THE WALL

Roger Waters' The Wall is a great concept album which, musically, is faultless. However there are certain aspects of this album which make it hard for me to class it as 5 star Prog masterpiece. The main one being that I think of this album as a commercially friendly rock opera, rather than a prog classic.

The album tells the story of some guy named Pink who battles with a metaphorical wall, or something like that. The album flows well and there many great songs, (even radio friendly), but it lacks that true prog element. Because most of the song structures aren't incredibly progressive they struggle to remain interesting after many listens. They're still very enjoyable, just not interesting. Albums like Wish You Were Here or even Atom Heart Mother would remain more interesting than The Wall after repeated listens.

Highlights are Young Lust, Goodbye Blue Sky, Hey You, Comfortably Numb, Waiting For The Worms, and the drama-filled The Trial. Is There Anybody Out There is interesting being that it brings back that guitar effect used in Echoes (I think that's what it is). I also liked the secret message in Empty Spaces.

Overall you cannot say this is a bad album, but if you think this commercial, less proggy album is injustice toward the band that used to be Pink Floyd, I don't blame you. The album spawned a movie along with it's larger audience and success, but I suggest avoiding it. It's weird, confusing and didn't make me enjoy the music any more than I did.