The recent apps list from the ‘long press’ of the power button shows many more apps in a side scrolling list (once they have been opened).
There is a small lock icon on each. Locking them keeps them in this menu. Once they are there they are still sort of active, at the very least still in a state they were left in after you navigated away from them (using the short press of the power button, not the ‘back button’).
Teaming this with the instructions set out earlier in this discussion to help apps run in the back ground, or auto load on boot, may go some way to working around the issue, but it will use more battery.
The entries are from 213 to 226 in this discussion. Since the 1.3 update the lock is vastly more easy to apply.
I hope this is of some use.