MEDDLE

This is where Pink Floyd reached its maturity. "Meddle" is Pink Floyd's sixth studio album released in 1971, and, unlike their previous albums, this album shows real teamwork and shows a more mature and well-planned project in which the four members of the band were working more as a group than as four independent musicians. The sound of the album is fresh and original, filled with different rhythmic styles that go from Hard Rock to soft ballads, passing through blues and, of course, a lot of Psychedelic and Spacey Rock as the main plate.

The album consists of six songs, five on the first side and a 23-minute opus called "Echoes" that closes the album and has become one of the most important and recognized songs in Pink Floyd's catalog. The album is considered by lots of people (as well as well-known websites, magazines, etc.) as one of the best Progressive Rock albums ever released, and I couldn't agree more.

1.- One of these days (05:58): The first track of the album starts in silence, then the sound of a strong breeze and then one note of bass starts to play faster every time, next thing is the organ playing one note once in a while, later the guitar appears incorporating itself to the song with a stingy solo, later the drums with some isolated punches and finally the instrument of the human voice saying just one line: "One of these days, I'm going to cut you into little pieces" and that's the moment when the music explodes like a volcano and the song reaches its climax just to go back to the breeze as the beginning, next thing you know, you're hearing an acoustic guitar starting the next song.

2.- A pillow of winds (05:11): The song is really soft, only acoustic guitar with some basic percussions and the voice of David Gilmour as the only singer. This beautiful soft ballad makes an interesting change of tone after the hard rock song that started the album.

3.- Fearless (06:09): The longest song on the A-side of the album is what we could call a softly played rock, it has drums and electric guitar which gives it the rocky style but still is very nice and enjoyable to listen to with a not too high volume. As a nice personal anecdote: this song was one of the most emotional moments when I had the opportunity to see Roger Waters playing it live in Mexico City, 2016.

4.- San Tropez (03:43): This is a jazzy tune in the same mood as "Fearless": nice and not too hard rock music, quite enjoyable with a barbecue under a sunny sky. The song contains one of the most relaxing jazzy piano lines played by Richard Wright. Absolutely gorgeous

5.- Seamus (02:16): A song that I like but I really think it shouldn't be in this album, it is a Blues song with harmonica and slide guitar, it's not a bad song, it's just that doesn't fit with the rest of the album, I believe a better option to fill this space would have been the single "Biding my time" however, it's still a very nice song.

6.- Echoes (23:31): The song that consolidates "Meddle" as an essential masterpiece, structured in three recognizable parts (the sung start, the instrumental jamming section, and the coda). This song shows the maturity of Pink Floyd as a band that says that they finally found their sound and the way they would follow on their following albums. An absolute classic

It's undeniable that Pink Floyd was (and still is) one of the most influential bands in the history of progressive and classic rock, they made remarkable masterpieces of rock and this was the first one. Bravo!!

SONG RATING: One of these days, 5 A pillow of winds, 5 Fearless, 5 San Tropez, 5 Seamus, 4 Echoes, 5

AVERAGE: 4.83

PERCENTAGE: 96.67

ALBUM RATING: 5 stars

I ranked this album #43 on my TOP 100 favorite Progressive Rock Albums of all time.

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