Left to right, Rick Wright, Roger Waters, Nick Mason standing
and David Gilmour -- during the heady days of the early 1970's.I was a graduating senior finishing High School in Virginia in June, 1975. A few days after school let out for the final time I got to see the legendary band Pink Floyd at the Capitol Centre in Landover, Maryland on June 10. Landover was not that far away from where I lived. A Pink Floyd ticket was a very hot ticket for this second of two nights at Capitol Centre and I had tickets for my girlfriend Liz and I. We shared a really fun day as we went out to an early dinner at a tall rooftop restaurant overlooking Washington, D.C. from Arlington, Virginia. We dined out and attended the concert with some buddies so she and I did not have to drive anywhere. After a very nice dinner Liz and I partook of some special dessert, 'Dixie Flat Tops' is what we called these little brown psychoactive fungi we collected in the cow pastures of Northern Virginia. We did not feel the full clean and clear impact of the psychedelic shrooms until we got to our seats which was perfect timing. The Capitol Centre at the time was a relatively new facility at that time that seated around 18,000 and for Pink Floyd every seat was sold. Despite the passage of 32 years and those mighty fine mushrooms, I still remember this show very clearly and with great fondness.
Prank's favorite Pink Floyd albums. Top from left to right 1971's 'Meddle' and 1972's 'Obscured by Clouds'.
Bottom left to right 1973's 'The Dark Side Of The Moon' and 1975's 'Wish You Were Here'. By the early 1970's Pink Floyd core was a four piece band consisting of Rick Wright on Keyboards, David Gilmour on Vocals and Guitar, Nick Mason on Drums and Roger Waters on Guitars and Vocals. All the band members contributed songs and wrote many together as a team, but Roger Waters and David Gilmour emerged as the main lyrical forces and all the band members often clashed over the direction of the band. Pink Floyd also had many guest players including Dick Parry whose sax solos added jazz textures to Pink Floyd's recorded and live sounds for most of the 1970's. Vocalists Venetta Fields and Carlena Williams toured with Pink Floyd during this period as well as appearing on the albums above. Riding high on the charts, Pink Floyd was in their prime both in the recording studio and with their live performances. By 1975 Pink Floyd had just released the album 'Wish You Were Here' which was the follow-up to their smash 'The Dark Side Of The Moon' from 1973 and which was on the Billboard Top 200 album charts 591 weeks in a row from 1976 to 1988. The buzz was that the 2nd half of the show would be the complete performance of 'Dark Side' in full quadraphonic sound and with the infamous crashing airplane. Quad sound was an ancient form of surround sound for you youngbloods out there. 'The Dark Side Of The Moon' was concept album of sorts, madness, powerlessness and mindless materialism were the main themes I picked up on as I would listen to this album in various states of mind over and over again in 1973 and 1974. I went through at least 4 vinyl copies of this one before I got it on CD. 'Wish You Were Here' also covered the territory of insanity and the greed of the music business. I am most fond of all the Pink Floyd albums from this era covering 1971 through 1975 including 'Meddle' and 'Obscured By Clouds'. I loved 'The Wall' and most of their later material but those 4 albums pictured above are what I cut my teeth on and they all still sound great to me.
Pink Floyd was originally named Tea Set in 1964 but changed their handle when they found another band was using that name. They became The Pink Floyd Sound, in tribute to two blues musicians, Pink Anderson and Floyd Council. The Sound part of the name was dropped by 1966. A true story about Pink Floyd from the 'Wish You Were Here' recording sessions. The album itself was a tribute to Syd Barrett. Syd died on July 7, 2006. He joined Waters, Wright and Mason in the band in 1965 to play Guitar and write songs and he soon was adding his unique vocal stylings. Syd was institutionalized in the late 1960's due to his fragile mental state attributed to a daily diet that included LSD for most of 1968. Syd was gone from the band by 1969 entirely. In '68 he would often show up to concerts and play a single chord over and and over or detune his guitar while the rest of the band was performing. David Gilmour joined Pink Floyd to play Guitar in 1968 and he eventually replaced Syd. The band members hoped that Syd would just stop showing up for the shows and soon thereafter he did stop. Syd put out a few solo albums in 1970 and then ended his music career. By 1974 Syd was a heavyset man, his head and eyebrows completely shaved, Syd wandered into the studio while the band was mixing 'Shine On You Crazy Diamond'. His former bandmates did not recognize Syd at first, when suddenly one of them realized it was their 'Crazy Diamond' Syd. Syd was asked how he gained the extra weight he had put on since they last saw him, to which he replied "I have a fridge full of pork chops". Syd was greeted warmly by the band but he subsequently slipped away during the impromptu party for David Gilmour's wedding which coincidentally was also on that day. It was the last time any of the other band members saw Syd Barrett alive.
O.K. back to the concert. There was no opening act, just an evening with Pink Floyd with help from Parry on sax, Fields and Williams on lead and backing vocals. As we got to our seats which were 5 rows off the floor to the right side about 20 rows from the stage. The house lights dimmed and we could see a large circular screen that was a few stories tall behind the stage with small shadowy figures in front of the screen. Those shadows were Pink Floyd and the band played on with no interruptions or words to the crowd other than the songs. They seemed almost introverted when compared to some of the shows like The Who or Iggy Pop or The Stones that I have seen. Nope, these guys wanted us to watch the screen while they played in the dark and it was pretty wild if you like the visuals. There were a few spotlights on the band, no drum solos, no guitar hero antics, just a solid run through some of the greatest Pink Floyd music of all time. We were first treated to an hour plus set of all the songs from the album 'Wish You Were Here' followed by a short break. The second hour was the complete 'Dark Side of the Moon' suite and there was this blinking eye on the screen. The jumbo screen was at least 30 feet tall and that eyeball was blinking right at us and Liz and I just started to laugh like loons. The quad sound setup in the arena provided crystal clear sound and truly enhanced the show, it was not a gimmick. As the music began we followed the descent into insanity and subsequent hospitalization and treatment of whomever's brain that big blinking eyeball was attached to on the jumbo screen. Scenes from a small airplane heading into a crash, ambulances, operating rooms, mental health facilities and some animations played on the jumbo screen. As we got to the end of the 'Dark Side' suite a small red airplane came out of the ceiling of the Capitol Centre and crashed behind the stage. All the while we see the reaction of the eye on the screen as the planes shatters into small pieces. Liz and I both jumped out of our seats as that little plane swooped across the arena and crashed, we both were laughing and looked at each other and said "Did you see that too?" and the whole crowd went pretty crazy. Everyone was standing and cheering and the band just waved and I think Waters said 'Thank you' but that was it for the crowd interaction. I had read that this airplane crash spectacle happening at some Pink Floyd shows put on in outdoor settings and was surprised they could pull it off indoors. Witnessing it live was much better than I could have ever anticipated in my mind's eye. The final encore piece was the song 'Echoes', which was a album side epic from 'Meddle' back in the ancient days when vinyl disks had 2 sides, and it was a fitting finale to one of the most remarkable shows I have witnessed. The music was great and the images and story line on 'Dark Side' gave this fresh new High School Graduate a lot to think about. It was a hell of a lot of fun. We left with the show with big smiles and our minds totally blown and images of a big 30 foot tall blinking eyeball forever seared into our memories.
© Prankster Media Services 2007
Time
(Mason, Waters, Wright, Gilmour)
Ticking away the moments that make up a dull day
You fritter and waste the hours in an offhand way.
Kicking around on a piece of ground in your home town
Waiting for someone or something to show you the way.
Tired of lying in the sunshine staying home to watch the rain.
You are young and life is long and there is time to kill today.
And then one day you find ten years have got behind you.
No one told you when to run, you missed the starting gun.
So you run and you run to catch up with the sun but it's sinking
Racing around to come up behind you again.
The sun is the same in a relative way but you're older,
Shorter of breath and one day closer to death.
Every year is getting shorter never seem to find the time.
Plans that either come to naught or half a page of scribbled lines
Hanging on in quiet desperation is the English way
The time is gone, the song is over,
Thought I'd something more to say.
