History Main / GratuitousPanning

* The piano section on [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B2vxoL-k9zw this version of the Warner Home Video logo theme]] pans from the left channel to the right.

** "Welcome To The Machine" from ''Music/WishYouWereHere'' has a pulsating low synth drone throughout switching from left to right.

* Music/MilesDavis: Once his albums started being mixed in stereo in the 60s, typically the piano/guitar/bass would be mixed to the left channel, with drums right and horns middle, as was standard at the time. However, in the 70s fusion era the songs became weirder and the personnel lists grew, and producer Teo Macero was given free reign to experiment:

* Music/EmilieAutumn, just about all of it. Of special note is "Dead Is The New Alive". At the start, the instruments ''[[UpToEleven cycle]]'' between the two channels. Also particularly noticeable with the background vocals in "Castle Down". In the discussion of "Shalott" on the ''Opheliac Companion'', Emilie and her producer Inkydust cite Music/TheBeatles' use of this trope as an influence.

* Music/MilesDavis: Once his albums started being mixed in stereo in the 60s, typically the piano/guitar/bass would be mixed to the left channel, with drums right and horns middle, as was standard at the time. However, this was turned UpToEleven in the 70s fusion era as the songs became weirder and the personnel lists grew, and producer Teo Macero was given free reign to experiment:

** ''On The Corner'' - [[UpToEleven Everything switches channels all the time.]]

** The song "Lucifer Sam" from the same album also takes this trope UpToEleven in that, with each repetition of the riff, the guitar track moves to a different position in the stereo field. Meanwhile, the drums and the vocals are separated as per usual with a song from TheSixties.

* ''[[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zaireeka Zaireeka]]'' by The Music/FlamingLips is this trope [[UpToEleven taken to 11]]: The tracks are spread across four separate CD's, and the listener is supposed to play all of them simultaneously in four separate CD players.

** ''Black Sabbath'' mostly pans the guitar towards the left channel, either obviously ("Black Sabbath", "Sleeping Village") or more subtly (exception being "Evil Woman"). "Black Sabbath" also pans the the bass to the right channel, "The Warning" puts the guitar solo on the right channel, and "Wicked World" reverses the guitar-left-bass-right panning of "Black Sabbath".
** ''Music/{{Paranoid}}'' mostly shoves the guitar on the right channel and the bass on the left channel, with the exception of "Hand of Doom", where their position is reversed, and "Fairies Wear Boots", "Rat Salad" and "Paranoid", which center both.
** ''Master of Reality'': "Sweet Leaf" begins with a tape loop of Tony Iommi coughing panned from left to center. "Embryo" uses subtle panning. "Children of the Grave" uses panning on the [[LastNoteNightmare spooky feedback-drenched coda]]. Outside of these, the album largely centers everything.

* "Supper's Ready" by Music/{{Genesis}} twiddles the vocals from left to right for 20 minutes.

* Hawkwind's ''D-Rider'' features synth parts that [[PlayingWithATrope constantly zig-zag betwen left and right.]] It wasn't the only time they played around with the stereo.

* DVD example: The stereo remix of ''Series/TheHitchhikersGuideToTheGalaxy'' TV series places the narration of the Guide entries completely in one speaker, and the background music in the other.

* Speaking of ''Radio/TheHitchhikersGuideToTheGalaxy'', the original radio version had had the speech on middle channel on monologues. And not always then. Also on the radio version, the Vogon voice treatment for the first episode had the voice on the right, and the phasing effect that had been added to it on the left. Rather disconcerting if you take out your right earpiece...

The visual equivalent of this is a WidescreenShot. [[JustForFun/IThoughtItMeant Has nothing to do with]] the practice of [[CausticCritic critically lambasting a work without restraint]], at least not inherently.

[[JustForFun/IThoughtItMeant Has nothing to do with]] the practice of [[CausticCritic critically lambasting a work without restraint]], at least not inherently.

* Music/MilesDavis' "He Loved Him Madly" bounces the low-rumbling percussion between left and right for 2 minutes. The drums and guitar in "Go Ahead John" similarly switch channels randomly, creating a deliberately strange dissociative effect.

* Music/TheBeatles: It's worth noting that Music/TheBeatles stereo mixing was done by other people and the band wasn't present during these sessions. There's a reason they say that "you haven't heard Sgt. Pepper's if you haven't heard it in mono." Their only album that was recorded directly to stereo and had the Beatles present and supervising the final mix was ''Abbey Road''. It's also worth noting that this trope was the reason why George Martin remixed two of the groups earlier albums (''Music/{{Help}}'' and ''Rubber Soul'') when they were released on CD for the first time in 1987. He also wanted to remix their first four albums as well, but thanks to EMI, didn't have enough time, so they were issued with the original mono mixes instead.

** "Taxman" from ''Music/{{Revolver}}'' used the "I Feel Free" method, bundling everything on the left channel, leaving tambourine and cowbell on the right, and filling the center with vocals.

* Music/{{The Toadies}} used to amazing effect in Possum Kingdom, the vocals are in one side and their effected reverb is in the other

** Liberty Records' "Premier" series, which featured die-cut gatefold covers. By 1964, that series had become a vehicle for Tommy Garrett's "50 Guitars" albums exclusively, but it managed to last until 1969.

* The Postal Service's "Such Great Heights" has a similar effect to "Before the Storm"; the song contains electronic beeping that alternates channels.

* "Slave to the Rhythm" by Music/GraceJones largely averts this. However, one track 'Don't Cry, It's only the Rhythm' features very heavy panning. At parts the music is played entirely in one channel, with sound effects in the other. From time to time it switches over, at one point doing so several times a second. Since the rest of the album is otherwise well balanced, it must have been a deliberate decision.

* Music/{{Led Zeppelin}}:

** ''Led Zeppelin IV'': "Stairway to Heaven" keeps the acoustic guitars on the left channel. "Misty Mountain Hop" has the same riff played by keyboards panned to the left and guitar panned to the right. The disorienting coda of "When the Levee Breaks" was achieved entirely through panning, according to Jimmy Page.

** ''Physical Graffiti'': "Custard Pie"'s main riff is played on guitar (right channel) and clavinet (left)
* Music/{{Black Sabbath}}:

* Music/{{Queen}}, "Bohemian Rhapsody" from ''Music/ANightAtTheOpera'' in particular - "Little high" the left speaker is followed by "Little low" in the right.
** Justified in the canon of The Prophet's Song, where voices are separated to make the whole thing easier to listen.

--> (Chris Barrie, as the Control Voice): We can take over your stereo speakers. We can do this to your left speaker ''(sound comes from left-hand speaker only.)''
--> ''Several seconds of total silence''
-->(Chris Barrie, as the Control Voice): Your right-hand speaker isn't working.

* Novelty singer Napoleon XIV, best known for "They're Coming To Take Me Away, Ha-Ha!" did a piece called "I Live in a Split-Level Head" where the first round of lyrics are in both channels -- and then each channel simultaneously plays ''different'' lyrics.[[note]] Specifically, the song has eight four-line verses; after they are recited once, the left channel starts over from the first verse while the right channel picks up at the fifth verse, and both proceed to go through all eight verses a second time.[[/note]]

* An interesting example in "Hemispheres" by Music/{{Rush}}: on the singing of the word "hemispheres", it's played once in the left channel before rapidly coming in on the right as well, making it sound like two Geddy Lees standing on either side of the singer.

** Similarly, this [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r2tRnBjf-6w widescreen variant]] of the famous [[Creator/TheCBSFoxCompany CBS-Fox Video]] logo has a panning "WOOSH" noise, and then a panning thunderclap. Both pan from left to right.

For a long time since the beginning of recording technology, most recordings were monaural (reproduced on a single channel), in spite of explorations by Clément Ader starting in 1881, and Bell Laboratories in the 1930s under the direction of Harvey Fletcher. The first stereophonic disc was released by Audio Fidelity in November 1957 and the technology quickly took off, by 1969 all major record labels having stopped manufacturing monaural records.