Pink Floyd - "Delicate Sound of Thunder" (1988)

You can't really complain much regarding this album. Of course, it's of high quality, the musicians among the best, the sound is great, (most of) the songs are really good. Hey, it's Pink Floyd. But is it a necessary record to own? Not really.

I found the album at a local book & record second hand store, and bought it partly to perfect my Pink Floyd collection, and partly because the only Floyd album I don't have, from their official studio releases, is A Momentary Lapse Of Reason, and many of those songs you find here. This way I can continue to justify I haven't bought A Momentary ... (I just don't like that album). That album's highlight, On The Turning Away, you'll get here in a great version, you'll also find Learning To Fly, A Momentary's ... other OK song. So why not? The album wasn't so expensive.

But otherwise it's Pink Floyd's earlier works that appeal to me on the album. It's a double album and the second disc contains only Floyd's earlier material, while the first contains only new songs (new, the year of 1988), except the opening song Shine On You Crazy Diamond. The songs are taken from five concerts the band performed at Long Beach, NY, the summer of 1988.

But I'd say there's no huge reason to have this album in your shelf. At least not if you have the original albums. The live versions don't really bring any new and exiting spices to the songs, and at least I tend to be negatively affected by hearing their previous works performed by only three-quarters of the group that created them (Waters had left PF long before this live album was recorded). It's like something is missing. I am also somewhat twofold when artists play their old songs, the fans favorites, probably mostly because that's what people want to hear. You're leaning against old, safe songs you've played a thousand times, and on the inside probably long ago left for new musical creations. But of course these are the songs that also I like the most and want to hear. Yes, it's twofold.

But again, there really isn't much to complain about regarding this album. Despite that, I will continue to listen to the original songs, most days. Knowing that the context was different when they were recorded, they were new creations the band worked on and recorded, makes them more interesting. And the "new" songs on the album, I have never been particularly interested in.


Tracklist

Side A
1. Shine On You Crazy Diamond 11:45
2. Learning to Fly 5:07
3. Yet Another Movie 7:03
4. Round And Around 0:33

Side B
1. Sorrow 9:44
2. The Dogs Of War 7:13
3. On The Turning Away 7:35

Side C
1. One Of These Days 6:17
2. Time 5:18
3. Money 9:42
4. Another Brick In The Wall Part II 5:17

Side D
1. Wish you were here 4:50
2. Comfortably Numb 8:42
3. Run Like Hell 6:42

Pink Floyd - "The Wall" (1979)

When I listen to The Wall I understand why it has never been one of my favorite albums with Pink Floyd. It's a two-minded, almost schizophrenic, experience to take part of this creation. You've got these beautiful harmonies, but with an obsessive insistence a minor chord always finds its way into the song and darkens it. Take a song like Mother, The Thin Ice, or really any song on the album - a beautiful melody but with a text that is sad, depressive and often aggressive. The hit Another Brick in the Wall has a really catchy chorus, where the bass and the guitar create a really nice groove. But then there are those children's voices that sing about the school's oppression ...

So it continues the whole album through. Now, there are many fine records with lyrics that have sad themes, but what colors The Wall is Roger Waters often aggressive, accusatory and desperate voice. It's not subtle, sad songs, it's pitch-dark anguish.

It strikes me how different The Wall is compared to everything Pink Floyd had previously created, yet it sounds very much Pink Floyd. Contradictory, yes, but true. We are far from Dark Side Of The Moon or Wish You Were Here, I guess the closest in sound is Animals. But The Wall is more desperate, harder, darker, more bombastic and lack songs that are over 5 minutes long. If Animals is a bitter reflection on our society, The Wall is Waters' self-therapy.

However, one can hear traces of Pink Floyd's earlier works. Take the druggy introduction to Empty Spaces, which could have been on a record like Wish You Were Here or why not More. Or the song Is There Anybody Out There? which I never liked, but that is far beyond what we usually describe as music. And when I hear the extremely bombastic Bring The Boys Back Home I come to think of Atom Heart Mother, with its choirs and orchestral arrangements.

The album was released in 1979, the film had its premiere in 1982 where the music to some extent is different (different mixes, Bob Geldof sings on some songs, etc.). The story in brief is a rock star's growing isolation from the outside world and his mental collapse. My new hometown Montreal has a part in The Wall. It was at a concert in this city that Roger Waters spat a person in the audience in the face, an event that was almost traumatic for Waters and got him thinking on his and the band's increasing isolation from their fans.

Many argue that The Wall is a solo album by Roger Waters, which there is some truth in. Gilmour is co-author of only three songs, and keyboardist Richard Wright quit the group during the recording (but was hired as a musician during the tour).

The Wall is described as a rock opera. I choose to call it a musical, and just like that it belongs to the same genre as Sound Of Music and Jesus Christ Superstar. As a musical (or rock opera), it has a lot of theatrical elements that lower the experience for me. I don't know if it's music I listen to, or a play I experience. I find it hard to distinguish between the film and the album. Is the album a soundtrack to the film, or was the film created on the basis of the album? I'm really two-minded about this album.


Tracklist

Side A
1. In The Flesh?
2. The Thin Ice
3. Another Brick in the Wall Part 1
4. The Happiest Days Of Our Lives
5. Another Brick in the Wall Part 2
6. Mother

Side B
1. Goodbye Blue Sky
2. Empty Space
3. Young Lust
4. One Of My Turns
5. Don't Leave Me Now
6. Another Brick in the Wall Part 3
7. Goodbye World Cruel World

Side C
1. Hey You
2. Is There Anybody Out There?
3. Nobody Home
4. Vera
5. Bring The Boys Back Home
6. Comfortably Numb

Side D
1. The Show Must Go On
2. In The Flesh
3. Run Like Hell
4. Waiting For The Worms
5. Stop
6. The Trial
7. Outside The Wall

Pink Floyd - "The Endless River" (2014)

Now that the worst hype has died down around Pink Floyd's latest, and last, album, maybe it's time to take a look at it. Did it fullfill the expectations?

Personally, I didn't really have any expectations. The two preceding albums - A Momentary Lapse of Reason (1987) and The Division Bell (1994) - were no more than OK and it would be much to ask that they suddenly, 20 years later, would create a masterpiece à la their 70's creations .

The Endless River is described by the two remaining band members, David Gilmour and Nick Mason, as a tribute / swan song for keyboardist Richard Wright, who died in 2008. The foundation of the album are leftovers from the recording of The Division Bell, in this case different synth loops / chords played by Wright. Approximately 20 hours of material, that they have listened through and picked out the goodies. Then adding guitars, bass, drums, etc., thus creating new songs. The album is instrumental except the last song Louder Than Words.

The album has a spacious, friendly and soft sound. Roger Waters' bitter reflections are long gone. However, the music is quite featureless and sometimes even a bit characterless. A song like Shine On You Crazy Diamond could perhaps be compared in its sound with some of the music on The Endless River, with the difference that the former has a much clearer idea and focus. One reason is surely that The Endless River is (almost) completely instrumental, songs without vocals require a higher degree of shape and form to not flow out as background music, as the music of The Endless River tend to do.

I'll also admit that I instinctively am skeptical of recording leftover material, something inside me says it probably was a reason they chose not to use it, from the start. In this case, though, I primarely experience it as a nice gesture towards Wright, to actually let his music get a last chance to reach out to the listeners. I have always regarded Wright as Pink Floyd's George Harrison, he didn't write many songs, but the ones he did were often really, really good. But still, this is left over material they chose not to use in 1994.

That Wright is somehow the main character on this record and the knowledge that this is Pink Floyd's last album colors it with a certain sadness. Isn't it sad to think that the institution Pink Floyd now has created its last works? It's a band that has been around for many years of our lives. The realization that everything has an end is sad sometimes. This arouses feelings in me because I myself have just moved from Sweden, left friends, job and family and the grief this means. Something that I am reminded of by The Endless River. And that I get older. I'm not so young anymore as when I discovered Pink Floyd and explored their various albums in the music room at the city library in Uppsala, Sweden. Those days are gone.

Overall, an OK album, but no more. The music has a tendency to become too much of background music and it's in periods hard to stay focused, if you don't actually choose to let it be background music, of course. The songs probably need a bit more of a distinct character to appeal to me more. But still, it has its place in the collection, as it is the last Pink Floyd will ever release (according to Gilmour). Personal favorite is Anisina.


Tracklist

Side A
1. Things Left Unsaid 4:24
2. It's What We Do 6:21
3. Ebb And Flow 1:50

Side B
1. Sum 4:49
2. Skin 2:37
3. Unsung 1:06
4. Anisina 3:15

Side C
1. The Lost Art Of Conversation 1:43
2. On Noodle Street 1:42
3. Night Light 1:42
4. Allons-Y (1) 1:56
5. Autumn '68 1:35
6. Allons-Y (2) 1:35
7. Talkin 'Hawkin' 3:25

Side D
1. Calling 3:38
2. Eyes to Pearls 1:51
3. Surfacing 2:46
4. Louder Than Words 6:32

Pink Floyd - "The Best Of Pink Floyd" (1970)

As a true Pink Floyd fan, I couldn't resist buying this album when I stumbled upon it the other week in a record store, although it was a bit expensive. But the chance of getting Pink Floyd's early single releases on vinyl was too tempting to resist, songs that are not found on any of their LPs (I have the songs on CD, though, since many years) .

Besides the single releases there are some songs from their first album The Piper Of The Gates Of Dawn. A string of psychedelic creations, most written by Syd Barrett. Why then is David Gilmour on the cover and where is Syd, man of order probably wonders? The songs are from the years 1967-68 and recorded before Gilmour came into the picture. According to sources on the internet, he only appears (in secret) on Julia Dream. EMI, which released the album, probably thought it was better to show the 1970 version of the band, I suppose. But fact is that the album was reissued later with Syd Barrett instead of Gilmour on the cover. After the crazy succcess with Dark Side Of The Moon the record company wanted to earn even more money on Pink Floyd, and re-released The Best Of Pink Floyd under the new name, Masters Of Rock, a serie that was made under the same name with a number of artists. That's when Syd got a spot on the cover.

The songs are of course quite different from the Dark Side Of The Moon and Pink Floyd's other 70's creations. This is the very definition of psychedelia, often with a dark touch, as if the music predicts Syd's future fate. Some might dismiss a few songs as a bit whimsical, but not me. I think all the creations are really groovy. Apples And Oranges is perhaps the song that most reminds of the music on Syd's solo albums that were released a few years later, with a peculiar timing of the vocals. Rich Wright and Roger Waters also contributes with a few songs. One might miss Point Me At The Sky, it was created , however, when Syd in practice had left the band, so perhaps it's OK. But personally, I would prefer it got a spot on the album instead of some song from Piper At The Gates Of Dawn.

The Best Of Pink Floyd invites the listener to the band in its younger years, filled with youthful energy and experimentation. Fun, trippy, sad and somewhat dark. Knowledge of Syd's later fate surely enhances this darkness.

Tracklist

Side A

1. Chapter 24 3:36

2. Mathilda Mother 3:03

3. Arnold Layne 2:51

4. Candy And A Currant Bun 2:38

5. The Scarecrow 2:07

Side B

1. Apples And Oranges 3:01

2. It WouldBe So Nice 3:39

3. Paint Box 3:27

4. Julia Dream 2:28

5. See Emily Play 2:50

Pink Floyd – “Animals” (1977)
 



Compared with their previous album Wish You Were Here, Pink Floyd has spiced Animals with large does of bitterness and bleakness. Both in therms of the theme - we humans are likened to pigs, dogs and sheep - and the sound. It's not the big sweeping soundscapes created on their earlier 70s albums, that dope smoking and acid eating people had (and still have) as their favourite soundtrack. Instead, it's a non-druggy, guitar driven sound. The keyboardist Richard Wright is heard more in the background, even though he has a prominent role in some shorter passages. The songs are a bit trickier, there are long songs without the usual verse-chorus-verse structure (which in no way is unusual when it comes to Pink Flyd). But it's not a single radio friendly track, therefore Animals can be a bit of a challenge, even for a Pink Floyd fan.

 

But it's a good album, no doubt.

 

 

Of course you can discuss whether it's a Pink Floyd album or a Roger Waters album. Opinions differ. Waters wrote all the songs except Dogs on side A, in which Gilmour helped out. On the other hand, Dogs fills up the whole A-side (more or less), which means the song is half the record. Gilmour claims that he wrote 90% of Dogs, so he doesn’t feel he was pushed out from Animals in any way.

 

However, there is no doubt that Waters at this time became increasingly dominant of Pink Floyd and considered himself to be its leader and main composer. Especially Wright and Waters had many conflicts, which some years later ended with Wright getting fired (but was rehired to The Wall tour). Animals is the first album where Wright hasn’t contributed with any songs which is sad. Wright is a bit like George Harrison in the Beatles, he doesn’t write that many songs, but the ones he does are really good.

 

The album was recorded in a new studio Pink Floyd had built in an old church, Britannia Row. The story about the cover has also become a legend, with the inflatable pig that broke loose and flew away. In fact, the final cover is a montage of two photos - the sky was more dramatic first photo shoot and then the pig was copied in. It was Waters who had the idea for the cover.

 

The pig in concert

The songs are long and branches off in different directions, all with their own character. And no doubt they are very qualitative and fascinating - beautiful guitar solos, sheep bleating, dogs barking and the sometimes quite up-tempo music breaks off into more quiet instrumental passages. It’s an album that can be recommended, but if one expects something like the earlier, more druggy, albums, it might be a disappointment. Here, Waters bitterness against humanity has taken over and seems to be the main inspiration. It's more English, bleak, social realism than drug-friendly musical journeys. It's not an album one gets particularly happy to listen to, maybe that’s the reason I haven’t played it as much as many of Pink Floyd’s other 70's creations.

 

OK, I'm writing bleak, English social realism, but it's still Pink Floyd - the qualitative dope music’s godfathers and pioneers. And this can also be heard on Animals. A perhaps more accurate expression might be bitter and bleak dope music with a very pessimistic view on people and society. In fact, sometimes Waters seems even contemptuous. Contemptuous dope music?

 

 

Tracklist

Side A

1. Pigs On The Wing (Part 1) 1:25
2. Dogs 17:03

Side B

1. Pigs (Three Different Ones) 11:25
2. Sheep 10:25
3. Pigs On The Wing (Part II) 1:23

Pink Floyd - "Wish You Were Here" (1975)

Some bands become such institutions that they almost become clichés, and some albums are such classics that they almost become boring to discuss (because so many other have already done so). This applies very much to today's theme, both the band and the album. When someone asks me what my favorite band is, and I, after some pretended reflection, respond Pink Floyd, I hear how boring it sounds. It sounds so much cooler to answer Zappa, The Strawbs or Hatfield & the North. And as I often respond Wish You Were Here on the issue of favorite album, again, it sounds a bit boring and average. Almost a little mainstream, and is there anything a music connoisseur don't want to be it's mainstream.

However, it can not be helped, I'm a big fan of Pink Floyd and especially this album. Although not always ending up on the top spot in my own "Best album ever" list, it always gets a top 3 position. In other words, a really good album. (Sometimes, when I'm in an extra adventurous mood, I can give first place to an album like Love's Forever Changes).

This album was purchased in the golden teenage years, an era which was a great journey of discovery in the musical landscape. I was problably around 18 years old when I bought it. Some music I bought in my teens I have trouble listening to today. It's too associated with these years and I have progressed in my musical taste. But Pink Floyd's creations are as good yet, and I will most certainly still like them when I'm  70+.

What can you say about the music on the album? First of all, the preceding album was Dark Side Of The Moon, and how can you make a follow up on a record like that? The answer is of course Wish You Were Here where, according to me, PF reached even higher. Most of you have probably heard the song/songs Shine On You Crazy Diamond, which is divided into two long suites, one on each side. A superb song which is kind of dedicated to Syd Barrett, but "Shine On is not really about Syd—he's just a symbol for all the extremes of absence some people have to indulge in because it's the only way they can cope with how fucking sad it is, modern life, to withdraw completely. I found that terribly sad. " (Roger Waters). This is one of my favourite song, all categories. The essence of modern music?

The title track is also a classic that doesn't really need to be commented on, problably the song from this album that's been played the most - both on radio and by street troubadours. I myself was extremely proud when I managed to play the song's riff on guitar. On the song Have A Cigar, the folk singer Roy Harper sings since Waters had some voice problems and thought that he didn't have the vocal range required for the song, and Gilmour simply didn't want to sing it. Apparently, Gilmour added some guitar on one Harper song (he recorded in a neighboring studio at the same time), so Harper returned the service. Waters, however, later regretted this decision since he then thought he should have sung himself. But perhaps it was wise since the song is a murdering criticism of the music industry. Better let Harper take the shit for that, right?

A classic story from the recording, that most of you probably already have heard, is that of Syd Barrett coming right in to the studio during the recording. The band members hadn't seen him in years and as he now looked radically different they didn't at first recognize him. When they realized who it was some started to cry. According to legend Syd listened to Shine On ... and didn't like it. He then disappeared from the studio.

Syd visiting the studio

This was Pink Floyd's ninth studio album and was recorded at Abbey Road Studios. One of my favorite albums but I really don't have much to say about it. Maybe you find that strange, but most have already been said.

Tracklist
Side A
1. Shine On You Crazy Diamond, Pts. 1-5 13:32
2. Welcome To The Machine 7:31

Side B
1. Have A Cigar 5:07
2. Wish You Were Here 5:34
3. Shine On You Crazy Diamond, Pts. 6-9 12:29

Pink Floyd - "Dark Side of the Moon" (1973)

The world is at the moment washed by a wave of Dark Side of the Moon created by Pink Floyd and their release of the new goodlooking and expensive CD / DVD box. Of course I don't want to be left outside, how much fun it is to stand outside and look from a distance at the party? In the cold and dark, and hear how much fun everyone has? Nah, I've done that enough, so I'm going to join the party but of course focus on the vinyl. Finally, I'm inside with the rest of you.

In the late '80s, I lived a year as an exchange student in Ohio, US. One thing that had made ​​me a little disappointed was the fact it was only sold CDs at the supermarkets. I had not yet entered into the new digital age and I missed the vinyls. On a trip to New York I discovered that it was still sold vinyls there so full of abstinence I bought a couple of albums of which Darkside ... was one. I was 16 years old and life was still an adventure. Pink Floyd was a new band in my life.

Themes that are repeated in the songs' lyrics are things that Roger Waters described as "making people crazy" - money, greed, death, mental ilness etc. and the record must be described as a concept album. Many miles has been written about this album and I will not be too tedious in repeting facts that you might already have read (or will read) on the Internet or magazines. But I can contribute with some mixed curiosities in a relatively unstructured form.

Dark Side ... was recorded during two recording sessions in 1972 and 1973 at Abbey Road Studios. The fact is that the music was created during a tour and was presented already in February 1972 for a bunch of journalists (which were delighted with what they heard).
PF discovered that another band, Medicine Head, already hade used the album title and then changed the working title to Eclipse. However, the Medicine Head album was a flop and PF went back to the name Dark Side of the Moon.

Alan Parsons was the engineer during the recordings. Relatively sophisticated equipment was used in the studio - a 16-channel tape recorder, synthesizers, etc. According to some the recordings were regularly interrupted since Roger Waters wanted to see his favorite team Arsenal play and the whole band wanted to see the TV show Monte Phytons Flying Circus. David Gilmour, however, later denied that this is true and claimed that they focused on the recording.

On the song The Great Gig In the Sky, Clare Torry sings a wordless melody improvised in the studio. For this she received £30 (equivalent to £300 today). However, she sued Pink Floyd and EMI in 2004 and claimed that she was a co-writer to this song and demanded royalties. The court said she was right and a secret agreement was signed. All the Dark Side ... records released after this date therefore has Clare Torry as a songwriter together with Richard Wright concerning this song.

On the record voices can be heard regularly saying different things, some of these voices belong to a few roadies. These were recorded in the studio where they had to answer various questions about violence, death and similar themes. Paul and Linda McCartney also answered such questions but their answers were not allowed to be on the album (they tried too much to be funny, according to those involved).

The classic cover was designed by Hipgnosis and George Hardie and was created after Richard Wright's wish to come up with something "smarter, neater, more classy" compared with the covers of the albums before. Wright had also asked for something "simple and bold."

Dark Side ... is one of the best selling albums ever, and the band members became wealthy. Waters and Wright bought large estates and Mason began his collection of sports cars. Some of the money was invested in the movie Monte Phyton And The Holy Grail.
It is estimated that the album has sold about 45 million copies and on a slow week it sells 8000-9000 ex. In 2002, for example, it sold around 400 000 ex, which made ​​it that year's 200th best selling album, nearly 30 years after its release.

So what I do I think of this historic album that always gets top rankings on lists such as "best album", "most important album" etc? Well, you can't dislike it and yes, it's very good. But I think PF has done even better albums so it's not my favorite of their creations. It's a fantastic production and the sound is crystal clear, it's hard to believe that this was recorded almost 40 years ago. The songs flow very nicely into each other and most are of very high quality. However, I have always been ambivalent to the previously mentioned The Great Gig ... which I find a little noisy with the crazy woman singing/screaming. In addition, I think Money is so-so and Us and Them can sometimes feel a bit boring. But this perhaps I write this mostly to balance all the great positive stuff that has been written about this album through out history.

As a final reflection, I might mention that this album for some reason has always given me summer vibes. The songs evoke images from my childhood's and youth's summers that meant an endless sea of liberty. Maybe it's because I listened to the album a lot during summers, or maybe it's the melancholy in the songs that comes through and raises the memories of a time that has passed. A time when you were free, didn't have any responsibility and could enjoy the day there and then. At least, that's how I remember it...

Of course I recommend a purchase of this album if you don't already have it. For me personally it's a little extra fun with this album in my collection as it was purchased in the Big Apple on one of my few visits there. But the content itself goes a long way too.

Favorite Songs
Time
Brain Damage

Track List
Side A
1. Speak To Me 1:30
2. Breathe 2:43
3. On the Run 3:36
4. Time 7:01
5. The Great Gig In the Sky 4:36

Side B
1. Money 6:22
2. Us and Them 7:46
3. Any Colour You Like 3:25
4. Brain Damage 3:28
5. Eclipse 2:03

Pink Floyd – “Obscured By Clouds” (1972)

Let us for once be honest with each other, put our masks aside and show our true selves - if there’s any Pink Floyd record from the 70s you can skip it’s this. If a different band than PF had made this album I, and many others, had certainly appreciated it in a different way. But when you're a band like today's main attraction you expect something better. So my judgement may be a bit unfair but at the same time it’s a proof of Pink Floyd's greatness.

Obscured By Clouds is the soundtrack to the French film La Vallée (The Valley in English) by director Barbet Schroeder. The band went to France and recorded the album in about two weeks. The film is about a number of people who go into the jungle in New Guinea searching for a mythical place - "the valley obscured by clouds". Although I was a little negative above towards the album it’s no doubt better than the movie which I found pretty boring when I saw it. My only reason to see it was of course that PF had made the soundtrack, this led me to believe that the film would be really cool. But no.

The songs are generally of lower standard than PF songs usually are, I also miss the wholeness PF albums often are. Obscured By Clouds feels more like a number of individual songs than an album. Compared with the band's previous album Meddle or the subsequent Dark Side Of The Moon there’s a big difference concerning this. Maybe it's because it's a soundtrack where the music is primarily designed to fit in a movie and its different scenes, it may make it harder to create a wholeness.

There are also few songs on the album that move me in any way or impress me. Compared with what Pink Floyd had created previously or was going to during the years after, which could be psychedelic, bombastic, powerful, pretentious and/or very beautiful, the songs on Obscured By Clouds are relatively bland. Some of the songs are instrumental while others are with song. Some are a little bit druggy, some are slow ‘ballads’ while others are more rock’n roll, but no one is on my top 10 list of PF's best songs.

So, no absolute need to have the record in your collection if you’re not a Pink Floyd fan (as I am). Then you must of course have it. Now and then I pick it out and let it spin on the turntable. Pink Floyd is still Pink Floyd.

 

Favorite tracks

Obscured By Clouds

When You’re In

Burning Bridges

 

Tracklist

Side A

1. "Obscured by Clouds" 3:03

2. "When You're In" 2:30

3. "Burning Bridges" 3:29

4. "The Gold It's in the..." 3:07

5. "Wots...Uh the Deal" 5:08

6. "Mudmen" 4:20

 

Side B

7. "Childhood's End" 4:31

8. "Free Four" 4:15

9. "Stay" 4:05

10. "Absolutely Curtains" 5:52

 

Pink Floyd - ”A Nice Pair” (1973)

A Nice Pair is a double album consisting of Pink Floyd's first two albums, The Piper At The Gates Of Dawn (1967) and A Saucerful of Secrets (1968). These albums show to some extent a different side of PF than the one we might associate with records like Dark Side Of The Moon or Wish You Were Here. Instead of the later sweeping concept albums, we here find a psychedelic playfulness, especially on the first LP. The sound on these albums are also less timeless – you here that you visit the 60s.

The cover was created by Hipgnosis and is made up by a total of 18 small images of proposed, but unused, cover images to the album.

The Piper At the Gates of Dawn may well be described as Syd Barrett's high point in his career. On this record, he has written all of the songs except one, usually alone, sometimes together with the others. He is also the lead singer on almost all of the songs, some would go as far as to call this a Syd Barrett album.

The music on this album can not be called anything but psychedelic, and I experience it as a psychedelia with a dark vibe. If that is because of the sound, the harmonies, the lyrics or the knowledge of Syd's subsequent fate, I can not answer. An acquaintance of mine who was a heavy user of cannabis described this as his favorite album to listen to while under the influence of the drug. He used the term "unconscious music" as he felt that the music to some extent opened the door to that forbidden part of the brain. Now, you might want to believe him or not, but I am inclined to agree with him. These are not songs about peace, love & understanding with druggy bluesfueled jam sessions, instead they are typical Syd Barrett songs with lyrics that may be viewed as playful or, as in my and my friends' case, dark and strange. The sound is also darker than the usual 60s psychedelia which on the whole provides a record that somehow gets into your head. My acquaintance was convinced that PF knowingly created such music in some inscrutable purpose, personally, I am not as convinced.

The recording took place in Studio 3 at EMI Studios while the Beatles were there and recorded Sgt. Peppers Lonely Hearts Club Band. Producer was Norman Smith, who had been studioengineer at all the Beatles recordings up to Rubber Soul. PF's drummer Nick Mason describes that the recording of the album went smoothly and was very effective. Norman Smith on the other hand, remembers the recording as "a hell", and this was aimed at both the recording itself and the band members' musical talents.

On the album there are a few examples of PF's early fondness of strange musical journeys and / or experiments. These are strange sounds (noises) in a relatively unstructured form that might be fun to create but not so fun to listen to. Instellar Overdrive is an example of this. If I had the records on CD, I would click "Skip" when you got to this and similar songs.

The songs on the album, however, are overall really good, with a few exceptions, and every one has its own unique characteristics. But I can’t escape the feeling that there is something strange with the record, even a playful song like Bike ("I've got a bike, you can ride it if you like, it's got a basket, a bell that rings and things to make it look good ...") has some sort of dark vibe. This makes the LP both fascinating and leaves some kind of wonder, a wonder about why it leaves you wondering. Don’t ask me to elaborate on this, it’s hard to put the finger on it and my subconscious doesn’t easily turn into the form of written words.

Allmusic.com writes about music: ”...giving the impression of chaos and confusion lurking beneath the bright surface. The Piper at the Gates of Dawn successfully captures both sides of psychedelic experimentation -- the pleasures of expanding one's mind and perception, and an underlying threat of mental disorder and even lunacy.”

On the second album, A Saucerful Of Secrets, the band seems to have matured. The songs have become more serious with a different tone. Syd's mental health had deteriorated dramatically and he contributed only with one song, the closing song Jugband Blues. PF had because of his increasingly confused and difficult behavior picked up a new member of the band, David Gilmour. This man was to become an important part of PF's future creations. For various reasons the band had not gotten around to get rid of Syd, despite all the difficulties he created. This means that this is the only album with PF where all five members took part. There are many stories about Syd concerning strange interviews, bizarre stage performances or sudden physical (or mental) absence from this time. The ones interested can Google his name to share his story.

The title track of A Saucerful Of Secrets is again one of these long instrumental songs that maybe should be called sound art. But I notice a difference from the similar projects of the first album, the tone and the mood feels more controlled and the band seems to have an idea what they want with these sound experiments. They seem to have some sort of goal.

Rick Wright has contributed with a couple of songs of which I find Remember a day the finest. He also sings lead vocals on four of the LPs eleven tracks, and does backing vocals on the title track, making it the only PF album where he sings on more songs than anyone else. The Roger Waters creation Corporal Clegg, is a song many people believe is an attempt to imitate Syd Barrett's more playful way of creating songs, but a failed one. Personally, I have always liked this song as it is more classic psychedelia than many other things they did. Believe it or not, but Nick Mason sings on this track which makes this the only album where all five members contribute with vocals (even if all members, then four, contributed with their voices on Meddle). Waters also contributes on this album with the classic Set the Controls for the Heart of the Sun, a favorite of mine that still holds true. This track is also the only song that all five members take part in, which makes it unique in the PF catalogue. I have always liked Syd's song contribution, Jugband Blues, a song that leaves you somewhat sad from knowing that this was the last thing he contributed to Pink Floyd. After this it just went downhill for him.

Just like on their first album, most of the songs have a dark side that makes me want to use the term "unconscious music" again. And yes, my acquaintance also played this album a lot when he used cannabis and has described the dark inner journeys he made. But unlike their first album there are songs here, or parts of songs, which lack this dark vibration, such as Corporal Clegg or the Rick Wright song See-Saw. If this is good or bad thing I don’t know.

Pink Floyd had from the start put a heavy focus on their stage shows which usually offered a lot of visual stimuli. Their light show was always evocative, and were made with lamps, spotlights and projectors. Large parts of their audience of course made the experiences even more thrilling with the help of drugs, but the members themselves were never very fond of these substances (except for Syd). Drummer Nick Mason describes in his autobiography Inside Out: A Personal History of Pink Floyd, that in addition to a joint from time to time at leisure time (“which everyone smoked in those days "), they used no drugs. And certainly not during a concert. According to Nick the members of the band always identified themselves more as musicians than as hippies or spokesmen for the psychedelic movement.

In conclusion, I have always liked these records and they have been played a lot in my home and best of all - they are still great. The reader may wonder why I bought this double album instead of the two separate records. The truth is that I didn’t really know so much of PFs earlier creations at the time of the purchase (I was 18, I think) and simply didn’t know that this record was actually two.

Favorite Songs

Matilda Mother

Remember a Day

Set the Controls for the Heart of the Sun

 

Tracklist

Side A

1. "Astronomy Domine" (Barrett) – 4:14

2. "Lucifer Sam" (Barrett) – 3:07

3. "Matilda Mother" (Barrett) – 3:08

4. "Flaming" (Barrett) – 2:46

5. "Pow R. Toc H." (Barrett / Roger Waters / Richard Wright / Nick Mason) – 4:26

6. "Take Up Thy Stethoscope and Walk" (Waters) – 3:05

Side B

1. "Interstellar Overdrive" (Barrett / Waters / Wright / Mason) – 9:41

2. "The Gnome" (Barrett) – 2:13

3. "Chapter 24" (Barrett) – 3:42

4. "The Scarecrow" (Barrett) – 2:11

5. "Bike" (Barrett) – 3:21

Side C

1. "Let There Be More Light" (Waters) – 5:38

2. "Remember a Day" (Wright) – 4:33

3. "Set the Controls for the Heart of the Sun" (Waters) – 5:28

4. "Corporal Clegg" (Waters) – 4:13

Side D

1. "A Saucerful of Secrets" (David Gilmour / Waters / Wright / Mason) – 11:57

2. "See-Saw" (Wright) – 4:36

3. "Jugband Blues" (Barrett) – 3:00

 

 

 

 

Pink Floyd – Atom Heart Mother (1970)

I remember clearly the first time I heard this record, it was in school at the age of 16 in a music class. Our substitute teacher played it while he spoke very philosophically about music for us. The music fitted very well with his words and he had certainly planned this carefully. I was in awe of the music and found it extraordinary beautiful. Afterwards, I heard him say it was Pink Floyd who were performing the music, a fact that made me surprised, I had heard The Wall and The Final Cut, but I had no idea that the band had done music like this. Or that they had done anything except those two albums. A new world opened up.

One of my classmates were equally charmed by the music and began to discuss music with the teacher after class was finished. After a while he decided to follow the substitute teacher home to check out some albums. In the teenager's world, there was only one interpretation of this and my classmate was for the rest of his school years looked upon as a might-be-homosexual and also got to hear this quite often (even though it was always said with a smile). It didn’t make things easier for him that he once also asked to borrow a mouth spray from a classmate with the words "Can I get sprayed in the mouth?".

Oh, sweet memories, but let’s head back to the album. In the music class we heard the album's A-side which consists of a 23-minute song divided into shorter sections, the piece I then found so wonderful. There are wind instruments, choirs and sections for orchestra. The band usually keep themselves in the background. The B-side contains four tracks where each member, except Nick Mason, has written one each. The final song is a collaboration between all four and again, is a long (instrumental) track divided into a few shorter sections.

It’s was always the A-side of the album that attracted me most. Largely because it offers some variation – there are bombastic parts mixed with very beautiful, almost fragile, parts. This was for a long time a favorite piece to listen to at bedtime, in bed with headphones and the lights turned off. Night Music.

The B-side contains more "normal" music and of the four different songs I prefer Roger Waters and David Gilmour's contributions (If resp. Fat Old Sun).

The album cover features a cow, the reason for this was that Pink Floyd were tired of the images that were associated with the psychedelic space rock which they had hitherto represented. Therefore, they wanted an ordinary plain cover. Storm Thorgeson, who designed the cover, went out to the countryside and photographed the first cow he saw, which then got be on the cover. The name of the album is from a newspaper headline on an article about a woman who had gotten a nuclear-powered pacemaker.

Pink Floyd actually did a tour where they brought a full orchestra and a choir to perform Atom Heart Mother. The tour of course lost money and they therefore scaled down the track for live performances - made it shorter without choir and orchestra. Pink Floyd performed Atom Heart Mother at concerts until 1972.

As I mentioned, I've always liked (and still like) this album. But not everyone does:

"Atom Heart Mother is a good case, I think, for being thrown into the dustbin and never listened to by anyone ever again!... It was pretty kind of pompous, it wasn't really about anything."

/ Roger Waters — Rock Over London Radio Station - 15 March 1985, for broadcast 7 April/14 April 1985.

"[Atom Heart Mother] was a good idea but it was dreadful. I listened to that album recently: God, it's shit, possibly our lowest point artistically. Atom Heart Mother sounds like we didn’t have any idea between us, but we became much more prolific after it.”

/ David Gilmour - Mojo Magazine - October 2001

"I wouldn't dream of performing anything that embarrassed me. If somebody said to me now: "Right...here's a million pounds, go out and play 'Atom Heart Mother'", I'd say: "You must be fucking joking...I'm not playing that rubbish!". 'Cos then I really would be embarrassed."

/ Roger Waters — interviewed by Richard Skinner - BBC Radio 1 - originally broadcast: Saturday 9 June 1984

But who cares what these men say?

 

Favourite tracks

Atom Heart Mother

Fat Old Sun

If

 

Tracklist

Side A

1. "Atom Heart Mother"  23:44

 

Side B

1. "If"  4:31

2. "Summer '68"  5:29

4. "Fat Old Sun"  5:22

5. "Alan's Psychedelic Breakfast"  13:00

 

 

Pink Floyd - “More” (1969)

At the risk of being repetitive, but again it was my older brother's albums which led me to Pink Floyd. As a child, his records The Final Cut and The Wall were heard on the stereo in the living room regurlarly. I found them really good but as a 10-year-old I had no idea about who Pink Floyd were or the music they had created earlier. I remember the feeling of surprise when I, as a 14-year-old on Rhodes (vacation with my parents), found a tape with Pink Floyd and a recording called More. I had never heard of it but took a chance and bought it, especially as it was quite cheap. Looking back, I understand that the countless tapes that were for sale almost certainly were pirated versions. But I was blissfully unaware of this at the time, even if the knowledge problably wouldn’t have made any difference.

With a feeling of excitement, I listened to the tape at our return home and found something completely different than The Final Cut or The Wall, it was druggy and psychedelic, it was different and not least, it was good. I got an insight that a new world was waiting to be discovered. What or how many titles Pink Floyd had created I did not know, but I understood that there was likely a lot more to find. Exciting! This world is still one I often find myself in as I hold Pink Floyd as one of my favorite groups.

More, PF's third album, is a soundtrack to a French film with the same name, directed by Barbet Shroeder. I am a bit suspicious towards soundtracks as they often consist of unfocused mood music, and without the images the music can be rather formless and lacking in character. More offers a pretty wild mix of music. The opening song, and one of my favorites - Cirrus Minor, starts with birdsong which I find creats a harmonious but a bit melancholy mood. A guitar slowly fades in and then Roger Water’s singing continues the theme of melancholy. The song ends with a few minutes of beautiful, floating keyboard chords that I found as a teenager incredibly beautiful. And the birdsong returnes into the song. Nice! When I lied down on the floor, closed my eyes, it felt almost as I lifted off the ground. I still think it's a very beautiful part of the record.

But this album also offers some songs that have to be defined as hard rock or Heavy Metal (The Nile Song and Ibiza Bar). These two tracks are according to me and many others the 'heaviest' songs PF did. In addition, we also have some beautiful songs of the quieter type, more or less acoustic, which actually belongs to some of PF:s better songs, for example Green Is The Colour. Then there are also a number of songs that might fit better in a film than on a record. Instrumental tunes that are relatively close to the more psychedelic music excursions PF did in their first years (Careful With That Axe, Instellar Overdrive). Personally I have always had a hard time with these songs, frankly. I think some moderation is called for concering the lust of musical experimentation! An exception on More concerning the instrumental songs is Main Theme, a really cool song that was/is so suggestive that it for some reason made me suspect that the band members used drugs (psychedelic music used to make me think like that. Maybe I still do).

Well, despite a diverse album with some lows (but equally high peaks) I give this album an ‘OK’. The great thing about the wild mixture of styles is that the records doesn’t get boring. It can also be mentioned that this was the first album PF recorded without Syd Barrett. After a few years I bought the album on vinyl.

Finally, I may also mention that the album made me extremely curious about the film, rumors said that among other things it contained heroin addiction and LSD trips! Irresistible themes. At this time, the 80s and then the first half of the 90s, it was often a challenge to get hold of obscure movies. Actually, it was not before Internet's entry into my life I finally found it and ordered it from a movie site. The film was actually not very good even if it contained those erlier mentioned themes. The album is better.

Favorite Songs

Cirrus Minor

Green Is The Colour

Main Theme

 

Tracklist

Side A

1. "Cirrus Minor"  5:18

2. "The Nile Song"  3:26

3. "Crying Song"  3:33

4. "Up the Khyber"  2:12

5. "Green Is the Colour"  2:58

6. "Cymbaline"  4:50

7. "Party Sequence"  1:07

 

Side B

1. "Main Theme"  5:27

2. "Ibiza Bar"  3:19

3. "More Blues"  2:12

4. "Quicksilver"  7:13

5. "A Spanish Piece"  1:05

6. "Dramatic Theme"  2:15