Put very simply, an EP is a sound recording that contains more tracks/recorded time than a single but fewer than an album or LP (Long Play). An Ideal For Living: A Celebration of the EP (Extended Play) is both a love letter and the first historical overview of this often-neglected format. 

From the 4-track 7 inch vinyl record to  the 6-track 12 inch to the 6-track CD, we’re talking about a range of EP formats that accommodate the sweet spot between a ‘single’ and an album LP and it’s time, say the authors (Corey duBrowa and friends), that we recognised how many great specimens there truly are out there.

So, the extended play recording. Not quite an album. More than a single. And more than an artifact of the vinyl era. In fact the EP even thrived at every turn of the music industry’s evolution, from vinyl to tape to CD to stream. This definitive book unearths the EP’s origins, history and cultural impact and enlists nearly 50 music industry veterans (musicians, scribes, producers, executives and superfans) to create a list of the 200 best EPs recorded and shapes these opinions into a book that seeks to trace the arc of the EP’s development and to chart the history of the music industry.