The delicate sound of sentimentality.


So I’ve been on this major Pink Floyd kick lately, which was ignited after Jim DeRogatis convinced me to read drummer Nick Mason’s autobiography, and it’s been fun revisiting my youth. In high school Pink Floyd was the first group I clamied as my band. The Who and Jane's Addiction took their place a short while later but Floyd was the first to really connect with me. I still don’t know why the music connected with me so well but it did. One would think that the isolation that is the high school years would cause me to gravitate to a band who's best known work is called The Wall but actually I was always drawn more to their earlier stuff; for instance I personally think that Obscured By Clouds might be their best album, but I pretty much love everything they’ve done. My first memory of the band is when I was younger and sitting in a hotel room with my family on some road trip and we were all watching Siskel & Ebert review some new rock and/or roll movie named The Wall. I wanted to see it but naturally my young mind lost memory of this desire almost as soon as it had manifested itself.

Flash forward a few years to high school and my evenings working in a bookstore. One of my co-workers had this great collection of these things called “CDs” and we’d go back to his place after work to listen to his huge stereo system and critique music. He was really into Tangerine Dream, Floyd, Yes and Metallica. SO we listened to a lot ot that. I in turn turned him on to The Who and more of the obscure – at that time – punk and college rock I listened to. We were a good team. I could go on about this guy forever considering the myriad things he turned me on but that’s a piece for another time.

So I’ve been on a Floyd kick. I had, though, been avoiding the later stuff that came out after Roger Waters left the band because I was afraid it would be nigh unlistenable. Sentimentality got the better of me though and I threw in Momentary Lapse Of Reason for the commute out to work last week. I was right. I should have left it alone. What I remembered as grand now sounded like foolish old men trying to replicate their past. Badly. Tired and dated guitar solos, too much ‘80s reverb on the drums and lyrics that just pretty much stink permeate the album. It hasn’t weathered the passing of time well at all. I did, however, notice one little oddity that I had to rewind and listen to again though. The intro to the Floyd song “One Slip” sounds almost exactly like the intro to the Chemical Brothers tune “Music: Response.” So I guess you could say that even at their crappiest Pink Floyd was ahead of its time? I know, I know. I’m reaching but cut me some slack. It’s 6am on a Monday morning and I’m here trying to bang something out just for you and all I’ve got this morning is sentimentality to share.