Classic Albums #11 - Pink Floyd - Dark side of the moon

[o]

I was thinking of doing a Radiohead album, or another Beatles one, and then looked at what are thought to be the 10 Best Albums, and thought I'd do Pink Floyd as I picked the album up gratis from my sister in law having never listened to it in my life. All I knew by Pink Floyd was Another brick in the wall.
Enjoy.

Side one
1. "Speak to Me" Mason Instrumental 1:30
2. "Breathe" Waters, Gilmour, Wright Gilmour 2:43
3. "On the Run" Gilmour, Waters Instrumental 3:36
4. "Time" (includes "Breathe (Reprise)") Mason, Waters, Wright, Gilmour Gilmour, Wright 7:01
5. "The Great Gig in the Sky" Wright, Clare Torry[nb 12] Torry 4:36
Side two
1. "Money" Waters Gilmour 6:22
2. "Us and Them" Waters, Wright Gilmour, Wright 7:46
3. "Any Colour You Like" Gilmour, Mason, Wright Instrumental 3:25
4. "Brain Damage" Waters Waters 3:48
5. "Eclipse" Waters Waters 2:03

[wonderwall]

Know this one well but not my favourite album by them shall dig it out and have a listen

[thehitparade]

Half way through so far.

SPOILER: Click to show

Hope Side 2 is more interesting.

[Shireblogger]

Looking forward to sticking the knife into this over-rated piece of nonsense.

Or maybe, I'll listen to it properly, for the first time in 20 years, and discover the brilliance I've been missing.

...We shall see...

[Shireblogger]

Pink Floyd – Dark Side Of The Moon

Context
I’ve never seen the appeal of Pink Floyd. From time to time I’ve borrowed their albums from friends or the library, but never managed to break through. I thought their performance at Live8 was interesting, and there are one or two tracks that I like. Prompted by Haven, I’ve tried again with “Dark Side Of The Moon”. And failed again, I’m sorry to say.
2/10

General Overview
It’s an album that is OK as background music. It isn’t offensive. But there’s nothing here to really get me going. No individual tracks that I’d want to download. A coherent sonic soundscape, very high quality muzak. One of the world’s best selling LPs – I don’t see why.
3/10

Intro & Outro
First impressions count. The instrumental-with-sound-effects, “Speak To Me”, is probably the worst track on the album on repeat listening. Interesting once, aggravating thereafter. Fortunately, we’re soon into “Breathe”, which is one of the album’s highpoints. By the time we get to “Eclipse” at the other end, I’ve completely lost interest, and the outro does nothing to change my mind, despite the multi-layered choral vocals.
1/10

Music
In places, very atmospheric. The whole band contributes in full, and I give them credit for not being shy to experiment. I can see why many people love this. It is original, different, and well paced. “Money” best demonstrates this, with Dave Gilmour’s guitar underpinning a strong composition.
5/10

Lyrics
Roger Waters’ lyrics aren’t the reason “Dark Side” has been so successful. Let’s be honest, it is mostly 6th form common room philosophy. No poetry, no stand-out couplets, no sentiments to make you stop and think. “There’s someone in my head but it’s not me”. “Money, it’s a crime…Is the root of all evil today”. “Down and out, it can’t be helped, but there’s a lot of it about”.
2/10

Production & Sound
Brilliant. No two ways about it. In the bath, in an aircraft hanger, in the car, in the dark, it sounds fantastic. Clare Torry’s wailing on “The Great Gig In The Sky” and the special effects sounds on “Money” especially make this album stand out from the crowd.
10/10

High Points
There are some parts of some songs which I enjoy, and which are pretty iconic. I could probably live with a 4-track edit, featuring “Breathe”, “The Great Gig In The Sky”, “Money” and “Brain Damage”. And I’d probably like it more than the complete album, because I wouldn’t get bored by all the noodling.
5/10

Low Points
The rest.
2/10

Packaging
Superb. In its gatefold vinyl format, it is the album artwork against which all others are judged. Nothing else to say. Just superb.
10/10

On balance
Well I tried again. And liked it more than I have before. But that’s a relative concept. I still see no need to own the album, or any of its tracks. I get why other people love it. But I don’t.
4/10

TOTAL SCORE
The time is gone, the song is over, thought I’d something more to say.
44/100.

For Haven:
4.5/10

[wonderwall]

Some good tracks on it ok to listen to once in a while don't understand why it is as highly rated as it is not even my favourite pink floyd album.I think wish you were here is far superior out of 10 I'd rate it a 7/10

[vastar iner]

OK. The longest-running chart run for any album in the US ever, and I’ve never heard it. So here we go. First surprise: its length. I would have assumed from the Floyd’s prig rock credentials that it would have been about three hours, but no, it comes in at under three-quarters. Hm.

Starts off with someone laughing. Presumably this is a meaningful intro. I don’t know whether this would have been deeply annoying in the vinyl age, with people skipping to track 2, or whether it would have got people in the mood - allow them to sit between their quadrophonic speakers and mediate into the mood.

So the first proper track is “Breathe”. It sounds surprisingly MOR-ish. Slow, almost folk rock. Not that bad; leaves more of an impression in the mind than most other album tracks. Then they go all Kraftwerky, a keyboard riff that reminds me of library music. At the time this must have been mega-futuristic, now it sounds post-modernist; I have images of a neon-lit tunnel into interstellar space. It could have been the soundtrack to The Black Hole. As a tune, it’s impossible to rate. It’s obviously a transition between songs, there sounds like a helicopter swooping down, it follows the running theme as it presages an escape. As it builds to a climax there are radio voices and an explosion. Hm. If I were listening for pleasure, I would probably skip it on the CD; if I were being fully immersed in to album, darkened room &c, I would not. I am not sure though whether it bears repeated aural interrogation.

Alarms. Bells. The Division Bell? No, too soon for that. Metronome. The guitar positively broods. Again there is a sense of urgency, a sense of fleeing; it’s nicely structured as it resolves itself into a multi-layered pop song before the vocals come in. Suddenly I am reminded of The Motors. Almost funk-rock. But after a normal song it becomes an extended guitar solo. Thing is, it doesn’t seem to be that indulgent; it’s not going into appoggiaturas and crescendos for the sake of it. It sort of works.

Then it fades into a piano intro. There’s a lot of Incredible-Hulk-Has-Become-Human-Again-And-Everyone-Is-Dead feel to this. Someone’s talking, can’t quite make it out. Something about dying? Picks up on the life-is-for-living theme of the preceding track. And now the chocolate advert vocals. OK, this is very familiar now. And is one hell of a track. Thumbs well up.

Fades into the ker-ching of “Money”. This is also familiar, but not in such a good way - it’s easily the weakest song so far. Yet it was a single in the States. Go figure, as they say Stateside. Then again, there is one thing that helps to understand it - it’s the easiest to take out of the album context.

Finishes with a funereal organ, which fades into another MOR-ish folk guitar. Gets boring, but then kicks on with a bit of a mass influx of instrumentation. Nick Mason’s drumming on this is stellar, by the way. Could have done without the sax though. I suppose in 1973 (or whenever it was) it was not seen as a sign that “this should only be played as muzak at a yuppie dinner party”. Finishes off with a monstrous synth chord solo and some cosmic guitar. This is the most spacey of all the tracks; it’s up and down and all around. Oh, hang on, is this a separate track? Everything segues in together. Anyhoo.

Now we have something a little bizarre, something about lunatics. More emphasis on the vocals in this one, then it goes into the crescendo bit which seems a theme of the album. Hammond organ makes it sound like Procol Harum. It envelops for a while, jazz-like, variations on a theme. Oh, that’s it? Expected more tracks.

Well, that actually seemed to fly. Very surprising. None of the over-indulgent self-obsessed frills and fripperies that I was expecting, it was all quite tidy and controlled. The acceptable face of prog?

I think this one is more difficult to evaluate now, because there have been a lot of Floydfluenced bands since, but not that many of a similar ilk before. So this is a step forward in music which I cannot appreciate in the same way today as I would have done back then. It’s a move to make the album an art form as opposed to the single as a song. So it gets big kudos for that.

Overall, then, a 7. A very good album. And I can see why it is so revered - it ruptured boundaries.

[o]

I chose this album, as it was one of those albums you hear people talking about and you see it on best albums ever lists, and I don’t know it all. Plus I picked it up for free off my sister in law 

Pink Floyd – Dark side of the moon
Speak to me – I guess this sounded good in the 70s when you were stoned, not now. 1/10
Breathe – This I do like, very chilled but not over indulgent. 6/10
On the run – I see where Kasabian got their influence for Apnea from now, don’t like this. 1/10
Time – The bell is almost there to wake you from your drugged stupor! Once the vocals start, I like this, but it takes too long to get there sadly! 5/10
The great gig in the sky – Ah, the wailing woman, drives me mad this track. 0/10
Money - I like Money, but for some reason thought it was by the Beatles when I’ve heard it in the past! 6/10
Us and them - So laid back it’s almost horizontal! But it does build nicely as well, and then revert back to chilling, pleasing. 5/10
Any colour you like – Does nothing for me, just self indulgent filler. 2/10
Brain damage – S’ok, although the mad laughing gets annoying after a while. 3/10
Eclipse – A good ending to the album. 6/10
4.5/10

[raliverpool]

This was the second album I bought on CD (after Sgt. Peppers ..), and I paid £14.99 for it back in 1987 in Boots. And unless it is selected before I have my next turn, I will nominate the third album I bought as my next classic album.

This album has a sonically flawless sound, imaginative arrangements and production, and classy songwriting all adding up to a classic record. After a few years in a relative wilderness following the departure of founding member Syd Barrett in 1968, struggling to find their niche over the course of a full-length LP, Pink Floyd found their feet and then some on 1973's Dark Side of the Moon, which at the time was a fashionable concept album. These days, it's a less-fashionable concept album (the very word conjures up visions of some overblown prog-rock nightmare), but over four decades on remains a high point in the band's creativity despite it being second on the list of classic albums for hipsters to trash (behind the Beatles' Sgt. Peppers ... obviously).

In retrospect it was the epic "Echoes" on 1971's Meddle that finally clicked things into place for Pink Floyd, and their soundtrack work on Obscured By Clouds was the perfect dry run lubrication for tackling a concept record such as this. Much is made of David Gilmour and Roger Waters, but truth be told the unsung hero here is Richard Wright, whose keyboard and synth work defines the sound along with Gilmour's beautiful guitar work and the crystalline vocal harmonies.

At a time when King Crimson, Yes, ELP, Genesis, etc were making increasingly complicated, and clever, clever musical and conceptual albums, this band went in the opposite direction stripping back their musical complexities to make an incredibly thought provoking and beautiful album which forces the close listener to reflect on how they run their life. What's good what's bad and what should and should not be important. An album that can honestly change your perception on just about everything. One that can be deeply personal, as it focuses on the individual and their daily struggle to accept the things that they cannot change, but to also never forget what is truly important to their unique being. And one that speaks about the individuals inherent need for society even with its plethora of problems it present to the individual.

Hence we come to this album (#. "Track" - Rating out of 10):

1. & 2. "Speak to me / Breathe (In the air)" - 7.0 – The album introduces you to the first sign of life, your (a baby's) heart-beat. It then segues into the frustration of the mundane and futile elements of life that accompany, and the importance of living one's own life
3. "On the run" – 7.5 - One of the most important proto-electronic rock compositions before Kraut rock existed it was inspired on Rick Wright's stress and paranoia via his fear of flying.
4. "Time / Breathe (reprise)" – 9.5 - Classic rock is present with the guitar solo, progressive rock is present with the use of special effects and reprises. The album's concept is also summed up in the lyrics leading up to the guitar solo. Life can be mundaningly drifting by, and then all of a sudden the alarm bells goes and you are caught in a traumatic, life changing, possibly life threatening event.
5. "The Great gig in the sky" – 10.0 - In my opinion the greatest instrumental of all time, and one of the greatest and most profound pieces of music ever made, thanks to the genius work of Rick Wright, engineer Alan Parsons and vocalist Clare Torry's soulful metaphor for death or the end of the world as per the visual vision the band had for the track:

6. "Money" - 9.5 - A song attacking Capitalism. It mocks greed and consumerism using flippant lyrics and cash-related sound effects. Ironically, it was inspired after an anonymous US record label boss moaned about how the band seemed to be incapable of coming up with a USA FM Radio friendly hit. The result it was released as a single in the USA and peaked at #7.
7. "Us and Them" - 10.0 - The sophisticated production behind the track only serves to help send the listener into a state of bliss, only for the violent sequence with Gilmour singing about the dark aspects present in humanity, and the conflict it causes to people who want to be left alone. And this is nearly two decades before Nirvana ripped off the Pixies "Quiet/Loud/Quiet/Loud .." technique! It is also a metaphor to the struggle of personal relationships.
8. "Any colour you like" – 8.0 -  concerns the lack of choice one has in a human society ("You can have any colour as long as it's black" Henry Ford (Ford cars), Black = depression) over a soundtrack of Wright's synthesizers taking the front row for most of the production, with Gilmour's guitar, Waters' bass, & Mason's drum combo serving as a base.
9. "Brain Damage" – 9.0 - The lyrics take in spirit the view of a madman in an asylum (a proto homage to founder Syd Barrett). It also questions whether it is not the individual who is insane, but the world that (s)he lives in. It also serves as a musical transition to one of the greatest endings in the history of music.

10. "Eclipse" - 9.5 - This fittingly closes the album with an epic mixture of jazz organ roars, chorus shouts, and Waters' lyrics summarizing the concept of otherness and unity, and the one sustaining product of life. The beating of the heart.

"There is no dark side in the moon, really. As a matter of fact it's all dark."

In short, this is probably the one album above all others where I can gauge how much people understand the concept of music by how much they appreciate this album or not. From experience, the friends I have who don't like or don't get this album have very shallow (Top 40, X-Factor, "if it's not in the charts it can't be not very good, otherwise it would be in the charts", music as a background soundtrack medium) taste in music, and certainly seem to be unable to appreciate the concept as music as an artform.


Overall 10 (80 / 9 = 88.89% (86%+) category).

My recommendation for a similar album (although not even close to being as good is) Mike Oldfield - Tubular Bells (1973) www.youtube.com/watch?v=uLP9vIW3DA4


The Pink Floyd Studio album rates (I bought the Discovery box set when it came out in 2011, and I love it):

The Piper At The Gates Of Dawn (1967) 8
A Saucerful Of Secrets (1968) 7
More (1969) 5
Ummagumma (1969) 5
Atom Heart Mother (1970) 6
Meddle (1971) 9

Obscured By Clouds (1972) 6

The Dark Side Of The Moon (1973) 10

Wish You Were Here (1975) 10

Animals (1977) 9

The Wall (1979) 7

The Final Cut (1983) 5

A Momentarily Lapse In Reason (1987) 5

The Division Bell (1994) 6

[smokeyb]

Pink Floyd - Dark side of the moon

I remember reading some time ago that they met in Nick Mason’s kitchen to compile a shortlist of things that bothered them. Those pressures were....time, money, madness, death. I guess that is what the album is basically about.

I first bought this album on vinyl back in the 70’s a few years after it first came out, and it very quickly became my favourite LP for years, still got it. Also bought it on CD in more recent times.

In saying that I only own 3 albums by them, so they are not me favourite artist.

The cover is iconic, and most music fans would recognise the cover even if they didn’t know the music.

Side one
1. "Speak to Me" – basically an intro to Breathe
2. "Breathe" – I used to chill to this track after a long day, takes me right back 8/10
3. "On the Run" – Lots of electronica going on here, plus some weird noises 7/10
4. "Time" (includes "Breathe (Reprise)" – wow, that alarm clock wakes you up, doesn’t get much better than this for music that was out at that time, way ahead of the competition 9/10
5. "The Great Gig in the Sky" – Powerful track that grabs you by the throat 9/10

Side two
1. "Money" – Very recognisable track from the cash registers about money, what else 10/10
2. "Us and Them" – This is my favourite track on the album, superb 10/10
3. "Any Colour You Like" – There’s a lot going on here, a very complicated track 7/10
4. "Brain Damage" – The lunatics are on the grass, sums up what this song is about, “I’ll see you on the dark side of the moon” 9/10
5. "Eclipse" – a great song to finish a great album 9/10

9/10 for me

[vastar iner]

Jul 19, 2014 22:43:36 GMT 1 smokeyb said:

I remember reading some time ago that they met in Nick Mason’s kitchen to compile a shortlist of things that bothered them. Those pressures were....time, money, madness, death. I guess that is what the album is basically about.

They were thinking big then. I'd've put down trying to change the headlight bulb on my car.