MEDDLE

I always seen "Meddle" as a transitional album, PINK FLOYD had already abandoned the most radical ideas of Syd Barrett and the four guys were giving their first steps towards the classic sound of "Dark Side of the Moon", "Wish You Were Here" and "Animals", but still they carried in their backs a strong Psychedelic inheritance that they would never leave totally behind.

This makes of "Meddle" a very eclectic album not fully Prog, Psyche or Rock, but with elements of the three genres blended with taste by Waters and Gilmour working as friends and peers. I don't believe it's as outstanding as most of the people believes, but already a very good album that leads from the trippy Psyche years to the mature Prog era.

"One of this days" opens the album in a superb way, after some wind noises, Roger Waters bass announces a frenetic song while blending, the excellent organ performance by Rick Wright. After some seconds with the bass hammering on our brains and a powerful drumming by Nick Mason, is David Gilmour who takes the lead with his distorted guitar, and then...the sonic explosion, the band hits us with everything they got,playing some sort of Psychedelia and early Space Rock, one of the best tracks by PINK FLOYD, and the highest point of the album in my opinion.

"A Pillow of Winds" marks a radical change, soft mellow and atmospheric but I believe too repetitive and gets a bit boring by the end; unlike the Beatlesque "Fearless", in which the powerful guitar work by David Gilmour is simply spectacular, and at the end the chants of the Liverpool fans (You'll Never Walk Alone) that blend perfectly with the music of Pink Floyd, another good moment.

But "Meddle" has also some weak moments and "San Tropez" is the weakest of all, the band takes the influence of the Beatles and creates a lame track with absolutely no interest, if the opener was average, "San Tropez" is one of the worst tracks of PINK FLOYD.

"Seamus" is a good chance to press the skip button, I believe they required a couple minutes to complete the album and added a rejected track they had in their portfolio, but at least we know that after this comes "Echoes"

After a weird intro, "Echoes" leads us in Psychedelic territory, the music is dreamy, trippy or oneiric, (choose the word you want) but the sound is typical of the late 60's, less aggressive than early PINK FLOYD but with the same spirit, only that more delicate and elaborate, simply delightful.

But this is a 23:30 minutes epic and the journey is only starting, the characteristic voice of David Gilmour and the nice work by all the band (specially by the bass and keyboards) demonstrates us this band is in the road towards huge achievements. The song goes in crescendo and the instruments keep joining and making it more complex, the tortured guitar of David Gilmour takes us through the eras of PINK FLOYD, from their early acid years, to the classic era, all in a lapse of minutes.

The interplay between Wright and Mason is elaborate and the arrangements are spectacular, each section leads us to the next with perfect coherence and extreme beauty, from the soft and calmed introductory vocals top the wild instrumental in the end, a great song.

People say that everything is well if it ends well, and "Meddle" can't end better, but the fact is that the album is uneven, I admit that "One of this Days" and "Echoes" are outstanding, that "A Pillow of Winds" and "Fearless" are good very good, but the "San Tropez" and "Seamus" are way bellow PINK FLOYD'S average and don't allow me to rate the album with more than 3 stars, that should be 3.5 if our system wasn't so rigid.

Good but non-essential.

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