Posts Tagged ‘Richard Wright’

PINK FLOYD – ” Grantchester Meadows “

Posted: September 27, 2016 in CLASSIC ALBUMS, MUSIC
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Ahead of the release of their much-anticipated box set The Early Years 1965 – 1972, Pink Floyd have shared a video for “Grantchester Meadows,” a fingerpicked ode to the English countryside as penned by Roger Waters for the 1969 album Ummagummaa. Pairing old performance footage with contemporary pastoral scenes, the picturesque visual is the definition of bucolic bliss, not to mention the most perfect start to a misty morning.

This special group performance, taped for the BBC, with acoustic guitars and vocals from Roger Waters and David Gilmour, plus additional piano from Richard Wright and taped songbirds, successfully evokes a summer’s day in Grantchester, a small village close to Cambridge, England. Grantchester’s famous former residents include the Edwardian poet Rupert Brooke, who moved there and subsequently wrote a poem of homesickness entitled ‘The Old Vicarage, Grantchester’. Taken from ‘The Early Years 1965 – 1972’.

The definitive Early Years box set, released 11th November 2016
27 DISC COLLECTION ON CD/DVD/BLU-RAY INCLUDES:

+ Many hours of rare and unreleased music & video
+ 14 Hours of video includes restored footage
+ original 4.0 Quad mixes / BBC sessions/live recordings
+ rare tracks including more than 20 previously unreleased
+ historic TV performances, live concerts and 3 feature films
+ Remixed 5.1 audio for ‘Live At Pompeii’ footage
+ collectable memorabilia
+100+ photos, most previously unseen
+ early singles + B sides on CD & vinyl

* 7 book-style packages, each with multiple discs. 6 are dedicated to a specific period and include related memorabilia and many unseen photos.

* Box bonus package includes collector’s audio and video. Box includes bonus larger replica memorabilia (posters, flyers, etc.) plus 5 x reissued replica 7″ singles, mastered from the original analogue tapes.

ALSO AVAILABLE ON 11TH NOVEMBER 2016:
+ 2-CD/Download/Streaming set – ‘The Early Years – CRE/ATION 1967-1972’

* The 6 year-specific packages will be made available in early 2017. The bonus package and larger memorabilia is exclusive to this box se

PINK FLOYD – ” Dark Side Of The Moon ” Released 43 Years Ago today 10th March1973

Posted: March 10, 2016 in CLASSIC ALBUMS, MUSIC
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Pink Floyd released their historic LP “Dark Side Of The Moon” on March 10th, 1973. It would go on to become the 3rd biggest album ever with over 45 millions sold to date.

In 2013, The Dark Side of the Moon was selected for preservation in the United States National Recording Registry by the Library of Congress for being deemed “culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant”.

It set new standards for recorded music. Happy 43rd Birthday to . It was the Pink Floyd’s eighth studio album The Dark Side of The Moon It remained in the US charts for 741 discontinuous weeks from 1973 to 1988, longer than any other album in history. With an estimated 45 million copies sold, it is Pink Floyd’s most commercially successful album and one of the best-selling albums worldwide.

No-one in March 1973 could have imagined that an album released in that month would still be thrilling listeners 43 years later, but it’s true.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VQiF76m6qHs

Pink Floyd, in conjunction with EMI, have undertaken an overhaul of their catalogue, and for the first time, allowed us to see part of their creative process, by compiling a 6-disc box set of ‘Dark Side’ including various multi-channel mixes, much memorabilia and restored screen films from their live show, but, most importantly, a newly-mixed live concert from 1974 and a disc of alternative versions and outtakes.

Generally regarded as Pink Floyd’s masterwork, the qualities of The Dark Side Of The Moon have perhaps been taken for granted in recent years, but a return to it with fresh ears reminds the listener of its strengths. Part of its enduring appeal is the quality of the material, there simply isn’t a bad track on it, with a listening experience greater even than the sum of the parts.

As to its subject matter, Roger Waters said in 2003 that it was “An expression of political, philosophical, humanitarian empathy that was desperate to get out.” He said it was about “all the pressures and difficulties and questions that crop up in one’s life and create anxiety, and the potential you have to solve them or choose the path that you?re going to walk.”

The band initially convened in December 1971 and January 1972 at Decca’s West Hampstead Studios in Broadhurst Gardens, London and then at a warehouse owned by The Rolling Stones at 47 Bermondsey Street, South London. One of the musical elements, to become “Us And Them”, already existed, having begun life as a rejected musical sequence by Richard Wright for Antonioni’s Zabriskie Point. Another, to become Brain Damage, was a piece of Roger Waters‘, created in the writing sessions of the Meddle album in January of that year.

In the pre-Internet age, it wasn’t too commercially suicidal to preview new material before its release, so Floyd were able to knock the album into shape over several months of road work. The first full-length performance was at the Guildhall in Portsmouth, England, on January 21st, 1972, after which almost the entire year was spent with the band performing Dark Side live, interspersed with visits to Abbey Road studios from May onwards to work on individual songs.

With Alan Parsons engineering, the first version of the Dark Side album was mixed in December 1972. On the box set, check out the first mix on CD 6 of The Dark Side Of The Moon, which is quite revealing about the gestation of the final version. Speak To Me as a track was a late addition, the album originally starting only with a backwards piano chord leading straight into Breathe (In The Air). The most obvious change is to The Great Gig In The Sky, which, before the addition of Clare Torry’s vocal performance in January 1973, was comprised mainly of Richard Wright’s organ accompanied by, in concert, taped religious incantations and in the first mix, voices of the Apollo 17 space mission. At the time, it was known as The Mortality Sequence or The Religious Sequence. It shows that all the band’s subsequent decisions on the album were creatively correct, including even the completely redone Travel Sequence, which was replaced by On The Run.

As much of a revelation as the newly-released material and the works in progress is the 1974 live album, compiled from performances at London’s Wembley Empire Pool in November 1974. As opposed to the then-live radio broadcast, mixed by the BBC in real time with an unflattering balance, this sourced the original multitrack tapes and, as mixed by Floyd engineers Andy Jackson and Damon Iddins, shows Floyd at the top of their game, rhythmic, swinging, emotive and punchy. If you can’t afford the box, it’s available as a 2-CD Experience edition alongside the remastered original album.

Perhaps you don’t need a reminder that the album is one of the biggest-selling albums of all time, but it’s not too late to rediscover it. I think you’ll agree that it’s also one of the best.

PINK FLOYD – ” Ummagumma ” Released 25th October 1969…. 46 Years Ago Today

Posted: October 25, 2015 in CLASSIC ALBUMS, MUSIC
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“The Narrow Way (Parts 1-3)”

Of anyone in the band, David Gilmour had the most trepidation about creating an individual experimental piece for the studio disc of Ummagumma. And he ended up with the best thing on the project. The three-part suite repurposes an existing tune for the rustic opener, but Gilmour’s guitar steamrolls through the middle portion before landing on a George Harrison-ish bit of space-twang for the climax.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b72I7TwsvBE&feature=youtu.be

The official video for ‘Careful With That Axe, Eugene’ by Pink Floyd recorded live in Brighton and originally released on the ‘Ummagumma’ album.

From 1969, Ummagumma was the band’s first double album and has one of their most iconic cover images. Ummagumma is an eclectic mix of both live and studio recordings.

Ummagumma

The album was re-mastered in 2011. Go to http://www.whypinkfloyd.com for more details.
UMMAGUMMA, the 1969 album from Pink Floyd celebrates its 46th anniversary today.
Using a unique concept, the first disc is a live album taken from their set list at the time and the second contains solo compositions by each band member. A double album by the English progressive rock band Pink Floyd. It was released on 25 October 1969, through Harvest Records. The artwork was designed by regular Floyd collaborators Hipgnosis and features a number of pictures of the band combined to give a Droste effect.

Although the album was well received at the time of release, and was a top five hit in the UK album charts, it has since been looked upon unfavourably by the band, who have expressed negative opinions about it in interviews. Nevertheless, the album has been reissued on CD several times, along with the rest of their catalogue.

Although the sleeve notes say that the live material was recorded in June 1969, the live album of Ummagumma was recorded live at Mothers Club, Erdington Birmingham on 27th April 1969 and the following week at Manchester College of Commerce on 2nd May of the same year as part of The Man and The Journey Tour. The band had also recorded a live version of “Interstellar Overdrive” (from The Piper at the Gates of Dawn) intended for placement on side one of the live album, and “The Embryo”, which was recorded in the studio before it was decided that the band members each come up with their own material.

The studio album came as a result of Richard Wright wanting to make “real music”, where each of the four group members (in order: Wright, Roger Waters, David Gilmour and Nick Mason) had half an LP side each to create a solo work without involvement from the others.Wright’s contribution, “Sysyphus”, was named after a character in Greek mythology, usually spelled “Sisyphus”, and contained a combination of various keyboards, including piano and mellotron. Although initially enthusiastic about making a solo contribution, Wright later described it as “pretentious”. Waters’ “Several Species of Small Furry Animals Gathered Together in a Cave and Grooving with a Pict” contained a variety of vocal and percussion effects treated at various speeds, both forwards and backwards, and was influenced by Ron Geesin, who would later collaborate with both Waters and Pink Floyd. Waters’ other contribution Grantchester Meadows was a more pastoral acoustic offering and was usually played as an opening to concerts over 1969. Gilmour has since stated he was apprehensive about creating a solo work, and admits he “went into a studio and started waffling about, tacking bits and pieces together”,although part one of “The Narrow Way” had already been performed as “Baby Blue Shuffle in D Major” in a BBC radio session in December 1968. Gilmour said he “just bullshitted” through the piece. He asked Waters to write some lyrics for his compositions, but he refused to do so. Mason’s “The Grand Vizier’s Garden Party” featured his then wife, Lindy, playing flute, and Mason playing a seven-minute drum solo

The cover artwork shows a Droste effect featuring the group, with a picture hanging on the wall showing the same scene, except that the band members have switched positions.The cover of the original LP varies between the British, American/Canadian and Australian releases. The British version has the album Gigi leaning against the wall immediately above the “Pink Floyd” letters. At a talk given at Borders bookstore in Cambridge on 1st November 2008, as part of the “City Wakes” project, Storm Thorgerson explained that the album was introduced as a red herring to provoke debate, and that it has no intended meaning. On most copies of American and Canadian editions, the Gigi cover is airbrushed to a plain white sleeve, apparently because of copyright concerns; however, the earliest American copies do show the Gigi cover, and it was restored for the American remastered CD edition. On the Australian edition, the Gigi cover is completely airbrushed, not even leaving a white square behind. The house used as the location for the front cover of the album is located in Great Shelford, near Cambridge.

On the rear cover, roadies Alan Styles (who also appears in “Alan’s Psychedelic Breakfast”) and Peter Watts were shown with the band’s equipment laid out on a runway at Biggin Hill Airport. This concept was proposed by Mason, with the intention of replicating the “exploded” drawings of military aircraft and their payloads, which were popular at the time.

Song titles on the back are laid out slightly differently in British vs. North American editions; the most important difference being the inclusion of subtitles for the four sections of “A Saucerful of Secrets”. These subtitles only appeared on American and Canadian editions of this album, but not on the British edition; nor did they appear on original pressings of A Saucerful of Secrets.

The inner gatefold art shows separate black-and-white photos of the band members. Gilmour is seen standing in front of the Elfin Oak. Original vinyl editions showed Waters with his first wife, Judy Trim, but she has been cropped out of the picture on most CD editions (with the original photo’s caption “Roger Waters (and Jude)” accordingly changed to just “Roger Waters”). The uncropped picture was restored for the album’s inclusion in the box set

Pink Floyd
David Gilmour – lead guitar, vocals, all instruments and vocals on “The Narrow Way”
Nick Mason – percussion, all instruments (except flutes) on “The Grand Vizier’s Garden Party”
Roger Waters – bass guitar, vocals, all instruments and vocals on “Grantchester Meadows” and all instruments on “Several Species of Small Furry Animals Gathered Together in a Cave and Grooving with a Pict”
Richard Wright – organ, keyboards, vocals, all instruments and vocals on “Sysyphus”

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