THE DARK SIDE OF THE MOON

I am sure that I will not find any revelations about Dark Side of the Moon as it is one of the biggest selling and most popular albums of all time. But there is a reason for that; it's incredible! I am very much at level 4 going into this, as I am sure most everyone who is seeing this is. Another point worth noting are the excerpts of various interviews that the band members led to various crew members and studio employees that are scattered over the various tracks of the album. Sometimes they are more prominent than others, but they contribute greatly to the atmosphere of the album. So even though it is probably completely unnecessary, here is my deep dive into the Dark Side of the Moon. FYI, I am listening to the 50th anniversary remastered version of the album from last year, just to see if I pick-up on anything I might have missed in the uncountable previous listenings to this album.

Track 1 - Speak to Me

Not so much a song as it is a collage of sound effects that fades in to start the album. Starting with a quiet heartbeat, it builds to an intense crescendo and leads into ?.

Track 2 - Breathe

The quintessential, mellow, Pink Floyd Groove. Nick Mason and Roger Waters set the groove for David Gilmour to play that slide guitar over. The vocals begin at around 1:20 in 2-part harmony from Gilmour & Waters. At 2 minutes in, Rick Wright gives us a nice organ glissando to start the second verse. A short, but unforgettable song. (We'll get another taste of it a bit later.) This leads directly to?.

Track 3 - On the Run

Fun synthesizer experimentation from Gilmour & Waters. For more technical information see the link to the song on the Wikipedia Page about the album.

It really tickles the brain, though. Lots of cool sound effects are used to give "Doppler Effects" and give the impression of a plane flying overhead.

Track 4 - Time

After the long fade out of On the Run merges into the beginning of Time. A sound collage of alarm clocks going off can be jarring. Then Waters creates the "Tick-Tock" sound by tapping the strings of his bass onto the pickups of the bass. Gilmour and Waters play low sustained notes while Wright adds texture on an electric piano. Over all of this is Nick Mason's famous roto-toms feature, which is bathed in reverb. The instrumental intro gives way to the song- proper at 2:28, being announced by tom-tom hits. Gilmour sings the lyrics that were penned by Waters in the verses, while Rick Wright sings on the bridges (he would not get another lead vocal feature until 21 years later on The Division Bell). This song can give one an existential crisis, if you're not careful! Starting at 3:30, Gilmour provides a signature, soaring guitar solo that is ever so tasty. The vocals return following the solo. I love the bluesy guitar fills between Gilmour's phrases, as well as the female backing vocals behind Wright in the bridges. As mentioned earlier, starting at 5:55 of the song, we have a reprise of Breathe, which functions as a coda for Time. The sustained notes at the end take us to?

Track 5 - The Great Gig in the Sky

Get the tissues ready! Wright plays a beautiful chord progression on the piano while Gilmour plays slide guitar. The bass & drums kick in, session vocalist Claire Torry gives one of the greatest wordless vocal performances of all time. (While initially paid a small session fee, she later sued, saying that her contribution warranted a writing credit, as she improvised the melody, and won an out of court settlement in 2005, giving her the writing credit and an undisclosed sum of money.) The sound that the band creates, with piano and organ, along with the rhythm section and guitar, along with Torry's exquisite vocals is simply sublime. The build to a wonderful crescendo. Then, at around 2:30, they bring the dynamic level down and give us a bit of a breather. The song continues to ease off until the ending. Simply beautiful. This concludes the original side 1 of the album and is really the only pause in sound on the album.

Track 6 - Money

To kick-off side two, we have a 7-4 sound collage of cash registers and coins. Waters comes in with the iconic 7-4 bass riff, which after a few repeats is doubled by Gilmour on guitar. Mason hits a drum accent, and we're off! Gilmour adds a vibrato-effected guitar and Wright plays accents on the electric piano while Gilmour sings. The sound effects return between verses. This is probably the most famous 7-4 song ever recorded. At 2:00 or so into the song, session saxophonist Dick Parry (who would return on Wish You Were Here, and later Pink Floyd tours and projects) plays a blistering solo. As I am listening, I am perfectly situated between left and right speakers and the panning of the various instruments gives added dimension (possibly thanks to the album's famous engineer Alan Parsons). At around 3 minutes in, we shift to 4-4 for Gilmour's guitar solo. Around 3:50 the dynamics drop down a bit and the solo continues. The level jumps back up at 4:20 and then Gilmour hits a stratospheric level high note. Pink Floyd are simply among the best at using dynamic levels to great effect. We return to 7-4 at 5:05 as the solo ends and the next verse begins. We shift back to 4-4 as we hit the coda and the song fades out, with some of the interview snippets previously mentioned. This song gives way to

Track 7 - Us and Them.

Wright's organ emerges from the fade-out of Money, then the band goes into another of their patented "mellow grooves". This one may be the most hypnotic one they ever did. Gilmour's arpeggio pattern and tone is simply mesmerizing. Dick Parry returns with a mellow sax tone this time, while Waters and Maso keep the pace under control. Gilmour begins singing at around 1:45 with lovely echoes on his words. Once again, Floyd's mastery of dynamic levels is put to good use as the chorus is much more powerful than the verses. Parry plays sax fills between vocal phrases on this verse. The choruses are so epic on this song, with a female vocal trio providing an extra dimension of sound as the music rises and falls. Starting around 4:45 Wright plays a simple luscious piano solo, followed by another sax solo from Parry. All-the while the lush rhythm bed continues. The sax-solo crescendos around the 6-minute mark, with the vocal trio in tow. My favorite lyrics of the song are sung starting at around 6:55: "With (echo), without (echo), and who'll deny, it's what the fighting's all about". The music builds for another chorus and then?.

Track 8 - Any Colour You Like

?begins. The band returns to a slightly faster version of the groove from Breathe (back at the beginning of our epic journey, remember?). This is essentially an instrumental bridge to connect us from Us & Them to Brain Damage. First, cascading synthesizer sounds are featured over the top of the groove. Then at 1:19, Gilmour enters with a biting guitar tone that is panned between the speakers on alternating notes. He seems to have recorded two solos, one for each ear. Waters has some nice bass fills as we go along. This song is closer to a loose jam than anything else on the album. However, at 3:12, they play a transitional bit that takes us to?

Track 9 - Brain Damage

?Which begins with a chimney, arpeggiated guitar part from Gilmour. Waters sings lead on the album, although Gilmour would sing it on later tours after Waters' departure from the band. Gilmour harmonizes with Water on parts of the verses. At 1:13, an organ swell initiates a crescendo, and the ladies return on backing vocals for the phrase containing the album's title. Mason plays a simple but effective set of tom-tom fills to bring us back to the verse. I like the laughing sound effect as Waters sings: "The lunatic is in my head" twice. The lyrics here reference a lobotomy, which was, sadly, common practice at the time to try to "cure" mentally ill people. The line "there's someone in my head, but it's not me" seems to be what happens following the lobotomy. At 2:32 the organ swells again and we are back to another chorus, with Mason playing the same type of drum fill, but this time we have a brief, forlorn synth solo that takes us to my favorite musical transition of all time, with 4 big tom-tom hits, into the song?

Track 10 - Eclipse

In fact, I think it should be illegal to play Brain Damage and Eclipse separately! ("It just ain't right! I tell you!") Those tom-toms lead to a moment of musical nirvana with glorious organ fills over a moderate 6-8 groove. Then Waters, with harmonies from Gilmour, Wright, and the female trio sings some of the greatest lyrics ever written over the next minute and fifteen seconds. There is a slow steady crescendo throughout the track. The overall effect is spine- tingling. As the song fades out the heartbeat from the start of the album returns and a barely audible voice says: "There is no dark side of the moon, really. In fact, it's all dark". At around 1:35.

OVERALL IMPRESSIONS:

As I said in the introduction, there is a reason this album is one of the most popular albums of all time. It's simply, in a word, perfect. So, then you may ask, especially if you read my review of Wish You Were Here a few albums back at number 7 on the countdown [Prog Magazine's 100 Greatest Prog Albums of All Time], why is it not your favorite Pink Floyd album? It's really just a preference, as I like the expanded form of Shine on You Crazy Diamond even better. They are both perfect albums. As we are reaching the pinnacle of this countdown, there have been a few others I have bestowed that honor on along the way; and I know there will be at least one more, possibly two. These albums near the top aren't here by accident. (Although, there are some others lower on the list that I think deserve to be much higher than they are, and I have said so in my reviews.) So yeah, obviously, Dark Side gets 5 out of 5 stars!