THE DARK SIDE OF THE MOON

Did you know that a blues rock group named Medicine Head released an album in 1972 with the same exact title? Because of this Pink Floyd briefly changed the name of this album to Eclipse. The Medicine Head album turned out to be a commercial flop so they decided to keep the title after all. I'm glad they did cuz it has a better ring to it :-P

Did the planets ever align perfectly for PINK FLOYD in 1973. This masterpiece delivered the perfect mix of ideas that the band had explored over the years making this an almost unanimously loved album by possibly the widest spectrum of music lovers on the planet. The music is accessible enough for anyone to understand and yet complex enough to satisfy even hardened proggers and that means that this album even today is a kind of coming of age album where kids of all ages are still blown away by its inventiveness. I have always seen this album as the perfect gateway into the greater prog universe.

DARK SIDE is so successful that it is the 2nd best selling album of all time. It remained on the charts for 741 weeks from 1973 to 1988 with an estimated 50 million copies sold! Countless lawsuits have been filed claiming creative collaborations with this enterprise and some have been successful but that soap opera is far removed from the music itself.

After years of what the group has called 'psychedelic noodling' on their previous albums they decided upon a concept with a unified theme. Syd Barrett may have only been in the group long enough to record one album before he basically lost his mind yet he provided inspiration in the form of mental illness while other themes include conflict, greed and paranoia.

DARK SIDE is both reflective and cutting edge. PINK FLOYD utilized the most advanced technology of the time and incorporated metronomic sound effects, tape loops, cross-fades of elements from other parts of the album, backward piano playing and 7-beat effects loop just to name a few. Despite all this hi-tech innovation the album has a warm soulful side. Richard Wright and David Gilmour proved their abilities to harmonize and the soulful studio diva Clare Torry delivered some of the most brilliant wordless vocalizations ever laid down on tape. And if that wasn't enough the music transitions from track to track in one stream of consciousness never breaking the spell throughout its entirety.

My absolute favorite way i've ever heard this album is when I saw it accompanied by a laserlight show on an astronomy dome. Very appropriate don't ya think?

PINK FLOYD - THE DARK SIDE OF THE MOON = 5 stars