What's the longest time it took you to complete a record?

I just set my new record record - 17 years!

It started in 2000, cutting acoustic guitar and vocals of a terrific singer songwriter. Idea was we would infill the rest, as he didn't have a band. We were both going through a lot of crazy stuff at the time (woman trouble, imagine that) and drifted apart. But the songs were so good that I finished 4 or 5 of them, more as very evolved demos that real masters (no real drums)

Fast forward to 2016. I get an email from the guy saying "I thought I was done playing music. But I recently played some shows and the response was incredible. I need a product - will you produce it for me?" His idea was an acoustic guitar/vocal thing, real simple. But I save everything. I found the fleshed out demos and loaded them up in PT. He drove in from Houston and I played him the stuff. About halfway through he says "wow, this is great - who is it?" I replied "you". He had completely forgotten most of the songs and what we had previously done.  It was a super cool, emotional moment, the kind I live for doing music. He said, "well, we HAVE to finish that". Just got the replicated CD's yesterday. So 17 years from start to finish.

BTW, the guy is Doug Forrest in case you're interested.

Wow That's an incredible journey for this art to see the light....

Very inspirational and I'm sure I'm just one more of many who can relate to how life can put things on the shelf for a bit!

Thanks for sharing!

Nice!

I just cut new vocals on a project that was 90% done in 1993.  It's been an odyssey getting the tracks into the computer from 1st gen ADAT's that hadn't been touched since 1994.    I think it will see a release eventually. 

My world/folk/gypsy-punk band SAI U DROM  just finished our album after 9 years. It was nearly finished in 2009 when my studio got destroyed in a flood taking the pc and back up hard drives with it.
The album is doing well and we haven't picked a label yet but we will eventually.
It's free to download or listen to
www.saiudrom.com

Does it count if the artist passed away and the record will never be finished?

Nice Story, I'm really happy that you were able to finish it.

The longest for me was 2 years, to mix and master a record. The Artist was really insecure and it just drifted.
I know it doesnt look impressive compared to your 17 years, but in your case you stopped working and then reconvene years later, In this case was 2 years doing 15 mixes of each song, and 4 or 5 different masters, it was a mess and really tiring I never want to be in a situation like this again.

I have another record that is in backup for the last 7 years, but in this case unfortunately the Artist died, music is finished but it needs to be mixed. One day I'm sure it will be mixed and released but at this point the conditions are not met for it to happen.

5 years...

Most Songs were written 4-5 years back, tracked and arranged. Half thrown out and other half written a year later. Album was ready for mixing. Mixing took another year with the label involved. Some tracks were mixed again 6 months later. Final mixes delivered after 3 years. Mastering took 2 weeks. Single released 9 months later and album followed a year later.

Let's just say I was done with the record on release day. Couldn't even tour it :-(

Hi,

My longest project took 30 years.

I set about recording the bird song where I live .... Waiheke Island New Zealand.
When it started I was busy designing my house and studio.
I received a bank loan through a government department which required periodic visits from an inspector.
We became friends.
His wife was Japanese.
On periodic visits to Japan he noticed that many of the train commuters were reading manga comics and were wearing headphones to retreat to an enclosed inner world.
He saw my recording equipment and came up with the idea of creating a series of CDs using industrial and organic sounds.
In the end this didn't eventuate, but it got me started with the idea of portable recording in the environment.
I spent two years designing and building battery powered preamps, parabolic dishes, and shotgun extensions.
Then, once I had the gear working and sounding good, I would load the Landrover and drive off to find good locations.
This mostly  involved driving to the other end of the island to avoid human sound polution on the sensitive mics.
I would leave when it was still dark, early in the morning, park the truck, and carry the gear to the location.
I would then set up the gear with one mic aimed at the bush, and one towards the coast.
This gave a stereo image, including sea and land birds.
I would then sit quietly hoping for no wind, rain, people, cars, boats, or helicopters.
And that the birds would feel like singing.
I continued this at regular intervals for a few years.
Then, from the hours of recordings I edited down to the most interesting bits, and selected where the birds were most happy.
Like us, they had days where they were grumpy and squarking at each other, or didn't feel like singing at all, or were full of joy.
Then I made a mix using multi channels that included air, water, and insect sounds.
This took a while because the overall length was about an hour, and I had to memorise where on each track were the moments I wanted to focus on.
Eventually, the mix was competed.
However, I decided that my approach had been too much like recording a music album with compression and reverb.
I wanted a less processed and more natural sound.
In the meanwhile, I had made more recordings, and a new species of bird had been released on the island, (which I had recordings of).
So, I started the edit and mix over. and completed the CD .

It was worth all this effort though.
All these hours of listening to the birds singing for joy, or for a partner, while recording, editing, mixing, and mastering, has given me a new appreciation of what singing really is.
It has changed how I sing, and how I listen and produce people who come to my studio.
Although the album is not widely distributed, those that hear it, love it.