With all the talk about whether or not Roger Waters is rejoining
\nPink Floyd (my opinion: I hope not – let’s let the past be) and the
\nupcoming re-release of the band’s Columbia catalogue,now seems as
\ngood a time to dip into the Pierce Memorial Archives (hey, who’s
\nbeen baking brownies in here?) for one of their most overlooked
\nalbums – 1977’s
\nAnimals<\/i>.<\/p>\n
For the British foursome, you’re in a sticky situation. Your
\nlast two albums,
\nDark Side Of The Moon<\/i> and
\nWish You Were Here<\/i>, have been incredible successes. But
\ninternal squabbles are beginning to fester in the band, and the
\ngroup seems to be torn over whether to continue in a pop vein or to
\nturn back to their psychedelic roots. The answer at the time: why
\nnot combine both? The end result: five songs, two of which are
\nbridges to start and end the album, all vaguely connected by a
\ntheme surrounding animals. The jams are incredibly drawn out, and
\nthe musicianship is at a high.<\/p>\n
So what does this all mean? Simple: while
\nAnimals<\/i> showed that Pink Floyd couldn’t go home again to the
\nworld of psychedelia, their songwriting was still riding at its
\npeak.<\/p>\n
The two snippets, both titled “Pigs On The Wing,” are of little
\nconsequence to the album – let’s pass on these tracks and
\nconcentrate on the remaining tracks. They all seem to have some
\ntouches of social commentary in them – though I will freely admit I
\nhaven’t picked up all the nuances yet. The first real track,
\n“Dogs,” seems to criticize the way we behave in the human race –
\nalmost as if
\nwe<\/i> are the real animals.: “You have to be trusted by the
\npeople that you lie to \/ So that when they turn their backs on you
\n\/ You’ll get the chance to put the knife in.”<\/p>\n
David Gilmour’s guitar work has rarely sounded better than on
\nthis track – his lines are controlled, yet powerful. Waters has
\nnever been a really happy person, though lyrics like these give us
\nthe first signs of the dark nature they would soon take. (Okay, I
\nlied: on “Pigs On The Wing,” you can almost hear the core of
\n“Mother” which would stand out on
\nThe Wall<\/i>.)<\/p>\n
I don’t want to take away from the work of Nick Mason and
\nRichard Wright, however; their work on drums and keyboards also add
\na special panache (brother, don’t think I haven’t been looking for
\na reason to use
\nthat<\/i> word) to the music. Wright’s keyboards help to add the
\ntouch of psychedelia that Pink Floyd was trying to recapture. And
\nMason, as always, provides a solid backbeat.<\/p>\n
The highlight for me on
\nAnimals<\/i>– in fact, the reason I bought it when I first heard
\nthe song on a local metal show – is “Pigs (Three Different Ones).”
\nIt is here that the band is at their tightest, with the keyboards
\nperfectly meshing in with the guitar lines, and the bass creating a
\nmelody all its own. It’s one of the best moments of Pink Floyd’s
\ncareer in my book – though here is where I have a problem
\nunearthing the social commentary.<\/p>\n
“Sheep,” the last of the “tracks” on this album, will sound
\nfamiliar to those who only know Pink Floyd from their 1983 best-of
\nA Collection Of Great Dance Songs<\/i>. If the band has been
\nusing a talkbox, then I will stand corrected when I’ve said it’s
\nbest used sparingly. The synthesized vocals in the middle of the
\ntrack are eerie, and while they become inaudible near the end,
\ntheir message still rings out clear. Also it’s worthy to note that
\na short tape lop first used back on “Dogs” returns to haunt you,
\nconnecting the track and the “enemies”.Waters also lays on a rather
\nheavy dose of social criticism again – there is no doubt that we
\nare the sheep he was writing about.<\/p>\n
The sad thing about
\nAnimals<\/i> is that it’s not known for the music it holds.
\nRather, the minor connection people will make is with the
\ninflatable flying pig that appears at Pink Floyd shows. (For that
\nmatter, I don’t remember the last time I heard about the band
\nplaying anything from
\nAnimals<\/i> on recent tours.) The fact is that this album is
\nprobably the one which is least known.
\nAtom Heart Mother<\/i> is known for the cow on the cover,
\nMeddle<\/i> is known for “One Of These Days”… while
\nAnimals<\/i> sits in relative obscurity.<\/p>\n
And while I love
\nWish You Were Here<\/i> and can tolerate both
\nDark Side Of The Moon<\/i> and
\nThe Wall<\/i>, I think it’s criminal that so few people these
\ndays know about
\nAnimals<\/i>. It’s almost as if – no, scratch that, it
\ndid<\/i> get lost in between the mega-hit,overplayed albums.
\nThis, kids, is what we call a God-Damn Shame.<\/p>\n
Fortunately, with the album being remastered as kind of a 20th
\nbirthday present (gee, and all I got when I turned 20 was an
\nelectric razor), we all have a chance to re-discover
\nAnimals<\/i>. Don’t let the length of the tracks fool you – the
\ntime passes very quickly with them, making you want to listen to
\nthe album again and again.
\nAnimals<\/i> is an album that does not deserve to be forgotten –
\npick up a copy today and adopt it for your own.<\/p>\n
Christ, I sound like a Beanie Babies ad…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":24527,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"tags":[],"artist":[5677],"rating":[5646],"class_list":["post-35730","review","type-review","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","artist-pink-floyd","rating-rating-a"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/35730","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/review"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=35730"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/35730\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/24527"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=35730"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=35730"},{"taxonomy":"artist","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/artist?post=35730"},{"taxonomy":"rating","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rating?post=35730"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}