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Pink Floyd

Joe Hutch

Joe Hutch

Mate of the bloke
Now and then I slag off post-Barrett Floyd. Until last night, this was more-or-less a prejudice thing, in the same way that I slag off reality TV despite never watching it.

However, last night I tuned into the closing five minutes of Johnny Walker's R2programme, and caught some noodling tune that was naggingly familiar but which I couldn't precisely identify. At first I thought 'Spiritualised, floating in gubbins' or such, but no, it wasn't that. The thing went on and one, ethereal voices warbling over a basic two-note tune. I thought it would never finish, but reached that point at which I *had* to find out who the perpetrators were. Finally it stopped, and Walker intoned in a respectful voice: 'Pink Floyd: Us and Them'.

So now my anti-Floyd rants are informed critical judgments rather than pure prejudice.
 
Don't be some open minded: musical prejudice is a wonderful thing: )

Kevin
 
For me, us and them era Floyd is the Wall I could never get past. Up to Dark side.. GOOD, after BAD, with the odd flourish that had some merit.

In the seventies I worked on the premise that if it was popular then you need to be suspicious. It stood me in good stead and it’s still a bad or good habit of mine, I can’t decide. There was a lot of very worrying ‘music’ around in those days. Songs about yellow ribbons and saving kisses for me euggh. I suspect there is now; I just rarely get exposed to it. If you are not sure come back later and have another look (or listen).

I used to work with someone who was a total James Last nut, he would buy every record he made and he made many, many records. If that wasn’t enough, he would pay lots of money to see him live. I didn’t understand, but it made him happy. I still don’t dig James Last but I am sure he has some merits to some people.

Martin, a highly prejudiced member of PFM who once thought all country music was country and western until I had my eyes and ears opened.
 
Floyd did three things, all worth hearing:

Psychedelia: 60s Columbia 7” singles and Piper At The Gates Of Dawn.

Space-Rock: Saucerfull Of Secrets, More, the live sides of Ummagumma and Echoes from Meddle.

Prog-Rock: Dark Side Of The Moon, Wish You Were Here.

That’s it, job done. Nothing else to see here. The rest is just a remarkably tedious self indulgent dilution of the prog period. A real shame as it all devalues the former. A plane crash in 1975 would have ensured lasting credibility.

Tony.
 
And maybe, just maybe, you could stretch Tony's list to include Animals -- though I agree that the ****ery and pretense increases geometrically from that point on.

Joe
 
If you ask me, Tony's list is far too long. Stopping at stage one (Psychedelia) is the best policy :)

-- Ian
 
sideshowbob said:
If you ask me, Tony's list is far too long. Stopping at stage one (Psychedelia) is the best policy :)
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Well, quite. Similar principles applies with Fleetwod Mac; if it ain't got Peter Green on it, avoid. (Though 'Kiln House' has some amusing pastiches and could thus be seen as a prototype HMHB venture).
 
And maybe, just maybe, you could stretch Tony's list to include Animals -- though I agree that the ****ery and pretense increases geometrically from that point on.
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Have you ever listened to the lyrics? Utter sixth form bollocks. Definitely not on the list!

Tony.
 
Tony,

Have you ever listened to the lyrics? Utter sixth form bollocks. Definitely not on the list!
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Not sure what you mean. Animals has pigs, horses and cows. Surely you can't go wrong with songs about farm animals.

Joe
 
Joe Hutch said:
Well, quite. Similar principles applies with Fleetwod Mac; if it ain't got Peter Green on it, avoid. (Though 'Kiln House' has some amusing pastiches and could thus be seen as a prototype HMHB venture).
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One of my guilty pleasures is "Tusk" which I think is a fine record.

re Pink Floyd: for me, dull and bland after the live stuff on Ummagumma. Mind you, did hear "Shine on You Crazy Diamond" as I walked down a hillside
towards a taverna in Mykanos, Greece in April 1979, the day Thatcher came into power. Crap song but brings back great memories of my late teens, sleeping on beaches, drinking cheap Retsina. Be great to go back through life and provide a better soundtrack to some key moments.

Kevin
 
You just have to think of Fleetwood Mac as (at least) three different groups.

Middle period Fleetwood Mac (the one with Bob Welch and Christine McVie doing the writing) is very good (though the production is rather weedy and does them no favours) and beats into an embarrassingly sticky pulp the cod-Chicago blues of Jeremy Spencer on any musical level other than the sixth-form common room.

And Fleetwood Mac and Rumours are two of the finest pop records ever made.

As for PF, I still like most of what precedes The Wall. I tried hard to like The Wall Animals and the Final Cut but they're all desperately dull.
 
Masterly restraint, Mike!

Just out of interest, how would you order The Works? I think I too largely agree with Tony's masterly evaluation, except that Wish You Were Here has never done it for me, whereas Atom Heart Mother and Obscured by Clouds have, flawed though I can see they may be. The studio disc of Ummagumma similarly has a strong claim on my adolescence. Logic doesn't come into it, really. Nick - wot you said about Fleetwood Mac [I just don't want to have to listen to them ever again].

palp
 
I think I too largely agree with Tony's masterly evaluation, except that Wish You Were Here has never done it for me, whereas Atom Heart Mother and Obscured by Clouds have, flawed though I can see they may be.
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I’ve actually got everything by Floyd up to and (sadly) including Animals, so I do have both those albums. I remember Atom Heart Mother as being a remarkably silly album in a very good sleeve – some kind of inappropriate brass band on side one and most of side two being some totally lame-assed attempt at The Beatles Revolution Number 9. IIRC Atom Heart Mother was a Ron Geesin collaboration, though nowhere near as funny as Roger Water’s 1970 offering ‘Music From The Body’, an album at least partially saved by a load of fart gags.

Obscured By Clouds: I recall playing it in the 70s and I even dug it out for a spin a year or two ago. I can remember absolutely nothing about it, it is an album totally and utterly devoid of memorable features - it creates no reaction whatsoever, nothing positive, nothing negative. I simply do not understand what this record is for.

Tony.
 
btw, I get by with three PF albums - Meddle (fave), WYWH, and DSOTM. Oh, and one Gilmour album (the eponymous one), and one Waters album (Amused to Death, which I listen to for the Jeff Beck bits, over and over). That's it.
 
Wasn't it a soundtrack for a French hippie movie? Maybe that's the explanation.
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Yes it was, I’d forgotten about that, though Obscured By Clouds doesn’t sound like a soundtrack album at all. IIRC it’s got 4 or 5 conventional songs a side. Conversely the earlier More is very much a soundtrack album having lots of short form snippets and reoccurring themes, yet despite this it is one of Floyd’s very best albums IMHO.

Tony.
 
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