INSIDE PINK FLOYD

This is one out of many "Critical Review / Inside" DVD collection. What is different here is that the members of the band do take part and provide interviews about their work their interaction. I believe that those hints are a definite plus to this particular document.

A long episode (almost 13 minutes) is dedicated to their debut album: "Piper". Some fine documents can be seen as the promotional video for "Arnold Lane" and some shots of "Let's All Make Love In London" with shots from "Interstellar Overdrive".

I also picked up one funny quote from Roger: "I was demoted from lead guitar to rhythm guitar and finally bass. There was always this frightful fear I could end up as the drummer"!

There are also three members from "Mostly Autumn" who are being interviewed. While Heather Findley and Bryan Josh are talking about the band, the influences and the music in general; Ian Jennings (their keyboards player) has a more technical angle which is one of the less interesting aspect of this collection (in general).

The images used to illustrate "See Emily Play" were shot in Brussels in 67 by the Belgian television. I once saw the whole stuff (about twenty minutes of play back in the surroundings of the Atomium). This long section about "ASOS" (over eleven minutes) is mostly dedicated to Syd and the growing problems that the band was experiencing with him (till his replacement by David).

After a short interlude about "More", the stress is mainly put on the live record from "Ummagumma" and the importance of their live sets. Another quote from Roger about it: "Ummagumma, yeah. What a disaster!"?(five minutes are spent on this double album).

About "Atom Heart Mother", the interview of Nick shows how difficult is was to record this album with the orchestra and I quote again Roger "I wouldn't dream of performing anything that embarrassing?I'm not playing that rubbish." What's valuable here are some footage of the track being played by the band only in a live representation. David's view about the album is the following: "ATM now strikes me as absolute crap". This chapter lasts for about eight minutes. 41

I particularly like the sequence about "Meddle" for several reasons: first, it was my first Floyd album that I purchased (back in 71) and second two of my fave tracks are featured (I guess that I don't need to tell you which ones, right)? David is more enthusiast about "Echoes" than previous songs from the band. He said: "At the end of Echoes is this kind of guitar orchestra going on?I still think this is wonderful". I bet you it is!!! A mere six minutes for these two fabulous songs (none of the others from this album are covered). 47

The next part is the best known visually since it uses footage from "Live At Pompei" namely "ASOS", "One Of These Days", "Echoes". The problem at this stage is that the length of the sequences are shorter and shorter. Only three minutes for this huge "live" album (and two for "Obscured by Clouds").

This DVD ends up on their first masterpiece: DSOTM (ten minutes). Footage to illustrate this section are taken from a Dutch TV programme broadcasted in 1989 and offer little interest therefore. I like the interview form David who says: "With DSOTM we were moving in a quite different league". Nick, on the contrary, says : "It's easy to see DSOTM as a turning point now, but we just considered it was just the next album we were working on".

Clare Tory's opinion about the superb "Great Gig In The Sky" is also of value. She had basically no clue at all before the recording of what was expected from her, nor did the band. "It was just an experiment". But a great one!

My version is the second issue and holds some 62 minutes of footage plus a seventeen minutes version of "Echoes" played live by "Mostly Autumn". A nice bonus should I say.

In all, this document is informative for the casual fan; not too much for the Floyd maniac. Three stars.