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I've never been convinced by the Oz theory - there are a couple of moments of synchronicity but that's purely co-incidence and could happen with practically any album and any piece of film if you time it right.

My first experience of Dark Side of the Moon was watching Floyd play it at the Wembley Empire Pool in October 1972 with my girlfriend Susan and my best mate Mike.

On the day the album was released I rushed to the local record store just as it opened for the morning, the owner hadn't un-boxed the day's deliveries yet but on noticing my impatience allowed me to unpack boxes to get my paws on the record for the first time. I handed over my £2.50 and left the shop a very happy boy.

Everything about the album blew me away, the music, the songs, the concept, the sound effects, the playing, the cover, the posters, the stickers... from removing cellophane wrapper (carefully keeping the circular sticker intact) to the last heart-beat ... everything. It also brought me to the realisation that our family "music centre" wasn't good enough to fully appreciate the sonic marvels of this recording and set me off building a hi-fi of my own to play it on.

I even got my mum to knit me a DSotM woollen jacket:

Forty one years later the album is still fresh and vibrant to me, last week I bought the 40th anniversary re-issue of the vinyl and the buzz of removing the cellophane from that to access the disc, posters and stickers invoked a wave of nostalgia that I hadn't experienced before - memories of the concert in London, of the little record store in Bedford and of me convincing my mum that she could make the jacket without a pattern. I haven't actually played it yet - I'm waiting to complete the re-build of my 1973 turntable that I started a few months back so I can re-live the experience all over again.

I've always wondered, what happens when the album finishes? Do you turn it over and start again?

I know what you mean - it's probably a very nice piece of stained glass and no doubt that in real life it's a very wonderful thing to behold, but reproduced as a 120mm CD cover it's ... meh. Worse than that, it's not George Hardie's elegantly simple graphic, as are none of the other re-imaginings of the prism artwork that have appeared since. 

My heart sank when I first picked up the 40th anniversary 180gm vinyl because it has a dreary pointillism version of the graphic on the front:

 

Fortunately it's not the cover, it's loose under the shrink wrap and removing it reveals the original cover in all its glory. For reasons known only to EMI they printed it as a sticker, quite what you're supposed to stick it on is beyond me.

Guldbamsen wrote: Oh and I only have a stereo set-up, so I can't enjoy the 5.1 mix. Am I missing something? It sounds absolutely stunning coming out of my old school Dali speakers, which are made of granite if I'm not entirely mistaken. Damn those things are heavy.

I have the 30th anniversary 5.1 mix as well and not owning a surround sound system (and never wanted to own one) I've never heard it either.

I love Pink Floyd to bits but there are only so many times you can milk this fatted cow no matter how much you change the packaging. (Are you listening Mr Oldfield?). I did buy the Experience edition when it came out because the bonus disc featured a 1974 live recording from Wembley but without that the cash would have stayed in my wallet.

One "version" I do enjoy is the Tom Stoppard radio play Darkside as it couples my favourite album with a subject that has become my pet hate: philosophy. Here I like that it doesn't borrow from the original artwork.

Has anyone tried syncing any of the DSotM tribute albums to the Wiz of Oz? Apparently Dubside of the Moon works really well.

 

and yes, i've already heard about this Wizard of Oz stuff, and im probably not going along with this. also, the album itself made the peak told here because of the Pop Catalog Albums chart which has been around since 1991; it has been on that chart ever since that year actually. it reached #47 on the Billboard 200 in 2011 when the remastered version was released too.

Cool jacket!

Those posters hung on our bedroom walls for years, the stickers remained in the sleeve in order to keep them undamaged. I don't know if our original DSOTM copy still stays at some of my brother / sisters' homes (along the years many of our albums got lost by taking them to other homes in parties, lending them without enough control etc ), but if it does I'd bet the posters and stickers are still inside it.

http://www.billboard.com/charts/billboard-200?page=4" rel="nofollow - http://www.billboard.com/charts/billboard-200?page=4

go down the page until THAT shows up.

Spooky... it's #89 in the UK charts too... and it's spent 666 weeks on the UK chart... 

and idk how long it has been on the US charts (omg almighty xD)

Bought Wiz of Oz special edition on blu ray this week for the kids... I wonder if it syncs better with the album, In any case it gives me another excuse to hear the album again.

 

Nahhh ... I would rather go listen to "The Dark Side of the Goons"

looks like its back in the top 100 for now!!

http://www.billboard.com/charts/billboard-200?page=4" rel="nofollow - http://www.billboard.com/charts/billboard-200?page=4

but this time, it ain't alone:

http://www.billboard.com/charts/billboard-200?page=7" rel="nofollow - http://www.billboard.com/charts/billboard-200?page=7

http://www.billboard.com/charts/billboard-200?page=8" rel="nofollow - http://www.billboard.com/charts/billboard-200?page=8

I missed that the first time around.

 

I rarely play Floyd these days. DSOTM has been played to death and it just doesn't excite me anymore when I listen to it. Maybe if I ever come down with memory loss as I age it will seem new and fresh then.

 

This is off topic but you brought up song writing and I find it a bit odd that so many on the song lyric thread seem not to be interested in lyrics yet so many here seem to pride themselves in their witty remarks and over all intellectual prowess in music threads as well as off topic subjects. You'd think they would care about the words in the songs as well. At any rate it seems  strange to me.

What? 

I know comedian Adam Ray was impersonating Tony Danza for a video clip in which he said: "Have you ever played Dark Side of the Moon and Schindler's List at the same time? [sneers] I'm Tony Danza."

 

... and  http://www.progarchives.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?TID=99047&PID=5021118#5021118" rel="nofollow - http://www.progarchives.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?TID=99047&PID=5021118#5021118  ...

"That's all about words and language", witty remarks, "clever remarks and intellectualization" ... all vague notions. How do you incorporate any of it in a song, do you know? Here, on this forum, people more or less improvise with speech (err ... writing). But songwriting is truly something special and needs a lot of attention. There are high standards and rules of thumb. Our everyday speech/writing has a different set of those. And songwriting is clearly not just about words and language. The author of the song has to breath life into the words and sweeten the whole thing with ... music!

 

I get what you are saying but that wasn't really my point.

I just think it's odd that those who like reading, books, current events, etc, which are probably most of the people on PA , seem to care less about song lyrics.

Maybe it's just me.....

I don't care anything about lyrics and I've been a musician for 22 years and I wouldn't call myself a literary person either (not that I don't read of course).

Oh well, here goes nothing...

pfft!

I read books, lots of books. I like novels, long novels, trilogies, double trilogies, whole series and serialisations.  I hardly read poetry at all but will read the occasional epic poem. However, I don't read short stories or novellas very much, they're not like a cup of espresso that delivers the full hit of coffee on a couple of sips, they're more like being served a short-measure and for that a little unfulfilling.

Removed of music and melody song lyrics seldom stand by themselves - those would be the poetry equivalent of a short story - thin on content and unsatisfying - if there is anything of interest in there to a wordsmith or someone who appreciates a well turned phrase it's easily consumed and digested. If it is deep and meaningful but buried in obscure references, metaphor or analogy then it has to be worth the effort of unravelling the puzzle to get to it. Those are the exception and are exceptional, but they are few and far between.

Yet Dark Side of the Moon's lyrics succeed where other's fail because it doesn't try too hard, Waters wrote the lyrics in plain terms using plain English that anyone and everyone could understand without dumbing them down or using trite cliché. What little allegory he uses is confined to easily identified symbology and in the end tell us things we already knew, and he manages to do that without being preachy or condescending about it because (perhaps for the only time in his career) he treats us as intellectual equals. Waters even makes a point of telling us as much... we're only ordinary men. No one has to sit for hours analysing the lyric sheet to get the message, you can pick it up from simply listening to the songs as they are sung. 

That's how lyrics should be - they are an integral part of the song and are not meant to stand-alone to be picked and pawed over, deconstructed and analysed - we don't do that to the drum patterns or the bass lines, we don't pick-apart the chord progressions or measure the note-intervals in a solo in order to appreciate and understand the music.

  Couldn't agree more.

 

That guy never heard "Phaedra" or "Bodylove" (both of them!). Well at least one of them had Alex De Renzy!