THE PIPER AT THE GATES OF DAWN

This is The Piper At The Gates Of Dawn, Pink Floyd's debut album. Most of the songs are composed by Syd Barett, who is often discribed as a genius by the other members of Pink Floyd and fans. Syd suffered from overdoses of drugs, mainly LSD, and was unable to play live. After contributing only one song on their second album, A Saucerful Of Secrets, the Pink Floyd story was over for Syd. Syd's style is very different from post-Syd Pink Floyd, the songs are no lengthy instrumentals, or powerful structured epics. In fact, Syd's compositions are very 60's, which means they include fairly simple chord patterns and not very complex structures.

The album has several ups and downs, the first song "Astronomy Domine" is a very big "up", the song has very powerful guitar playing and a very lovely solo, one of the most trippy songs Pink Floyd has ever made. The second song is a fun one too, "Lucifer Sam" has a growling guitar riff and a catchy chorus, the song is not much more than a fun song though. Next is "Mathilda Mother", a pretty mellow one, much smoother than the previous two, the song has a very egyptian style verse and a pretty short organ solo. Mathilda Mother is just as Lucifer Sam not a very memorable one, though it is a fun song. After Mathilda Mother we get "Flaming", which is just as Mathilda Mother kind of mellow, the organ in this song is fantastic, I think. This song does have something special the previous two songs lack, I can enjoy this one much more than those.

The next song is a weird one "Pow R. Toc H.", the intro makes me smile every time, the intro proves Syd Barett's experimental abilities. The fun intro segues into a very jazzy middle part, nice piano playing by Richard Wright with Syd's experimental sounds on the background. The next song "Take Up Thy Stethoscope And Walk" is a composition by Roger Waters, though it does sound a bit like some of Syd's compositions, it is more guitar and organ driven though. I've heard some pretty negative things about this song, but I think it is a pretty good song. "Interstellar Overdrive" is the lengthiest song on the album, lasting over nine minutes. It starts out with a catchy guitar riff and segues into a very lengthy jam, I can enjoy this jam, but I think it lasts a little bit too long, one of the highlights of the album though.

Next is "The Gnome", probably my least favorite of the album, Syd sing some of the lyrics in a pretty fun way, but the song just can't keep me intrested, even though it's only two minutes in length. "Chapter 24" is a decent song, it is in the same style as Flaming, but it's more vocal driven and is not as good as Flaming. Next is "Scarecrow", which I think is a very nice one, it has a sort of medieval feeling to it, I also like Syd's singing on this song pretty much. The final song on this album is "Bike", one of the happiest song I know, not neccecarily, but it's a very fun one.

The Piper At The Gates Of Dawn is a one of a kind album, Syd's fate is very unfortunate, but I think if he would lead the band further on Pink Floyd wouldn't be as great as they would be. I rate the album three stars cause it's not bad at all but has only a few great songs, most of them are only decent.