ANIMALS

Sullen even by their standards, "Animals" is a dark, brooding, intractable slab of an album. Using GEORGE ORWELL's "Animal Farm" as a launching point, ROGER WATERS attacks complacency toward the status quo as a breeding ground for submission. The songs are diatribes against humanity, bookended by a pair of acoustic interludes that feign sweetness. Obviously, not everyone is enamored of Waters' long, nasty lecture against life; some found the numbing sameness a concession to waning creativity, others a relentless dressing-down at once mesmerizing and powerful. (For the record, I fall into column B.) If "Animals" finds itself shy of an arkful of musical ideas, guitarist DAVID GILMOUR steps in to fill the void with his poignant commentary. His leads are easily the album's most distinctive musical element, biting where the remaining instruments feel muted. In structure, it's not so different from "Wish You Were Here", but in sound the arrangements are stripped down to the lean muscle. "Animals" doesn't make any pretense of a positive spin; "Wish You Were Here" offered the chance of escape, "Animals" the option of ignorance. Unlike "The Final Cut", which was equally bleak, "Animals" is considered "classic" PINK FLOYD.

Those listeners in a meditative mood will find in this music a self-sustaining world where the air is not only breathable but pleasurable, albeit acrid. It's a heavy trip, but it's also intense in the best possible sense.