Medley
In music, a medley is a piece composed from parts of existing pieces, played one after another, sometimes overlapping. They are common in popular music, and most medleys are songs rather than instrumental. A medley which is a remixed series is called a megamix, often done with tracks for a single artist, or for popular songs from a given year or genre.
See also Credits Medley.
Examples of Medley include:
- "Just a Gigolo"/"I Got Nobody" by Louis Prima in 1956. Other artists that made cover versions are the Village People and David Lee Roth.
- "Stars on 45 Medley" (1981) single by Stars On 45.
- Dschinghis Khan have release a few medleys based on their hit songs.
- "Weird Al" Yankovic's numerous Polka songs are all technically medleys, though usually in a very different style than the original material.
- The aptly titled Kick ass Guitar solo by Steel Panther.
- Nico Nico Douga Medleys are quite popular and have quite a few variations.
- Metallica preformed a 15-minute medley of songs from there first two albums (sensibly titled Kill/Ride Medley) on the Cunning Stunts live CD.
- They also do a medley of early Mercyful Fate material on Garage Inc.
- GWAR has done a medley of their entire first album at a few shows (probably an answer to fans that complain they never play anything from it anymore).
- Dream Theater did a live medley of arena rock anthems on the Change of Seasons EP.
- And it's got nothing on their Instrumedley. Google it.
- The Beatles did an entire medley of Abbey Road at the end of the album.
- Their album Love is essentially one long medley with few pauses between the songs.
- Vector to the Heavens from Kingdom Hearts 358 Days Over 2 is a medley of Musique pour la tristesse de Xion, Kairi, and Dearly Beloved.
- One-Hit Wonder Cat Mother And the All Night Newsboys' hit "Good Old Rock n Roll" is a medley of 50's hits. The song's producer? None other than Jimi Hendrix.
- Age of Aquarius/Let the Sunshine is a medley by The 5th Dimension.
- Listen to a classic rock station long enough, and you will likely hear "Devil In A Blue Dress/Good Golly Miss Molly" by Mitch Ryder and the Detroit Wheels. Depending on the station, you might even hear the version that includes "CC Rider".
- In Homestuck a few important songs are medleys of other songs:
- Descend, the song that plays at the end of Act 4, is a medley of many, many other songs. How many? Here's the list. (The last song on the list - marked with a ??? - is from a currently unreleased song known as Penumbra Phantasm. However, that music would also be used in Umbral Ultimatium, which starts with the ending of Descend.)
- Cascade, the song that plays at the end of Act 5, is composed of four separate songs: Cascade (Beta) (originally another composer's take on Descend), Flare, Savior of the Dreaming Dead, and Black Hole / Green Sun (a remix of Black Rose / Green Sun).
- Rex Duodecim Angelus, a song from the official albums, contains the Leitmotifs of most of the trolls.