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Immediately following the multi-platinum juggernaut, Dark Side of the Moon, yet not too long before Roger Waters turned Pink Floyd into his personal, psychiatric catharsis, the band crafted the enduring gem, Wish You Were Here in 1975.

An unabashed nod to Pink Floyd’s founder and erstwhile leader-gone-mad, Syd Barrett, the album stands as the most poignant and listenable of the Floyd’s entire oeuvre. All the elements of the bands songwriting skills gelled, and by that I mean the long, spacey song templates of the early albums got the tightness and clarity that came out of Dark Side, and also the near synth-pop of Dark Side (save for David Gilmour’s epic guitar licks) were given some room to breathe, courtesy of the band’s earlier work.

As a result, “Shine On You Crazy Diamond,” a nine-part song that intro’s and outro’s the disc, and encompasses two-thirds of the effort, never wanders or loses its tension and virtuosity. Sandwiched between this epic are three great rock songs, “Welcome to the Machine,” “Have a Cigar,” and “Wish You Were Here.” Roy Harper was used as lead vocalist on “Have a Cigar,” the only time other than Clare Torry on “Great Gig in the Sky” that the band went outside the unit for a lead singer. Harper sounds so much like Waters, though, that you need the liner notes to discover this tidbit of Pink Floyd trivia. (Another bit of trivia – Foo Fighters cover “Have a Cigar,” with Queen’s Brian May on lead guitar, and which appears on the soundtrack of the first Mission: Impossible film – it’s a highlight of that disc.)

Waters’ lyrics were never better than in 1975. He conjured the intense weltangst that came to the fore in Dark Side, but the words have a lingering maturity that disappeared after he careened into the lyrical silliness of The Wall. When he and Gilmour managed to actually collaborate, the results were unforgettable, and Wish You Were Here remains as vital and relevant 37 years after its release.

How I wish

How I wish you were here,

We’re just two lost souls swimming in a fish bowl,

Year after year,

Running over the same old ground,

What have we found?

The same old fears,

Wish you were here.

This entry was posted on July 12, 2012 at 7:53 pm and is filed under Music with tags clare torry, dark side of the moon, david gilmour, have a cigar, pink floyd, roger waters, roy harper, shine on you crazy diamond, welcome to the machine, wish you were here. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.