OBSCURED BY CLOUDS

Pity that Floyd never took commisions again. Might have brought a little more joy to their apparently cumbersome creative processes. You know what ? This is actually a whole album of single-hits. That cannot be said about other Floyd-albums of that period. I am one of those who - in those days - provided myself with Dark Side of the Moon on day of release, to go home and say "aaargh saxsolo negative naive schizopomp who do they think they are kidding ?". Apparently everyone else. But this is the basic reason why I hold this - the follow-up record in high esteem. It restituted a favourite band in my eyes. Back to "More", back to the "hey, what are we gonna mess around with today" innovative band trying to handle being hailed as the "new Beatles". "Dark Side .." was no victory, but a surrender. Of course the bleak shadow from "Dark Side ..." never disappeared again from Floyd, and is also present on "Obscured by Clouds", but it is not an insisting concept to the record. Pink Floyd was a band who was at their best when they hardly knew what to do. And this slight prolonging of the divinely fumbling More-Meddle-period of five-star-records was more than welcome.