Syd Barrett

For musicians, Syd Barrett needs no introduction as you will understand if you keep on reading. His real name is Roger Keith Barrett, but he got his nickname from a local jazz double bassist named Sid Barrett. Barrett played the guitar, sang and wrote lyrics from 1964 – 1974. Despite he left Pink Floyd in 1968 only four years after he founded the band, and he managed to release two albums and mark the beginning for a new genre; Psychedelic rock.

But his creativity didn’t come from nowhere. He frequently used LSD which made him creative, but drugging himself had its negative effects. Somebody believed he was a schizophrenic since he acted weirder and weirder. On stage Barrett became so unpredictable, that there was need for someone to take his place during performances. That someone got to be David Gilmour, an old friend of Barrett.

In the beginning, after he had been replaced as a live performer, he just wandered around on stage until the rest of the band just suddenly decided not to bring him with them. An episode that really annoyed the other band members was when Barrett kept on changing the arrangement on a song he called “Have you got it yet?”

His struggles with the other band members and LSD made him go back to Cambridge to his mother. He died of cancer as a result of diabetes the 7^th July 2006, only 60 years old.

Nick Mason

The famous drummer in Pink Floyd is named Nick Mason. He has been the only constant member of the band since its formation in 1964. He was born in 1944 in Edgbaston, England. In addition to play drums on every Pink Floyd album, has Nick Mason also performed backup vocals. Mason has contributed songwriting duties on a variety of Pink Floyd songs as well. Two songs have been dedicated to Nick Mason: “The grand vizier’s garden party parts 1-3” from the album “Ummagumma” and “Speak to me” from the album “The dark side of the moon”.

“Speak to Me”

"I've been mad for fucking years, absolutely years, been over the edge for yonks, been working me buns off for bands..." "I've always been mad, I know I've been mad, like the most of us...very hard to explain why you're mad, even if you're not mad..."

In July 2005, Nick Mason, David Gilmour, Richard Wright and Roger Waters preformed on a stage for the first time in 24 years. They played at the “Live 8” concert in London. According to Nick Mason, there is a forthcoming reunion just around the corner; Pink Floyd is not officially disbanded yet.
Besides from his glorious career in Pink Floyd, Has he also done some work with other people like Steve Hillage, Robert Wyatt, the Damned and Gong. Mainly drumming and producing. He has also been playing drums for Michael Mantler. In 2004 was a book with the title: “Inside out: A personal history of Pink Floyd” published in the UK, and the author behind it was of course, Nick Mason. It was written to tell an audience worldwide, the complete adventure about one of the most successful bands ever.

Albums

All Pink Floyds albums

High Hopes

Beyond the horizon of the place we lived when we were young
In a world of magnets and miracles
Our thoughts strayed constantly and without boundary
The ringing of the division bell had begun
Along the Long Road and on down the Causeway
Do they still meet there by the Cut
There was a ragged band that followed in our footsteps
Running before time took our dreams away
Leaving the myriad small creatures trying to tie us to the ground
To a life consumed by slow decay

The grass was greener
The light was brighter
With friends surrounded
The nights of wonder

Looking beyond the embers of bridges glowing behind us
To a glimpse of how green it was on the other side
Steps taken forwards but sleepwalking back again
Dragged by the force of some inner tide
At a higher altitude with flag unfurled
We reached the dizzy heights of that dreamed of world
Encumbered forever by desire and ambition
There's a hunger still unsatisfied
Our weary eyes still stray to the horizon
Though down this road we've been so many times

The grass was greener
The light was brighter
The taste was sweeter
The nights of wonder

With friends surrounded
The dawn mist glowing
The water flowing
The endless river
Forever and ever

The song



Analysis of the song
The song “High Hopes” is written by David Gilmour’s (guitarist, lead singer, and one of the songwriters in Pink Floyd) girlfriend Polly Samson, inspired by an autobiographical angle by Gilmour. David Gilmour composed the music. The song is the last track at the final studio album “The Division Bell” by Pink Floyd, released in 1994.

We guess the “I” person in the text is David Gilmour, and here is a quote from him talking about the song:
"High Hopes" was really the last one, it was written after all the other (songs) were sort of, in some form or another. I think I wrote it in July or something. It was very, very quick. It's one of those ones that works, quickly, but beautifully, almost immediately and, I came up with a tiny bit of music, just had it on a cassette, just a few bars of piano. And then I went off to get away to a small house somewhere with my girlfriend, Polly, and try and make some progress on the lyric writing. And she gave me a phrase about something about before time wears you down. And I took it from there, and...got stuck into a whole sort of thing about, I suppose, my, it's autobiographical really, I suppose I'd have to say on that one, it's about my life, Cambridge life, and my childhood, I suppose. Yeah, we came up with it very, very quickly, we wrote the words to it in, most of the words to it in a day. And then I went back to the studio, with no one else there, the minute I got back, and put a demo down of it. Did everything myself on it, and it was virtually complete in a day. ”

When the song starts, you immediately get a harmonic, but melancholic feeling. The intro is instrumental and we can hear the sound of church bells and birds. You kind of get the feeling of lying in wet grass. The melancholic feeling you get at the start of the song, last until the last guitar solo at the end, but the two times when they sing the refrain, you get this pleased feeling that everything will be all right.

The lyrics and the music are in the same mood. Witch makes the song very comfortable to listen to. The song kind of gets you in a mood where all you want to do is to lie down, close your eyes, and think. Due to both the lyrics, the music, and the genius combination of everything a good song should contain.

The text is written in past tense. The words beyond and behind are mentioned several times, and the fact that they are telling about the past is very clear. Except from the refrain:
“The grass was greener. The light was brighter. The taste was sweeter. The nights of wonder” there is no word or phrase repeated. One word that may be stressed out would be the word horizon. Probably to point out that the horizon is one thing you should have in mind as the song goes by.


“High Hopes” is a song that almost every person can relate to. Or every person that can look back in their lives and see themselves having high hopes about the future, but when they get there, things aren’t as bright as they thought it would be. You can say the song is about growing up, looking forwards to living life, and then later, looking back again. The song can be about having a dream, and to have all this ambitions about yourself and how things should become. Then you were “In a world of magnets and miracles. Our thoughts strayed constantly and without boundary” and lived “in that dreamed of world. Encumbered forever by desire and ambition.” When you were young and had these thoughts about the future you felt that “The grass was greener. The light was brighter. With friends surrounded. The nights of wonder.” Then you get older, and even though how far you have come, you still aren’t pleased, because you had such high hopes. “Looking beyond the embers of bridges glowing behind us. To a glimpse of how green it was on the other side. Steps taken forwards but sleepwalking back again” This phrase from the text tells about you looking back on the dreams that just went up in smoke, and then you try to move on, but you don’t manage to, because you are “sleepwalking back again”.

So listening to this song makes me think about how it's never as good as it seems on the other side, and how we always dream about something new, never happy with what we have. Before you crossed the bridge, you dreamed about it, then, once you had, you dreamed about going back. The song is simply about how we never get pace with our lives, and never get truly satisfied. “There's a hunger still unsatisfied” 

The genre

Pink Floyd – a champion in many fields

Progressive rock was Pink Floyds habitat, a widespread style developed from earlier rock genres as an attempt to elevate rock music to new levels of artistic credibility, and make a progress to earlier standard rock. Progressive rock appeared in the late sixties and gained adherents worldwide during the seventies. It was created from a combination of several styles, and the music arrangement in this new genre incorporated characteristics from classical music, jazz and world music, but also mixed origins from different styles of rock; blues-, hard-, folk- and psychedelic rock. Instruments were guitar, bass, keyboards, piano and drums.

The psychedelic rock is a style which is inspired from hippie culture, and attempts to reach the inner worlds and enhance mind- altering experiences of psychedelic drugs like LSD. It was developed from earlier genres like folk- rock, the typical features are exotic instrumentals, inventive studio effects and fragments from space rock, which is a subgenre characterized by slow, instrumental passages dominated by synthesizers, experimental guitar work and science fictional themes. The popularity of art rock increased with its artistic and experimental sound, and influence from classical music. These lyrics were poetic, political and philosophical, and Roger Waters wrote about his personal struggles combined with social criticism. Instrumentals were used, and the songs often contained elements from electronic art music with space effects. Many songs emphasized musical instruments, featuring little singing, which is a genre we call instrumental rock.

Pink Floyd was an adaptable band playing music in many fields, using fragments from several styles and genres. Their music was mainly categorized as progressive rock, but during Pink Floyds glorious career, styles like psychedelic, instrumental, space and art rock were visited. I believe the use of various musical styles is the reason why Pink Floyd was able to spellbind an entire world, and make revolutionary sounds to enrich musical history. Their music will always remain popular because of the adaptability they proved time after time through their characteristic, peculiar sound, and harmonically plain music.

Richard Wright

Richard Wright, also known as "Rick" Wright was a british pianist, keyboardist, vocalist and song writer. He was born 28 July 1943, and grew up in "Hatch End" in northern London. Richard Wright was educated at Haberdashers' Aske's School and the Regent Street Polytechnic College of Architecture. In college he met some of his future fellow band members; Roger Waters and Nick Mason, and together they founded Pink Floyd, then called "Pink Floyd Sound". Wright was a prominent musical force in the group, while not credited as a singer at the album "The Piper at the Gates of Dawn", he sang lead on songs like "Astronomy Domine" and "Matilda Mother". As the sound and the goals of the band evolved, Wright focused more on contributing on his distinctive style to extend the instrumental compositions in the band and less on song writing. Because of strugling both with personal problems and with the relationship to Roger Waters he was forced to resign from Pink Floyd during The Wall sessions in 1979. In 1983, Pink Floyd released the only album on which Wright does not appear, it is called "The Final Cut".

Comfortably Numb

Pink Floyd- Comfortably Numb
One of their greatest songs. The clip is from "The Division Bell Tour" at London Earls Court on Oct 10, 1994. The song is from the album "The Wall"

Album: "The piper at the Gates of Dawn"

Pink Floyd is an english rock band that gained reconition in the 60s for their phychodelic and space rock music, which evolved in to progressive rock in the period 60s to 70s. in 1967 Pink floyd debutet with their album "The piper at the Gates of Dawn". It`s to day thougt of as one of the most influential albums ever made, as it had tremendus inpackt on how psychedelic rock music developed. The lyrics in the album is about bicycles, space, gnomes etc. The songs in the album that were written by Syd Barrett appeared at the "games of may consert" several months before the release of the album making it more controversial than any other albums.