with a 4/4 time signature:

* EVERY locked groove @ 33 rpm is around 133 BPM.
* EVERY locked groove @ 45 rpm is 180 BPM

Pitch control can change the BPMs of course.. (+/- 10 BPMs @ 33; +/- 15 BPMs @ 45 -- assuming you have +/- 8% pitch control. Tweaked pitch control obviously changes this.)

― iDonut B4 x86 (donut), Thursday, 27 October 2005 21:01 (twenty years ago)

Also, +/- 6% pitch change on any music will very closely change the tonic to +/- one half step, respectively.

― iDonut B4 x86 (donut), Thursday, 27 October 2005 21:03 (twenty years ago)

The Mae-Shi's "To Hit Armor Class Zero."

www.mae-shi.com

Amen,
-chad

― chad beck (chadly), Thursday, 27 October 2005 22:31 (twenty years ago)

Mudhoney's "My Brother the Cow" has most of the album repeated -- backwards -- until the disc space runs out.

― Rickey Wright (Rrrickey), Friday, 28 October 2005 00:18 (twenty years ago)

The first GYBE ends in a locked groove. However, this is a bit of a special case since the CD and vinyl versions are very different recordings (besides the locked groove).

also, Speedy J's Loudboxer to thread..

I only have the vinyl, which is ALL locked grooves. What does the CD version do?

I thought the two versions were the same, except that the vinyl also includes ~ 100 locked grooves.

― MindInRewind (Barry Bruner), Friday, 28 October 2005 00:38 (twenty years ago)

Nibbled to death by an okapi

Hahahah. But then the CD adds bonus tracks!

― Ned Raggett (Ned), Friday, 28 October 2005 00:42 (twenty years ago)

Sandy Duncan's Eye put a locked groove in the MIDDLE of one of their album sides

The Lee Dorsey album Get Back! reissued a couple years back put a locked groove in the middle of a song. That had to have been a mastering error.

― Vic Funk, Friday, 28 October 2005 00:46 (twenty years ago)

One of Pete Shelley's albums XL-1 had a locked groove followed by ZX Spectrum sounds that you could record on to tape and then load up to display album lyrics.

― wombatX (wombatX), Friday, 28 October 2005 01:13 (twenty years ago)

ultimate dorkery

― Special Agent Dale Koopa (orion), Friday, 28 October 2005 02:48 (twenty years ago)

Yup. More recently perpetrated by Urusei Yatsura, albeit on CD.

― wombatX (wombatX), Friday, 28 October 2005 02:54 (twenty years ago)

I don't know what the fuck you people are talking about. And I'm a pretty big dork... deep inside the dork forest...

― Edward III (edward iii), Friday, 28 October 2005 02:56 (twenty years ago)

Deat ILM, I am five years old. What is a locked groove?

― poortheatre (poortheatre), Friday, 28 October 2005 04:20 (twenty years ago)

"Another Monty Python Record" has the bit where one of the pirahna brothers scratch the record, and the CD duplicates it for a little while. Just enough to get the joke.

― Whiney G. Weingarten (whineyg), Friday, 28 October 2005 04:33 (twenty years ago)

Deat ILM, I am five years old. What is a locked groove?
-- poortheatre (gah24...), October 28th, 2005.

I cannot tell you until you are a college radio DJ.

― Edward III (edward iii), Friday, 28 October 2005 04:47 (twenty years ago)

Nibbled to death by an okapi

Ha ha. I was going to post a thread on this very topic. Provoked by listening to a CD of Carla Bley's "Escalator Over the Hill" where, to replace the locked groove at the end of the vinyl version, they just keep the loop going for another 15+ minutes. I don't have the CD version of "Machine Gun Etiquette" but I REALLY hope it has 15 minutes of "Nibbled to death by an okapi" at the end - in fact, I'd go so far as to say I've rarely hoped for anything more fervently

― Oh No, It's Dadaismus (Dada), Friday, 28 October 2005 10:37 (twenty years ago)

I have Machine Gun Etiquette on CD but the version I have has bonus tracks after the album so I don't think it has the locked groove. Oh well.

I just got rid of my Evol CD cos I got it on vinyl :)

― Colonel Poo (Colonel Poo), Friday, 28 October 2005 10:49 (twenty years ago)

The first GYBE ends in a locked groove.

The first time I listened to this the locked groove played for something like 40 minutes before I realised what was happening.

― aldo_cowpat (aldo_cowpat), Friday, 28 October 2005 11:01 (twenty years ago)

Obviously, many dance 12"s include rhythm/noise loops as bonus locked grooves.

Ectomorph singles on Interdimensional Transmissions have locked grooves both at the end and in the middle of the record. One 12" even has parallel grooves running side by side, so you're never sure which version of "Subversion" you're getting when you put the needle down.

― Janne (Janne), Friday, 28 October 2005 14:06 (twenty years ago)

That Pete Shelley bit is awesome

― jdubz (ex machina), Friday, 28 October 2005 14:15 (twenty years ago)

Unknown Pleasures.

― owen moorhead (i heart daniel miller), Friday, 28 October 2005 14:24 (twenty years ago)

The Flaming Lips cd mentioned above does have one variation about half way through. If you can follow me here - at one point it goes something like: 'pich' 'poch' 'pich' 'poch' 'pich' 'poch' 'poch' 'pich' 'poch' 'pich' 'poch'...
Another one of their records - I think it's Telepathic Surgery - has a locked groove of ecstatic applause at the end.
I had a Blast First compilation called Nothing Short of Total War that ended with a guy saying "There's no fucking culture over thereThere's no fucking culture over thereThere's no fucking culture over thereThere's no fucking culture over thereThere's no fucking culture over there...".

― Mike Dixn (Mike Dixon), Friday, 28 October 2005 14:28 (twenty years ago)

"Hahahah. But then the CD adds bonus tracks!"

"Ha ha. I was going to post a thread on this very topic. Provoked by listening to a CD of Carla Bley's "Escalator Over the Hill" where, to replace the locked groove at the end of the vinyl version, they just keep the loop going for another 15+ minutes. I don't have the CD version of "Machine Gun Etiquette" but I REALLY hope it has 15 minutes of "Nibbled to death by an okapi" at the end - in fact, I'd go so far as to say I've rarely hoped for anything more fervently"

Arguments about the purity of sonic reproduction notwithstanding, the Compact Disc has yet to offer a genuinely meaningful alternative to rival that incomparable experience that only vinyl can offer as an option when you slowly regain consciousness, with a throbbing brain, several hours after passing out as a consequence of excessive alcohol consumption....

"I have Machine Gun Etiquette on CD but the version I have has bonus tracks after the album so I don't think it has the locked groove. Oh well."

A Deluxe re-issue of The Back Album is apparently due out shortly-ish - although it doesn't seem to include anything particularly revolutionary.

I'm just hoping that when they reach Strawberries they manage to unearth some serious quantities of previously-unreleased demos and outtakes that may rock my sad little Damned-obsessed world the way that this is doing at present.

― Stewart Osborne (Stewart Osborne), Friday, 28 October 2005 21:35 (twenty years ago)

what does the locked groove on the GYBE! record sound like? i've always wondered about it, even after i found a digitized version of the vinyl, because they stopped it before the loop started.

― l, Saturday, 29 October 2005 04:14 (twenty years ago)

I cannot tell you until you are a college radio DJ.

...And you start backselling the songs while it drowns you out because you refuse to wear headphones.

― Pleasant Plains /// (Pleasant Plains ///), Saturday, 29 October 2005 05:13 (twenty years ago)

I'm pretty sure the LP of Lifter Puller's Fiestas and Fiascos has one, but my turntable just freaks out and pulls the needle back when it gets to that point. Stupid automation.

― mason r butler, Saturday, 29 October 2005 05:54 (twenty years ago)

Sgt. Pepper's locked groove

― naus (Robert T), Sunday, 30 October 2005 04:25 (twenty years ago)

Disc - Transfer

their best album, format specific

http://www.discogs.com/release/98364

― milton parker (Jon L), Sunday, 30 October 2005 04:32 (twenty years ago)

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