By this point, you’ve all heard Comfortably Numb, the classic rock song with what is often regarded as the best blues-rock solo of all time, and the blistering coda, where a fiery David Gilmour peels paint from walls with his multi-million dollar black Stratocaster. Hell, even modern blues man Eric Gales, on his new album The Crown, takes his shot at Gilmour’s coda on “Too Close to the Fire” (WELL worth your time to listen to – Gales is pure fire!)
Many of you have probably also heard the childrens’ choir demanding that “We don’t need no education” in Another Brick in the Wall, Pt 2.
But “The Wall” is something else entirely. Released in late 1979 in the long shadow of sales behemoth Dark Side of the Moon (45 million sold, and counting, Dark Side remained on the Billboard charts for 741 weeks, from it’s release in 1973 all the way until 1988), The Wall is singer, bass player, and songwriter Roger Waters’ invitation into a severely fractured mind, his own (with a little of former Pink Floyd vocalist Syd Barrett added in). Broken at a young age by the loss of a father he barely knew in World War II, the album tells the internalized story of a man loosely based on Waters numbing himself and building a wall around his mind and soul to isolate from an increasingly painful and fearful existence.
He becomes a famous musician, embraces fascism, drugs and excess in a continuing effort to suppress that which would break him, until it cannot be contained any longer.
It is a theatrical album, one of the early blueprints for a concept album, with many repeating musical and lyrical themes, short vignettes, and performances that are more acting than singing. You can hear where this album was a huge influence on later bands like Queensryche and Dream Theater.
And it is absolute fucking brilliance.
I knew Another Brick in the Wall, Pt 2 from being played on the radio near-constantly in 1980, when I was a child, and I picked up Floyd’s live album Delicate Sound of Thunder as one of my very first CDs, spurred on by a transcription of Comfortably Numb in a guitar magazine, with the accompanying story waxing for days about its brilliance, but I didn’t consider The Wall in it’s entirety until the early 90s.
I was working construction for my father’s company at the time, and there was always a boom box or car stereo in the truck, or something on which I could pop a home-made cassette (recorded from the double CD I had at home), and I listened to it on repeat endlessly for like a year and a half.
There’s a track or two I don’t really care for here (“Bring the Boys Back Home” comes to mind), but they’re all an important part of the whole. Every minute of this album is an important part of the story – another brick in the wall that must eventually fall.
The Wall is less accessible than a lot of the Floyd’s other work, but it is worth every minute of the time you put into it, listening to and dissecting the music as well as the lyrics, the framework, the story. It is as close to an autobiography in concept album form as we’re ever likely to see, and it’s bold, raw, and brave, and a drawn out, drug-induced therapy session for a staggeringly broken man who finally finds the path to his own recovery.
And with all that, it STILL managed to sell over 30 million copies.
It’s over 80 minutes long, so I’m sorry about doing that again, but it is well worth your time, for the story, the brilliant writing of Roger Waters, the fiery playing of David Gilmour, and just… Everything. What an album!
Many of you have probably also heard the childrens’ choir demanding that “We don’t need no education” in Another Brick in the Wall, Pt 2.
But “The Wall” is something else entirely. Released in late 1979 in the long shadow of sales behemoth Dark Side of the Moon (45 million sold, and counting, Dark Side remained on the Billboard charts for 741 weeks, from it’s release in 1973 all the way until 1988), The Wall is singer, bass player, and songwriter Roger Waters’ invitation into a severely fractured mind, his own (with a little of former Pink Floyd vocalist Syd Barrett added in). Broken at a young age by the loss of a father he barely knew in World War II, the album tells the internalized story of a man loosely based on Waters numbing himself and building a wall around his mind and soul to isolate from an increasingly painful and fearful existence.
He becomes a famous musician, embraces fascism, drugs and excess in a continuing effort to suppress that which would break him, until it cannot be contained any longer.
It is a theatrical album, one of the early blueprints for a concept album, with many repeating musical and lyrical themes, short vignettes, and performances that are more acting than singing. You can hear where this album was a huge influence on later bands like Queensryche and Dream Theater.
And it is absolute fucking brilliance.
I knew Another Brick in the Wall, Pt 2 from being played on the radio near-constantly in 1980, when I was a child, and I picked up Floyd’s live album Delicate Sound of Thunder as one of my very first CDs, spurred on by a transcription of Comfortably Numb in a guitar magazine, with the accompanying story waxing for days about its brilliance, but I didn’t consider The Wall in it’s entirety until the early 90s.
I was working construction for my father’s company at the time, and there was always a boom box or car stereo in the truck, or something on which I could pop a home-made cassette (recorded from the double CD I had at home), and I listened to it on repeat endlessly for like a year and a half.
There’s a track or two I don’t really care for here (“Bring the Boys Back Home” comes to mind), but they’re all an important part of the whole. Every minute of this album is an important part of the story – another brick in the wall that must eventually fall.
The Wall is less accessible than a lot of the Floyd’s other work, but it is worth every minute of the time you put into it, listening to and dissecting the music as well as the lyrics, the framework, the story. It is as close to an autobiography in concept album form as we’re ever likely to see, and it’s bold, raw, and brave, and a drawn out, drug-induced therapy session for a staggeringly broken man who finally finds the path to his own recovery.
And with all that, it STILL managed to sell over 30 million copies.
It’s over 80 minutes long, so I’m sorry about doing that again, but it is well worth your time, for the story, the brilliant writing of Roger Waters, the fiery playing of David Gilmour, and just… Everything. What an album!
head sooooo take from that what you will lol.
Funny enough, I’ve been jamming “Comfortably Numb”’for the last two weeks pretty much on repeat. Unreal stuff!
