Minus one recordings

In the Philippines, the Minus-one (commonly, albeit improperly, spelled "Minus one" without the hyphen) is a variant mix of a multitrack recording, wherein the lead vocal track of a song is muted for further commercial "exploitation". In the Philippine recording industry of the 1980s, during the heyday of vinyl records, this variant was released as the "flip side" of a commercial song's 7-inch single, but generally never a part of the Long Playing album containing the full-featured song. Succinctly, a B-Side selection became referred to as "minus one" because the lead vocal track is subtracted from the A-Side song's original mix.

Record production genre


As a genre of record production in the Philippines, the inclusion of a 'minus one' Side-B reduced the production cost of a 45 RPM 7-inch "single" by foregoing the need for yet another song to occupy the 7-inch record's flipside. It also encouraged buyers to "sing along" with the bonus accompaniment of the "hit single".

A "minus one mix" would not necessarily be wholly instrumental, as backing vocals of the song's original mix may be retained. The concept of instrumental B-Sides to complement their full versions became a production trend of the Philippine record industry of the 1980s, which was replicated overseas. In the ensuing years, tracks from minus-one flip sides were assembled by production houses for their inclusion in compilations. Their commercial success notwithstanding, no spurious claims were made that vinyl sing-along B-Sides of OPM were an "ïnvention" or innovation.

Examples of Minus One sides
The following table illustrates early B-sides of Zsa Zsa Padilla's 7-inch singles released by Blackgold Records. Many such vinyl sides have since been ported to other platforms, including VCD, videoke and free video sharing websites.


 * ► In 1987, a song by the Filipino band, The Dawn was released as a 7-inch 45 RPM single (with minus-one) by their record label, OctoArts.
 * ► In the millenium years, Narda, a band from the Philippines, featured an album page in AllMusic with dedicated Minus One content.

Minus one is content


The wave of "Minus-one" vinyl B-Sides brought about a genre in the Philippine record industry, harvested by the cousins Vic del Rosario and Orly Ilacad, co-owners and executive producers of Vicor Music Corporation and its offshoot record labels. They released the seminal 7-inch B-sides of minus-one recordings, later grouped together as minus-one compilations on cassette tape format, Compact Disks and later as online material. As sheer musical content, the instrumentals were a precursor to widespread recreational crooning at home and outside, its provenance effectively traced to the Music Minus One products of the mid-1950s. As a Filipino trait for festivity, the allure for minus-one recordings crossed cultural barriers in the Philippines.