for uncovering this essay for uncovering this essay A Japanese CD release of The Dark Side Of The Moon several years ago contained the following essay:
With the current trend towards theatrical rock, the influence over other groups by Pink Floyd has never been seen to be greater; yet while other groups bring on stage lighting, dry ice, and employ tapes, it is worth noting that the Floyd instigated this approach as far back as 1967.
Their bassist Roger Waters recalls: "We did a concert at the Queen Elizabeth Hall in London called 'Games For May' when we did a lot of strange things, although it was much less controlled than it is now. But we even used a form of quadrophonic sound then. I think everyone in the group was into doing something different, and at that time we did some really lunatic things. I can remember spending quite a lot of time moving a bunch of flowers from vase to vase because I couldn't think of anything else to do at the time; I'd run out of potatoes to throw at the gong, and I thought that if I kept moving then nobody would take any notice of what I was playing."
"We always felt right from the beginning that there could be more to rock and roll than standing on stage playing Johnny B. Goode."
Waters had been stydying architecture at the Regent Street Poly in London when he met Syd Barrett who had come to London from Cambridge. Barrett was to play quite a large part in the development of the group before he left in 1968 to be replaced by another musician from Cambridge (the town not the university) Dave Gilmour.
Many British rock musicians have come from the art and architectural departments of our colleges and Waters thinks it is no accident: "You can't go to music school can you? Not unless mummy handcuffed you to the piano since you were three. You will also had to have a million grades of music. I think the sort of people who go to art schools are people who don't want to indulge in a career with a big C".
"Also art school is one of those situations where you have got time if you want it, and can get away with it. There's not so much to learn. You have to do more and learn less".
So Waters and friends spent their time putting together groups, learning other peoples tunes, mainly those of The Rolling Stones. The year was 1965 and already they were using the name of Pink Floyd. But they were becoming less content with just doing other peoples music, and in 1966 they broke into using mixed media for the first time at a gig down at Essex University where a paraplegic had been given a film camera and had made a film of London. The film was shown on a screen behind the Floyd as they played. In America, on the West Coast, this was an art-form that was interesting many groups at the time particularly Jefferson Airplane, and Floyd were beginning to hear about their work.
It was in the summer of 1966 that the Floyd really became known for the first time. It was the period of the 'underground', of audiences who had tired of being fed the top twenty and wanted more from their music. At the idiosyncratic venue of All Saints Hall, Powis Gardens, in West London, the Floyd provided what was wanted, and soon it was impossible to get into the hall when they were playing. Then that centre of the alternative music in London, UFO, opened in the equally unlikely surroundings of the Blarney Club in Tottenham Court Road. It was held each Friday night, and the Floyd were the major group resident there.
Even in 1966 the record market was still a 'singles' one so Floyd went into the studios and made the obligatory 45 r.p.m. disc, which would be unthinkable for such a group in 1973. The song was Arnold Layne, and it became a hit. They followed it up with an even bigger hit See Emily Play, and still shudder at the thought of appearing three times on Top of the Pops in 1967 in "nice satiny shirts".
Then came their first album recorded at EMI's Abbey Road studios on four-track: Piper At The Gates of Dawn. It was recorded at the same time as The Beatles were making Sergeant Pepper, and the Floyd can remember being silenced in awe as George Harrison and Ringo Starr came into their studio to see how they were getting along.
By now Floyd were beginning to think out their future the way they wanted it, and not the way the industry at the time demanded. For example, when they played ballrooms they refused to play their hit singles and as a result were often booed and pelted with beer cans.
With their next album, Saucerful of Secrets, their musical direction was to change, and the basis for their whole future formed. The change came with the title number. They had finished a side of shorter pieces and now they were allowed to do one longer piece. It was what they had wanted to do for some time. It also marked the permanent break between the group and Barrett, who only appears on certain tracks of that album.
Gilmour had joined up with Nick Mason, Rick Wright and Roger Waters. Now they had made a break-through they followed it up with Ummagumma in mid-1968, [actually 1969] an album which was half-live and half-studio recorded. Each of the group did half a side on their own.
In 1970 they appeared at an open air concert in Hyde Park using classical musicians and singers in the background, but it was the harnessing of electronics to their music which really interested them. Meddle followed but it is in their latest thematic work The Dark Side of the Moon that all their thoughts, both technical and musical are brought together.
Few who were at the Rainbow in February of 1972 will forget the stunning effect their performance had on the audience. Or perhaps that should read audiences, because Floyd appeared for four nights, and over 13,000 people bought tickets. When they started working on The Dark Side of the Moon they used their usual technique, as soon as they had a tune in their minds they put it down on the Revox. Then they went away, and came back and reworked what they had done. The album is a result of over a year's work, because they have been performing the work on stage around the world in the last 12 months.
Waters says of this process: "The result is that it has changed somewhat from what people will have heard on stage last year. The Rainbow concerts, and the following tour, was only the beginning of its life. It's not a bad record, although I say it myself."
On stage they used every piece of the L40,000 worth of equipment at their disposal, quadrophonic sound, lighting towers, dry ice, tapes. A combination mirrored by other groups without the same effect. Waters explains about the version on the album: "It's much more different to anything we've ever done before. Thematically it's much easier to understand. The ideas that we're attempting to put across aren't wrapped up in such a weird package."
In March the group go back to America and will once again perform Dark Side of the Moon, but it will be a slightly different version reflecting the album, where they use girl backing singers. Floyd have recently brought the girls over to London to rehearse. Waters explaining: "I don't know their names, but they have just spent three months rehearsing and three months on the road with Leon Russell. A bit different to two weeks rehearsing and three weeks on the road with us."
When they return they intend to plan, and write, an entirely new stage show and also interest themselves in another Floyd project: the provision in London of a permanent audio-visual show which would last basically an hour, and be programmed to their music. Waters says: "We hope to find a building for this. I've seen something similar done in Paris but not as we'd like to do it. The idea is that people would pay a few shillings and then get an hour of lights and effects. We could do stuff that would be impossible in concert or on record, such as using more speaker systems."
For me, Pink Floyd have always been in the fore-front. Recently they experimented with the use of ballet, working in concert with Roland Petit in Paris. They are always searching for new ways of putting over their music but whatever they do has to be an integral part of that music.
With The Dark Side of the Moon they are pushing their musical barriers in another directions once again.
[signed] Michael Wale
