What double albums should be a single and why?

Hi,

BIZARRE. 

No one goes around saying that Beethoven has too much padding, and so does Stravinsky. And folks, today, many times saying this about rock music, are missing the point, specially when the "padding" is more of a FEELING about how one goes through those moments in time, something that classical musicians have been doing for hundreds of years, and now ... these rock audiences think they know and feel the music better than its creator ... and the folks in that audience do not have the courage to get up on the stage and do their own piece of music and get a similar criticism.

"SEEING" what the passages are about is a problem, since these are about you using your imagination, and HONESTLY, the folks that do not like these passages ... and many are phenomenal ... are the ones that want the lyrics to tell them what this is all about.

I just find the whole thing really disrespectful of what "progressive" music has been about for 50+ years which also included INTROVERTED moments in the music ... which for my hearing, was an extension of some of the extended jams that you heard in many places like the Fillmore or UFO (for example) but have long been forgotten.

ALL of IT, is a part of the music ... and I find it sad to see an artist criticized for it ... when the problem is OUR OWN INABILITY TO FIND WHAT THE TRUTH IN THE MUSIC IS ... as it has no "lyrics" to tell us! Too many here, think the only truth HAS TO BE the lyrics TELLING YOU what it is all about Alfie!

No Dance Of the Little Fairies then? 

Yeah I do like that album but I think you make a fair point. It did go a bit like ELP Works One album. Too much solo bits and pieces that were needless. The tracks you mention are the best ones , especially Fifo that was written by Monkman and is a rather overlooked masterpiece imo.

But that's totally different, isn't it? The record company is a business that runs by the rules of business. They have to make a living, too. They don't make an artistic assessment, they ask themselves, will we more likely earn or lose money if we sell this as quadruple album. Their assessment that they have an all too good chance of losing money with the quadruple and their chances of earning money are better if they release them one by one may well be correct, even if they admitted that from an artistic point of view you are right. But that's not the game they play. And the game we play here is different still, at least as far as I'm concerned. Even if you got your quadruple released and some people loved it to pieces as it is, what's wrong with somebody else writing "I could well do without half of it" if they just think so? If you as an artist put out your work in public, you've got to live with people saying what they think, even if it doesn't flatter you.