RELICS

An early compendium of singles, B-sides and lesser-known album tracks, with a fair share between Pink Floyd's three principle songwriters (Barrett, Wright and of course, Waters).

Relics has a nice flow to it despite the chronological gaps between the songs; they must be well chosen. Certainly, the inclusion of 'Arnold Layne' and 'See Emily Play' is beneficial as they are unavailable on any normal studio release. The same goes for most of the tracks actually. And although these songs vary in style somewhat, the fit together almost like an album proper, a song cycle indeed!

I enjoy Wright's quirky 'Paintbox', and the studio verison of 'Careful with that Axe, Eugene' is cool to have, even though the Ummugumma take is probably better. But the real gem here is Waters' cool and bluesy 'Biding My Time', which has uncharacteristically clean production, plenty of horns and a killer guitar solo. How this workout didn't end up on Meddle I don't know. Although I haven't heard the More soundtrack yet, I think the two songs from it are probably the weakest on this album, but they may very well be the best the film soundtrack had to offer! In any case, Relics is mostly good and, being a compliation, is naturally devoid of filler-material.

A good purchase if you own the majority of the Floyd's discography and are looking to go further. A bad purchase if you don't like the Barrett-Gimour-crossover era, because that's the focus. Perhaps more work has gone into the album cover than the song selection.....