[Jubei]

The first two albums are markedly different from the rest of Pink Floyd's output. I like both of them and probably listen to Saucerful of Secrets abit more. Piper is more energetic and wacky, while Saucerful of Secrets is darker and more spaced out.

Ummagumma has a really brilliant live side with a superior version of A Saucerful of Secrets, IMO. The studio side is unusual but lets each member of Floyd have their say - it is nice to see what type of music Nick Mason fancies. I personally love this album.

Both soundtrack albums (More and Obscured by Clouds) have their moments but are patchy overall. More has more of the early Floyd sound and Obscured By Clouds features more catchy (more pop?) songs. I listen to Obscured by Clouds quite alot.

The title track of Atom Heart Mother features a ton of David Gilmour guitar, and sounds very much prog rock - it is more pretentious that Echoes. I think Fat Old Sun is a marvellous Pink Floyd ballad.

Quote:

Originally Posted by viator122 /img/forum/go_quote.gif My favorites are probably DSOTM, Meddle and WYWH, and I'm looking for advice on where to go next.

Since you like Meddle, DSTOM and WYWH, I figure you like David Gilmour's guitar work. Atom Heart Mother and Obscured by Clouds have more guitar work in this vein. The guitar work in the earlier albums are more spaced-out, psychedelic sounding.

 

[Jubei]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Aman /img/forum/go_quote.gif Why give him more of the same pretentious Waters-infested dribble? He should experience the real Floyd that came before the days of Post-DSotM Roger Waters bastardizations.

I have to agree that Animals, The Wall and The Final Cut basically are basically Roger-Waters-featuring-David-Gilmour-on-lead-guitar bastardizations more than a cohesive Pink Floyd creation. For that matter, I prefer The Pros and Cons of Hitchhiking to The Final Cut.

Still think Ummagumma (live side) is the best Floyd disc.

 

[stewgriff]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jubei /img/forum/go_quote.gif I have to agree that Animals, The Wall and The Final Cut basically are basically Roger-Waters-featuring-David-Gilmour-on-lead-guitar bastardizations more than a cohesive Pink Floyd creation. For that matter, I prefer The Pros and Cons of Hitchhiking to The Final Cut. Still think Ummagumma (live side) is the best Floyd disc.

Animals is awesome, since Waters' anger and cynicism fits perfectly with the music. And Gilmour gets in a bunch of great solos. The Wall's almost as good when you knock out all the "Bring the Boys Back Home" and "The Trial" crap. For me, The Final Cut is unlistenable, and "Learning to Fly" and maybe "High Hopes" are the only tracks from the Dave Floyd that are truly great.

 

[mcsamms]

I would recommend that you should take a serious look at Piper At the Gates of Dawn, and A Saucerful of Secrets. I know a lot of people who just listen to a couple Darkside of the Moon tracks and a couple tracks on The Wall and thats about it, others who just listen to the later stuff and have never even heard of Obscured by Clouds or Piper At the Gates of Dawn.

The thing is you don't get to see the full picture of what these guys are all about, where they came from and the musical progression and experimentation that eventually led to Meddle and Darkside of the Moon.

The first two albums are some of their most interesting and clever works, musically and lyrically. If you are willing to look around a little bit then you should also look at The Early Pink Floyd Singles, all excellent tracks and who else could turn a song about getting high into a song about candy and a currant bun. Pink Floyd: Live at Pompeii should also be on the top of your list, the best versions of "Set The Controls for the Heart of the Sun" and "One of These Days" in my opinion, drums and vocals are much clearer.

 

[Jubei]

Quote:

Originally Posted by mcsamms /img/forum/go_quote.gif Pink Floyd: Live at Pompeii should also be on the top of your list, the best versions of "Set The Controls for the Heart of the Sun" and "One of These Days" in my opinion, drums and vocals are much clearer.

That's a lovely recommendation. I totally forgot about it.

 

[daveDerek]

there have been some very good suggestions made already but if you appreciate meddle i'd say give atom heart mother a go. also ummagumma has some fine material, especially the song 'careful with that axe eugene' which is about an axe murderer stalking his victim. it's long and slowly builds. in college i'd a friend who'd first heard this tune while under the influence. since it builds so slowly it was serving mostly as background music while he was having some laughs. apparently (as he relates the story. this was all before i knew him) when it got to the climax of the tune it scared the crap out of him, so much so that he had to turn off the stereo and go for a walk.
i haven't seen the pompei video in a long time but i recall that as being a lot of fun. the early floyd stuff has some nice psychedelia and experimentation that's worth exploring. in some ways i'd say that they peaked with wywh, an album that is so cohesive that it's one of those rare perfect albums (sort of like close to the edge, by yes). after that, while they had their moments, i feel they were in decline, although that's probably the time when they acheived their greatest popularity. their breakthru album, dsotm is, by most any std, a landmark album that's still influential to this day and is the most consistently selling disc that i'm aware of. it was on billboard's charts for something like 15 straight years, and then would still bounce on and off the charts (if i've mistated that i'm sure someone will correct me...).
oh btw, if any of this stuff floats yer boat, i'd recommend trying out the quirky and demanding, but absolutely superb, gentle giant!

 

[rwest1389]

OBSCURED BY CLOUDS is very underated. Very calm and scerene, similar to parts of meddle
ATOM HEART MOTHER i like very much, but its pretty love/hate. id recommend trying it out at least

 

[Hermitt]

After Syd was asked to leave the band because of obvious reasons then, the expermentation and psycedelica <sp> really seemd to expand. I have the box set of Syd's Madcap releases and it's really sad to listen to just how far he had regressed. Most of it, to me anyways, sounds like child-like gibberish. Very sad

 

[mcsamms]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Hermitt /img/forum/go_quote.gif After Syd was asked to leave the band because of obvious reasons then, the expermentation and psycedelica <sp> really seemd to expand. I have the box set of Syd's Madcap releases and it's really sad to listen to just how far he had regressed. Most of it, to me anyways, sounds like child-like gibberish. Very sad

I really quite like a lot of his later music. It is certainly a lot different then anything else he had output, but I find the intense metaphors and self reflection to be quite interesting to listen to. And then on occasion you find a song like "Dominoes" which is just brilliant all together.

I have the one that also has the outtakes and excerpts, and there it becomes quite obvious the kind of mental state that he was in, kind of hard to listen to those last tracks really when its almost like watching someone disconnect from reality.

 

[Aman]

Quote:

Originally Posted by mcsamms /img/forum/go_quote.gif I have the one that also has the outtakes and excerpts, and there it becomes quite obvious the kind of mental state that he was in, kind of hard to listen to those last tracks really when its almost like watching someone disconnect from reality.

Well I hope you're happy with that. I find it disgusting that somebody capitalized off of his mental insanity. It's really just exploiting a person in his highest state of vulnerability. How sad.

Quote:

After Syd was asked to leave the band because of obvious reasons then, the expermentation and psycedelica <sp> really seemd to expand. I have the box set of Syd's Madcap releases and it's really sad to listen to just how far he had regressed. Most of it, to me anyways, sounds like child-like gibberish. Very sad

Later Pink Floyd didn't do anything that was all that different; they just put it into a more accessible context. Everything they had done in things like Dark Side of the Moon were accomplished by those such as Karlheinz Stockhausen years before, and later works (with their pretentiousness and all) were also late on the game. These comments show me that you really just don't have a grasp on why Syd is hailed as the songwriting genius he is.

 

[goldenratiophi]

Quote:

Originally Posted by viator122 /img/forum/go_quote.gif I'm thinking Ummagumma might be a good choice[/i]

Ummagumma has some great performances, esp. on the live disc. But I wouldn't recommend it without hearing more from their '60s stuff first though. The recording quality is pretty bad, too; maybe there's a different mastering that sounds good, but mine sucks. Go for Piper; it's one of their best. Piper, DSOTM, and WYWH are the best 3 Floyd albums IMO. Piper's different though; Syd instead of Roger, and it's psychadelic, very different from the prog stuff.

 

[mcsamms]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Aman /img/forum/go_quote.gif Well I hope you're happy with that. I find it disgusting that somebody capitalized off of his mental insanity. It's really just exploiting a person in his highest state of vulnerability. How sad.

Thats what I was getting at. The album would be much better if it were to just contain the original tracks, which I think are quite good.

 

[Hermitt]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Aman /img/forum/go_quote.gif Well I hope you're happy with that. I find it disgusting that somebody capitalized off of his mental insanity. It's really just exploiting a person in his highest state of vulnerability. How sad. Later Pink Floyd didn't do anything that was all that different; they just put it into a more accessible context. Everything they had done in things like Dark Side of the Moon were accomplished by those such as Karlheinz Stockhausen years before, and later works (with their pretentiousness and all) were also late on the game. These comments show me that you really just don't have a grasp on why Syd is hailed as the songwriting genius he is.

I understad the talents that Syd had, He had a gift of making up lyrics about anything right on the spot. I've watched just about every documentary and read many interviews with the band members and recording engineers that tried to get Syd back into the studio. What i was meaning with the expanding of their (Floyd's) sound and music was due to lots of new equipment and instruments that they did not even know how to use, so they often recorded as they played with various new equipment as they experimented with what kinds of sounds they could create with it all.