WISH YOU WERE HERE

After the release of "The dark side of the Moon", the following album had to be amazing too.

Some people don't know that between "The dark side of the Moon" and "Wish you were here" Pink Floyd was working on an album that never came to see the light but some of its leftovers became the bases to compose the "Wish you were here" and "Animals" albums. The unreleased album was supposed to be called "Household objects", so glad it didn't happen, because "Wish you were here" would have never existed that way. The album consists of five songs, two on the A-side and three on the B-side. The cover is well-recognized worldwide, maybe not so much as the Dark side's cover, but it is.

1.- Shine on you crazy diamond, parts I-V (13:32): The song starts with an organ note which starts to elevate the volume while some sparkly notes begin to "float" around, then David Gilmour's guitar starts to cry beautifully and in the minute 8 Nick Mason's drums begin to punch. The lyrics were dedicated to Syd Barrett. At the end of the song, Dick Parry's sax appears and gives an amazing closure. The breeze starts again until the song disappears slowly into the sounds of a machine. This is probably my favorite song of all Pink Floyd's discography.

2.- Welcome to the machine (07:33): The second song of the album begins with the remains of the first one: a 7-minute piece with less presence of the guitar solos but with a nice rhythm that tends to be kind of dark (not as much as the songs on Pink Floyd's early albums, but more than the rest of the album).

3.- Have a cigar (05:24): The B-side starts with a more rocky song, in which, as a special guest, the main singer is British Folk-Rock musician Roy Harper; this is almost a Hard Rock song which ends with an elegant touch of people switching radio stations until the acoustic intro of the next song starts.

4.- Wish you were here (05:16): Probably the most famous song of the album, there is not too much to say about "Wish you were here" which hasn't been said already, so I'd only say that is a beautiful and emotional mainly acoustic song.

5.- Shine on you crazy diamond, parts VI-IX (12:29): The album finishes with the conclusion of "Shine on you crazy diamond". The last part is pretty different: it ends with a majestic organ solo by Rick Wright.

Some people don't like Pink Floyd and that's okay, but it is undeniable that some of their works made important changes in music's history and they continue to be a major influence for several artists around the world. Masterpieces in their discography as "Wish you were here" are an obvious reason for that.

SONG RATING: Shine on you, crazy diamond I-V, 5 Welcome to the machine, 5 Have a cigar, 5 Wish you were here, 5 Shine on you, crazy diamond VI-IX, 5

AVERAGE: 5

PERCENTAGE: 100

ALBUM RATING: 5 stars

I ranked this album #14 on my TOP 100 favorite Progressive Rock albums of all time.

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