[mb-users] Are 12" releases considered EPs?

[Lauri Watts]

On 10/17/06, Chris Bransden <chris at whenironsattack.com> wrote:
> On 17/10/06, Lauri Watts <krazykiwi at gmail.com> wrote:
> > This is really long and boring and technical. But here goes anyway.
> >
> > The traditional reason to put out singles, is to sell albums.  To sell
> > albums, ideally you want to get in the sales charts, because then you
> > will get radio airplay, and people will want the album.  To get in the
> > sales charts, you have to 'qualify' under certain rules, and releases
> > that don't qualify, are not technically 'singles', by industry
> > standards.
>
> yep, though i think this is more of a technicality. for a lot of
> artists, there would be no advantage in charting, so this isn't an
> issue.

If y'all could mentally insert "on mainstream labels" in there in a
few random places :)

Mostly, this was just a big long rant to explain why something being
longer than 20 minutes, is not automatically an EP.

And yes, as you point out, there are some genres where EP's are ubiquitous.

I still come down to this: If it doesn't say on the cover, and you
can't find some documentation either way, and you aren't familiar
enough with the band and it's history to make an educated guess, then
err on the side of making it a single.  If it really is an ep, someone
will surely have some proof of that and fix it.  And singles outnumber
EP's exponentially, because there is a big business advantage to
calling something with even a hint of chart potential, a single.

Regards,
-- 
Lauri Watts