wilco

If 2022 has heralded any large-scale trends in the music industry, then the prominence of the double album is a surefire contender. Over the course of this year, we’ve had double albums from indie stalwarts like Beach House, Wilco, and Big Thief, plus the likes of King Gizzard & the Lizard Wizard, Kendrick Lamar, Johnny Marr, Jeff Parker, and even two from Red Hot Chili Peppers. You could count Jack White’s two complementary albums this year, too, if you want. These sprawling, ambitious records have become a noteworthy staple, a major fixture of 2022 that’s become especially apparent as year-end coverage reaches a fever pitch. We’re aware this phenomenon exists, but why does it?

Double albums are not something new. They were particularly important in the 1970s, including seminal titles like Led Zeppelin’s Physical Graffiti, Fleetwood Mac’s Tusk, and the Clash’s London Calling, to name just a few. But, they were spread throughout an entire decade. This year alone has seen a concentrated abundance of them. It’s a fruitless task to highlight only one reason for this surge, but the pandemic has likely played a significant role. Tom Schick, who co-produced Wilco’s twangy Cruel Country, mentions it. “With the pandemic, a lot of artists were able to get in a room together for a long time,” he says during a phone call. “There was just a lot of creative energy that was pent up, and the double album is just a natural result of that, at least in Wilco’s case.” Once frontman Jeff Tweedy and co. hit the studio, the music “naturally flowed out of them,” as Schick puts it.

Peter Standish, the Senior Vice President of Marketing at Warner Records (with whom Uproxx shares a parent company, WMG), worked on both of the Red Hot Chili Peppers albums from this year, and he echoed Schick’s rationale. “A lot of the recording occurred during the pandemic,” Standish says. “Maybe people have a lot more time on their hands to write and record.” Still, the SoCal funk rockers had another factor at play. It was their first time writing with guitarist John Frusciante since 2006’s colossal Stadium Arcadium, and the quartet was thrilled about the reunion. “John’s tenacious focus on treating every song as though it was equal to the next helped us to realize more songs than some might know what to do with,” goes one of the band’s quotes from the Return Of The Dream Canteen press release.

Even though touring is still highly infeasible for many artists today, it was completely put on hold during lockdown. This opened up more free time than usual for artists to write new material. It makes sense why so many of these massive albums are appearing just now, considering vinyl supply chain issues affecting the production process. At the time of this writing, Cruel Country is still unavailable on vinyl; it’s slated for a January 20 release date. “It takes forever for when you finish the record for the actual vinyl to come out,” Schick says. “[Cruel Country] came out in the summer. We’re still waiting on the vinyl; I think we might get it this week, which is just crazy.”

Johnny Marr, however, intended to create a double album from the outset. Surprisingly, he had never made one before Fever Dreams Pts. 1-4. Once he realized that, the influential English guitarist charted a course for his foray into more conceptual territory. Making a double LP appealed to him in the sense that it rejected the playlist-based streaming culture we currently inhabit. To Marr, this represents a sense of artistic freedom that’s often scarce.

“Generally, I think people like the idea of taking on something that’s a little less fiercely commercial,” the former Smiths guitarist explains over Zoom. Even in mainstream circles, that notion applies, as he cites prominent, critically acclaimed filmmakers like Wes Anderson and the Coen brothers. “I think Kendrick’s album is a really good example of it. Right out of the gate, it appears to be conceptual and expresses a bigger idea than just how many streams it can hit up.”

A double album can also allow for more expression. While some artists may use brevity as a tool to convey their ideas in a short-form capacity, a long-form project provides ample space to explore a wide variety of styles they may not have otherwise tried. Dragon New Warm Mountain I Believe In You, for example, shifts from ebullient alt-country (“Red Moon”), to spacious post-rock (“Little Things”), to MPC-driven lo-fi (“Heavy Bend”).

“I can try not to sound immodest, but I think what it suggests is people being inspired,” Marr says. Referencing fellow Odyssean efforts like Once Twice Melody, Mr. Morale & The Big Steppers, and Cruel Country, “I quite like the company that I’m in with this. I think it’s a really healthy inspiration and a healthy disregard for crass commercialism. Hopefully, that’s true.”

Artists’ reasons aside, however, why have listeners been gravitating toward these notoriously lengthy endeavors? The streaming industrial complex, after all, begets a single- and playlist-focused economy, one that doesn’t prioritize unified experiences like a deliberately sequenced, front-to-back album. Schick points toward a deeper connection with fans.

“For the fans and these artists, it’s exciting to see,” Schick explains. “To be able to sit with it [for a longer time], it’s just a more intimate thing. The double record is ambitious, and it’s exciting. It’s fun for the fans, and it’s fun for music-lovers.”

Length, though, isn’t always the definitive trait of a double album. Kendrick Lamar’s Mr. Morale & The Big Steppers, for example, is shorter than 2015’s To Pimp A Butterfly. Sonic Youth’s influential Daydream Nation, which clocks in at just under 71 minutes, is a paltry appetizer compared to the seven-course meal that is Smashing Pumpkins’ gargantuan Mellon Collie And The Infinite Sadness, whose original vinyl pressing is over 128 minutes long. To put it another way, the qualifications for a double LP are as nebulous as they are malleable. What constitutes an EP vs. an LP, a regular album vs. a double album, has been a long-standing curiosity. Some EPs, like Sufjan Stevens’ hour-long All Delighted People, are much longer than some LPs, such as Pusha T’s 21-minute Daytona.

If 2022 marked such a momentous time for the double album, then can we expect it to fade out of view in 2023? It’s a difficult metric to predict, one that Schick also agrees is inconclusive. “I can speak only from my experience and the people who I’ve been working with, like Jeff Tweedy and Wilco,” he says. “ But I wouldn’t be surprised to see the quadruple album, just from the amount of playing and writing that they’re doing. On my end, I don’t see that slowing down, but maybe it’s a different situation for other bands and other artists.”

As of now, the only major 75-minute-plus record slated for next year is Smashing Pumpkins’ “three-act” statement, ATUM. Maybe this is an ongoing trend we’ll see for the next year or two, or maybe 2022 has simply been an auspicious time for these enormous projects. If it continues, then 2022 has proven that double albums don’t have to be stuffed to the brim with filler. They don’t have to be tedious, monotonous experiences that we listen to all the way through exactly once. As incredible records like Dragon New Warm Mountain I Believe In You, Mondays At The Enfield Tennis Academy, and Once Twice Melody demonstrate, an album’s length can easily be justified. The primary draw of a double LP, to begin with, is how different songs resonate with different listeners; seldom is there a steadfast consensus on the absolute best track. Part of that harkens back to what Schick mentions as a crucial raison d’etre for music writ large: human connection.

Some artists covered here are Warner Music artists. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group.