WISH YOU WERE HERE

In 1975, punks cried their hate against Prog Giants and the biggest bands such as Yes Genesis ELP and King Crimson had inside tensions or stopped music for while. Only, Van Der Graaf Generator with "Godbluff", Camel with "The snow Goose" and especially Pink Floyd with "Wish you were here" suceeded in having success. After the big success of their timelles masterpiece "Dark side of the moon" bands members had difficulties to do something according to Waters. But "Wish ..." was a bright continuity. The album begins with "Shine on you crazy diamond" (looked as Floyd masterpiece) with sounds fingers on glasses. Over this sound comes a Synthetisor solo played by Wright which contains dreamy moods and quite sad emotions. Then comes Gilmour bluesy guitar solo which shows IMO Syd Barrett world and feelings. Part II begins with a slow four-notes-riff which is the most melodic ever. Then comes the Waters Mason rythm section during Gilmour and Wright spacy dialogue, the best dialogue between a guitarist and a keyboardist, during Part II and III. The vocals come only in part IV with Waters sweet voice and bright chorus harmony with Gilmour and Wright. Waters also shows as a songwriter his affection to Syd Barrett who is the theme of the song and maybe of the album. Then Dick Parry closes the part V with saxophones solos. "Welcome to the machine" begins with mechanical sounds and then comes the EMS VSC3 a synth hugely used by Wright. Then comes Gilmour's 12 strings guitars and tourmented vocals with Mason electronic percussions and Waters acid poetry about music buisiness. Each verse are seperated by Wright's Moog solos which shows lot of emotion and bitterness. This song can be seen as the kind of thing which happens to Syd. Then "Have a cigar" is a ironic song about music buisiness too in the same way of "Money" but less funky. This is sung by a friend of the band: Roy Harper who shows lot of irony. The song is dominated by a bright keyboard riff. The end is ponctuated by a long and impressive Gilmour's solo and a siound effect which made the sound like the one of an old radio. It's the bridge to the title track. "Wish you were here" begins with 12 strings guitars arpegio and then a kind accoustic guitar solo. Then Gilmour starts his emotive vocals soon joined by the whole band. After two verses Gilmour plays another guitar solo. The last verse is in my opinion maybe the most emotional ever ("two lost souls swimming in a fish bowl") and seem to beabout Syd. The song finished with wordless vocal harmony, guitar and moog solos and a wind effect which is a bridge between the final track. The last part of "Shine on" begins with a mystic Wright's synthetisor solo. Then comes the Gilmour's crazy slide guitar solo until the end of part VI. Then comes vocals as bright as in the first part. Then part VIII is the funkiest and jazziest part of the song with good bassline and tortuous Gilmour guitar. The song closes with part IX with maybe the longest Wright's spacy keyboards solo wich is really emotional and shows kindness to Syd. It's bright and closes magnificiently the album. This album was sold over 10 millions of copy around the world and so have a simillar success than "The Dark Side of The Moon". Marillion's Steve Rothery (who sounds a little like Gilmour) says "Wish you were here" "was a major influence". I think it's also inspired Camel's "Moonmadness", Supertramp's "Even in the quiet moments" and Alan Parsons' "I Robot". A splendid album as good as the mythic previous