Pink Floyd 2010

2010

Eduardo Pérez R.

Universidad Anahuac México Norte

23/08/2010

Pink Floyd

Pink Floyd 2010

Contenido

Introducción ............................................................................. 3

Material y métodos .................................................................. 7

Resultados ............................................................................... 9

Conclusiones ......................................................................... 14

Introducción

Pink Floyd was an English rock band who earned international recognition for their psychedelic rock music in the late 1960s, and for their progressive rock music from the 1970s onward. Their work is marked by the use of philosophical lyrics, sonic experimentation, innovative album art, and elaborate live shows. One of rock music's most critically acclaimed and commercially successful acts, the group have sold over 200 million albums

Pink Floyd 2010

worldwide, including 74.5 million certified units in the United States, making them one of the best-selling music artists of all time.

Pink Floyd were formed in 1965, and originally consisted of university students Roger Waters, Nick Mason, Richard Wright, and Syd Barrett. The group were a popular fixture on London's underground music scene, and under Barrett's leadership released two charting singles, "Arnold Layne" and "See Emily Play", and a successful debut album, The Piper at the Gates of Dawn. In 1968, guitarist and singer David Gilmour joined the line-up. Barrett was soon removed, due to his increasingly erratic behaviour. Following Barrett's departure, bass player and singer Roger Waters became the lyricist and dominant figure in the band, which went on to achieve worldwide critical and commercial success with the concept albums The Dark Side of the Moon, Wish You Were Here, Animals, and The Wall.

Wright left the band in 1979, and Waters in 1985, but Gilmour and Mason (joined by Wright) continued recording and touring under the name Pink Floyd. Waters used legal means to try to keep them from using the name, declaring Pink Floyd a spent force, but the parties reached an out-of-court settlement allowing Gilmour, Mason and Wright to continue as Pink Floyd. The band again enjoyed worldwide successes with A Momentary Lapse of Reason (1987) and The Division Bell (1994), and Waters continued as a solo musician, releasing three studio albums. Although for some years relations between Waters and the remaining three members were sour, the band reformed in 2005 for a final one-off performance at Live 8.

Formation

Pink Floyd 2010

Nick Mason and Roger Waters first met while studying architecture at the Regent Street Polytechnic in London.

[1] The pair first played together in a band formed by Keith Noble and

Clive Metcalfe, with Noble's sister Sheilagh. Fellow student Richard Wright joined later, and the band became a sextet, taking the name Sigma 6.

[2] Waters initially played rhythm guitar

before switching to bass, and Wright's girlfriend was a regular guest artist. The band performed initially during private functions, rehearsing in a tearoom in the basement of Regent Street Polytechnic. They played songs by The Searchers, and also material written by fellow student Ken Chapman, who became their manager and songwriter.

[2]

In September 1963 Mason and Waters moved into the lower flat of Stanhope Gardens, owned by Mike Leonard, a part-time tutor at the Regent Street Polytechnic. Leonard was a designer of light machines (perforated discs spun by electric motors to cast patterns of lights on the walls)

[nb 1] and for a time played keyboard alongside them, using the front room

of the flat for rehearsals.[3]

Mason later moved out of the flat, while accomplished guitar player Bob Klose moved in. Sigma 6 changed their name on several occasions, from the Megadeaths, to the Architectural Abdabs, and then to The Tea Set.

[3][4]

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As The Pink Floyd Sound

With the Tea Set lacking Noble and Metcalfe's vocals, Klose introduced the band to Chris Dennis, a technician with the Royal Air Force.

[10] It was during Dennis's

tenure that the band was first referred to as The Pink Floyd Sound,

[nb 2] created by Barrett on

the spur of the moment when he discovered that another band, also named the Tea Set, were to perform at one of their gigs. The name is derived from the given names of two blues musicians whose records Barrett had in his collection, Pink Anderson and

Floyd Council.[11][12]

Dennis was posted to Bahrain, thrusting Barrett into the spotlight as frontman.

[10] They first performed in a recording studio in December 1964, minus the

presence of Wright, who was taking a break from his studies. Through one of his friends, who let them use some "down time" for free, they managed to secure recording time at a studio in West Hampstead. This four-song session became the Tea Set's first demo tape, and included the R&B classic "I'm A King Bee", two Syd Barrett originals: "Butterfly" and

Pink Floyd 2010

"Lucy Leave", and "Double O Bo", a group-composition which—according to Mason—was "Bo Diddley meets the 007 theme."

[13]

Material y métodos

The Pink Floyd Sound became the resident band at the Countdown Club near Kensington High Street in London, where from late night until early morning they played three sets of 90 minutes. According to Mason, this period "… was the beginning of a realisation that songs could be extended with lengthy solos."

[14] An audition for ITV's Ready Steady Go!

soon followed (they were invited by the programme's producers to return the following week), as did another club, and two rock contests. At the behest of his father and college tutors, Bob Klose left in 1965,

[15] and Barrett took over on lead guitar.

[16] Playing mostly

rhythm and blues songs, they began to receive paid bookings, including one for a performance at the Marquee Club in March 1966, where they were watched by Peter Jenner. A lecturer at the London School of Economics, Jenner was impressed by the acoustic effects Barrett and Wright created,

[12] and with his business partner and friend

Andrew King became their manager.[17]

Although the pair had little experience of the music industry, they used inherited money to set up Blackhill Enterprises, and purchased new instruments and equipment for the band, including a Selmer PA system.

[18] Under their

guidance, at venues including All Saints Hall and The Marquee, the band became part of London's underground music scene.

[19]

While performing at the Countdown Club the band had experimented with long instrumental excursions, and they began to expand upon these with rudimentary but visually powerful

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light shows, projected by coloured slides and domestic lights.[21][22]

To celebrate the launch of the Free School's magazine International Times, they performed in front of a 2,000-strong crowd at the opening of The Roundhouse, attended by celebrities including Alexander Trocchi, Paul McCartney, and Marianne Faithfull.

[23] Jenner

and King's diverse array of social connections helped gain the band important coverage in The Financial Times and The Sunday Times.

[24]

Their relationship with Blackhill Enterprises was strengthened when they became full partners, each holding an unprecedented one-sixth share,

[18] and by October 1966

their set included more of their own material.

[22] They performed at venues

such as the Commonwealth Institute,

[25] but were not universally

popular; following a performance at a Catholic youth club the owner refused to pay, a stance which the magistrate agreed with, claiming that the band's performance "wasn't music".

[26] This was not the only

occasion on which they encountered such opinions, but they were better received at the

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UFO Club in London.[27]

Barrett's performances were reportedly exuberant, "… leaping around and the madness, and the kind of improvisation he was doing … he was inspired. He would constantly manage to get past his limitations and into areas that were very, very interesting. Which none of the others could do."

[28] The often drug-addled audience was

receptive to the music they played, but the band remained drug-free —"We were out of it, not on acid, but out of the loop, stuck in the dressing room at UFO."

Resultados

According to Mason, the psychedelic movement had "taken place around us—not within us".

[30] Nevertheless The Pink Floyd Sound were present at the head of a wave of interest in

psychedelic music, and began to attract the attention of the music industry.[31]

While in negotiations with record companies, Joe Boyd and booking agent Bryan Morrison arranged for and funded the recording of several songs at Sound Techniques in West Hampstead, including "Arnold Layne", and a version of "Interstellar Overdrive",

[31] and also for the

production in Sussex of a short music film for "Arnold Layne". Despite early interest from Polydor, the band signed with EMI, with a £5,000 advance. Boyd was not included in the deal.

[32][33]

"Arnold Layne" became Pink Floyd's (the definite article seems to have been dropped at some point in 1967)

[34] first single, released on 11 March 1967.

[35] Its references to cross-

dressing saw it banned by several radio stations, but some creative manipulation at the shops which supplied sales figures to the music industry meant that it peaked in the UK charts at number 20.

[36] All four members of the band had by then abandoned their studies

Pink Floyd 2010

or jobs, and they upgraded their ageing Bedford van to a Ford Transit,[37]

using it to travel to over 200 gigs in 1967 (a tenfold increase on the previous year). They were joined by road manager Peter Wynne Willson, with whom Barrett had previously shared a flat.

[38] Willson

updated the band's lighting rig, with some innovative ideas including the use of polarisers, mirrors, and stretched condoms.

[39]

Their second release was "See Emily Play", on 16 June.[40]

It was premièred at the Queen Elizabeth Hall in London earlier in May that year,

[41] where the band also used a device

called an Azimuth co-ordinator. They performed on the BBC's Look of the Week, where an erudite and engaging Waters and Barrett faced rigorous questioning from Hans Keller.

[42]

The single fared slightly better than "Arnold Layne", and after two weeks was at number 17 in the charts. It was mimed for the BBC's Top Of The Pops, to which they returned after the single climbed to number five, but a scheduled third appearance was cancelled when Barrett refused to perform.

[40] It was about this time the rest of the band first noticed

changes in Barrett's behaviour.[43]

By early 1967 he was regularly using LSD,[44]

and at an earlier show in Holland Mason observed him to be "completely distanced from everything going on, whether simply tripping or suffering from a more organic neural disturbance I still have no idea."

[43]

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[edit] The Piper at the Gates of Dawn

Main article: The Piper at the Gates of Dawn

Pink Floyd's contract with EMI had been negotiated by their agent, Bryan Morrison, and EMI producer Norman Smith. They were obliged

[45] to record

their first album at EMI's Abbey Road Studios in London.

[46] There they

experimented with musique concrète, and were at one point invited to watch The Beatles record "Lovely Rita". Although in his 2005

autobiography Mason recalled that the sessions were relatively trouble-free, Smith disagreed, stating that Barrett was unresponsive to his suggestions and constructive criticism.

[47] The Piper at the Gates of Dawn was released in August 1967, and Pink Floyd

continued to draw huge crowds at the UFO Club, but Barrett's deterioration was by then giving them serious concern. The rest of the band initially hoped that his erratic behaviour

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would be a passing phase, but others, including Jenner and June Child,[nb 3]

were more realistic:

… I found him in the dressing room and he was so … gone. Roger Waters and I got him on his feet, we got him out to the stage … and of course the audience went spare because they loved him. The band started to play and Syd just stood there. He had his guitar around his neck and his arms just hanging down. —June Child,

[49]

To their consternation, the band were forced to cancel their appearance at the prestigious National Jazz and Blues Festival, and informed the music press that Barrett was suffering from nervous exhaustion. Jenner and Waters arranged for Barrett to see a psychiatrist, a meeting the frontman did not attend, and a stay in Formentera with Sam Hutt, a doctor well-established in the underground music scene, led to no visible improvement. A few dates in September were followed by the band's first tour of the United States.

[50] Blackhill's late

application for work permits forced the band to cancel several dates,[51][52]

and Barrett's condition grew steadily worse.

[53] He detuned his guitar during a performance at the

Winterland Ballroom, causing the strings to come off, and during a recording for The Pat Boone Show he confounded the director by miming the song perfectly during the rehearsal, and then standing motionless during the take. King quickly curtailed the band's US visit, sending them home on the next flight.

[54]

Shortly after their return from the US the band supported Jimi Hendrix's tour of England,[54]

but Barrett's depression worsened the longer the tour continued,

[55] and his absence on one

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occasion forced the band to book David O'List as his replacement.[50]

Barrett's position as frontman was becoming less secure. Wynne Willson left his role as lighting manager and allied himself with the guitarist.

[56] Pink Floyd released "Apples and Oranges", but for the

rest of the band Barrett's condition had reached a crisis point, and they responded by adding a new member to their line-up.

[50]

David Gilmour was already acquainted with Barrett, having in the early 1960s studied modern languages at Cambridge Tech, while the latter studied art.

[9] The two had performed

at lunchtimes together with guitars and harmonicas, and later hitch-hiked and busked their way around the south of France.

[58] In

1965, while a member of Joker's Wild, Gilmour had watched The Tea Set,

[59] and two years

later the band asked him to become the fifth member of Pink Floyd. Barrett had recently suggested adding four new members, in the words of Roger Waters, "… two freaks he'd met somewhere. One of them played the banjo, the other the saxophone … [and] a couple of chick singers".

[60] While Barrett

reluctantly agreed to Gilmour's induction, Steve O'Rourke (an assistant to Bryan Morrison) gave Gilmour a room at his house, and a salary of £30 per week.

[61] Gilmour immediately

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went out and bought a custom-made yellow Fender Stratocaster, from a music shop in Cambridge (the instrument became one of Gilmour's favourite guitars throughout his career with Pink Floyd), and in January 1968 he was announced as the band's newest member.

[62]

To the general public he was then the second guitarist, but as Barrett's performances continued to ebb, privately the rest of the band began to see him as a replacement. One of Gilmour's first duties was to pretend to play a guitar on an "Apples and Oranges" promotional film.

[62]

In a demonstration of his frustration at being effectively sidelined, Barrett tried to teach the band a new song, "Have You Got It Yet?", but changed the structure on each performance—making it impossible for them to learn. Matters came to a head on the way to a performance in Southampton. When somebody in the van asked if they should collect Barrett, the response was "No, fuck it, let's not bother".

[63]

Conclusiones

Waters later admitted "He was our friend, but most of the time we now wanted to strangle him".

[64] For a short period Barrett still turned up to the occasional gig, apparently confused

as to what was happening.[64]

As a result of his de facto removal, Pink Floyd's partnership with Peter Jenner and Andrew King was dissolved in March 1968, and Barrett's departure was officially announced on 6 April.

[65] Jenner and King, who believed that the creative spirit

of Pink Floyd derived almost entirely from Barrett, decided to represent him, and ended their relationship with Pink Floyd. Bryan Morrison then agreed that Steve O'Rourke should become Pink Floyd's manager.

[66] Barrett had been their main songwriter, and Gilmour

Pink Floyd 2010

mimed to his voice on the group's European television appearances, but while playing on the university circuit Waters and Wright created their own new material, such as "It Would Be So Nice", and "Careful With That Axe, Eugene". They were joined by road manager Peter Watts before touring Europe in 1968.