I listened to Pink Floyd's The Dark Side of the Moon the other day. On its own, that's not such an notable occurrence. There was a time in my life (and not too long ago at that) when listening to that album was an almost daily ritual.
Actually, it's kind of amazing that I haven't written about DSotM yet on this blog, considering that Pink Floyd's 1973 opus holds a significant place in my development as a music listener. Like, really significant. Not only is it the first album I ever bought (I had been mooching off my brother's CD collection beforehand), but its psychedelic, existential ways are also responsible for the broadening of my horizons beyond the classic-rock-and-Green-Day listening habits I stuck to in my early teens. I haven't taken a census of my current music library or anything, but I bet that at least 82 percent of the artists I listen to now I listen to because of some taste-related chain reaction started by my falling in love with The Dark Side of the Moon. For example: Pink Floyd got me listening to Radiohead, which got me listening to prog and indie rock and eventually jazz, all of which got me listening to like a trillion other bands, which turned me into an insufferable music snob. I've tried to cut back on the snobbery bit, but however you slice it, The Dark Side of the Moon is pretty dear to my heart.
So no, it's not at all surprising that I was listening to it. What was surprising, though, is how little my feelings on the album have changed since I first heard it when I was sixteen. That's not the case with a lot of music I listened to in my teens. I mean, sure, I still like most of the music I listened to back then, but my relationship with a lot of that music is kind of like returning to a favorite camping spot at some state park—I still enjoy the sights, but the location has lost some of the mystery and grandeur it held for me at first. To put it another way, I still like Coldplay, but "The Scientist" no longer seems like the soul-shaking powerhouse I once thought it was.
But The Dark Side of the Moon? Man, that's still one friggin' great album. And returning to it now, I realize that one of the great things about this album is that it's grown with me. At each stage of life I listen to it, I find something new to love about it.
When I was sixteen (and the most pretentious, insufferable teenager you've ever met), I was drawn to the way the songs faded into one another to form one big song, the psychedelic flourishes, and the philosophical lyrics (all of which were novel to me—hey, all I was really listening to at the time was Aerosmith and Journey). Also, that guitar solo in "Money" was pretty cool, too. As I've gotten older, I've had phases when I was more interested in the existentialism in the album's lyrics or with the cool pathos of the jazz touches or that weird, almost inaudible string music at the very end of "Eclipse." Always something new.
So when I listened to the album again the other day, it wasn't the jazz or the guitar solos or existentialism that stood out to me but rather how awesome "On the Run" and "Any Colour You Like" sound now. Until recently, I had considered these two tracks (the only instrumental songs on the album, by the way, depending on how you classify "The Great Gig in the Sky") to be minor pieces, the necessary connective tissue to get from "Breath in the Air" to "Time," or "Us and Them" to "Brain Damage," to make the album cohesive. But I'm a different listener now than I was at sixteen, and something about those intervening years has brought me to a place where I now not only appreciate those two instrumentals but think they're two of the best songs on the album.
With "On the Run," I now see this song as, among other things, Pink Floyd's take on krautrock. That driving synthesizer pulse, the chaotic percussion, the disembodied human voices—that's all stuff right out of Kraftwerk and Can's respective songbooks, mixed with some of the freakier elements of Pink Floyd's psychedelic past (e.g. the penultimate movement of "Echoes" from their previous album, Meddle). It's also a killer sonic experience to enjoy with a good pair of headphones. My melody-driven listening habits as a sixteen-year-old didn't have much to do with the non-melodic sonic experimentation of "On the Run," but now that I care more about ambient textures and mood in music, it's absolutely riveting. A lot of songs seem less fresh once I become acquainted with other genres of music. "On the Run," though, has only become more interesting.
The cover from the 2003 re-release of the album (which is the one I own).
Not as fond of it as the original cover, but part of me wishes this had kicked off a
trend of iconic album art being rendered in stained glass.
And then "Any Colour You Like"—oh man, what to say about this gem? There are points of comparison to be made with the song, but honestly, I can't think of any other piece in Pink Floyd's discography (heck, in pop music in general) that sounds like the jubilant synth-funk symphony that is "Any Colour You Like." On the one hand, there's the playful main melody that's especially prominent toward the end, a plucky tune that seems prescient of a certain strain of disco that would arise later in the '70s. David Gilmour's funky guitar noodlings in the background give the track a jammy flavor that interplays nicely with the melody in this regard. But then there are those synthesizers! Synths get a lot of flack in certain circles for their role in the rise of corporate rock, but holy cow, if "Any Colour You Like" doesn't have the best classic-rock-era use of synthesizers, it's pretty dang close. The way they run up and down those jazzy arpeggios early in the song is beautiful and more evocative of the album's famous prism cover than any other moment on the disc. Even better is the climax of the song, when these two movements—jazz-synths and disco-funk—converge in a glorious pileup of sound that is at once pop-music catchy and classical-music complex.
New knowledge, expanded listening habits, and a differing ethos opened up a whole new level of appreciation of this album for me. I guess that's how it is with favorite albums (and just in case I wasn't clear earlier, this is one of my favorite albums). It's not just the familiarity that makes you return, but also that the music keeps blossoming into new experiences.
Of course, not everyone feels this way about The Dark Side of the Moon. I've heard many great people call this album slow and boring. And it's okay that they feel that way (even if they're dead wrong[1]). That's another thing about favorite albums: they're personal. So yeah, I'm sure many of y'all out there don't share my enthusiasm for The Dark Side of the Moon. But I bet a lot of you have experienced something similar with your own favorite album or song, that feeling of having that music grow with you.
And that's about all I have to say about that. Feel free to share your own favorite music experiences in the comments—that's what that box down there is there for. Until next time.
1] Kidding, kidding. You like what you like, and there's no quantifying or disproving taste[2]. One of my least favorite things about my sixteen-year-old self post-DSotM is that I held the seriously misguided belief that a person's aesthetic tastes were a reliable indicator of that person's worth or that person's intelligence. I can't tell you how many conversations surrounding that idea I now regret.
2] Which isn't to suggest some sort of all-encompassing relativism here. I think it's totally possible to argue for some kind of non-subjective worth in a piece of art while still acknowledging that everyone enjoys different things and that everybody enjoying different things is okay. Those of you who don't care for The Dark Side of the Moon, I'll try to convince you that it really is a great album, but if you still don't agree, that isn't some character flaw of yours or anything. We can respectfully disagree, right? [steps off soapbox]
