‘Echoes’ is pink Floyd’s latest cash cow
A single note is plugged into a synthesizer becoming an echo, a drop which forms ripples in a listener’s ears – the song stretches like a road, through lyrical avenues, around guitar embellishments, ending with the same single note nearly 17 minutes later.
It is the ethereal title track from “Echoes: The Best of Pink Floyd,” another attempt to milk the band for whatever it’s worth, and it’s worth a lot.
The seemingly anonymous members of Pink Floyd have pushed more albums in the last 25 years than any group this side of the Beatles. “Dark Side of The Moon,” an album with lyrical and musical depth, was on Billboard’s Top 100 for 14 years. Pink Floyd’s apex, “The Wall” was the top selling double LP of all time, the most ambitious stage production of the time and made into a partially animated film.
I would argue Pink Floyd is the best group ever. Although they never had the universal impact of Lennon, McCartney and company, the group was probably more varied and definitely had a longer prime (1971-1983). Former Pink Floyd front man Roger Water’s lyrical preoccupations with lunacy, war and politics might have been depressing, but his poetry was always more sophisticated and noteworthy than the wet-dream meanderings of The Rolling Stones or Led Zeppelin. The only band comparable to Floyd in my eyes is The Doors, but their albums are not the thematically constructed sonic experiences of England’s most famous art school dropouts.
The evidence is in the songs. Astronomy Domine from the often-overlooked LSD days (circa 1966) shows original lead singer Syd Barrett balancing brilliance and schizophrenia. It is a kaleidoscope of sound, psychedelic music’s crazy cousin.
Less dated is Shine on you crazy diamond (parts 1-7) an epic tribute to Barrett after he was kicked out of the band. The song is subtle and spacious, building slowly until the climax of frantic saxophone. The song is the band’s musical peak, a last reminder of the instrumental showcases that defined Floyd’s earlier albums. Soon Water’s lyrical obsessions – many of which sounded like journal entries from a neglected child – would dominate the band’s direction.
The resulting songs were surprisingly powerful. Like Sheep, an Orwell-influenced political statement, or Hey You, a vulnerable admission of loneliness.
Unfortunately, Waters’ forgotten masterpiece, “The Final Cut,” is represented by only one song on “Echoes,” and it is a so-so song at that. The Fletcher Memorial Home, is a Waters’ fantasy in which the leaders most responsible for wartime atrocities (aka Thatcher, Brezhnev, McCarthy and Nixon) are gassed. It is a bleak track, and although it is not one of the best songs on “The Final Cut,” it is definitely representative of the desolate lyrical images found on Pink Floyd’s equivalent to “Blood on the Tracks.” Looked at individually, I have no complaints about the songs on “Echoes.”
However, Pink Floyd was never about songs – they were about albums. The group is an MP3 downloader’s nightmare because their songs do not end – they bleed into the next.
Looked at in this light, “Echoes” lumps tracks together out of context, a fact compounded by the albums non-chronological order.
A particularly glaring example of this occurs near the end of the second disc when Learning to Fly, an optimistic Gillmour track is followed by Arnold Layne, an unsettling Barrett composition about a cross-dresser.
My advice: Skip the latest attempt to cash in on Pink Floyd’s legacy. It is always sad to see a group’s back cataloged ravaged in the name of money.
Since 1980, Floyd has released just three legitimate albums, but have had their past work packaged in two greatest hits collections, a box set and a slew of flat live recordings. Stick with the originals. “The Wall,” “Dark Side” and “Wish You Were Here” are a good start. Afterwards, get the before mentioned “The Final Cut” followed by “Meddle” and “Animals.” Better yet, buy them on vinyl so the money hungry powers-that-be stop profiting from a group whose creative prime is long behind them.
Grade C