Understanding Have A Cigar
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- Опубліковано 15 вер 2024
- Come in here, dear boy, have a cigar! You're gonna go far.
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What do you do when you've spent your entire life working toward a single goal, and then you accomplish it beyond your wildest dreams? That was the conundrum faced by Pink Floyd after the release of Dark Side Of The Moon, and while each member had their own response, the overall answer seemed to be "mourn the loss of a purpose". They'd done it, and they weren't happy, so the band, led by their famously cantankerous bassist Roger Waters, decided to look inward. They didn't like what they saw, but as artists, they knew how to handle that sort of darkness: You turn it into more art. Wish You Were Here wasn't a passion project, it was a project of necessity, ground out of the band by a music industry that demanded a follow-up to keep the money flowing, and at the heart of the album, Waters struck back, laying bare all his sharpest critiques of the business that had destroyed his soul.
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Some additional thoughts/corrections:
1) It's maybe not entirely correct to the story to say that Cigar Man's goal is to get the band to _sign_ with him, given that much of the dialogue, especially in the second verse, seems to be from a later point where they're already working with him and he's trying to get them to do more work ("You've gotta get an album out, you owe it to the people") that will ultimately make him money, but I went with the simpler version because the details aren't that important and it's a reasonable read of the first verse at least.
2) A thing I probably should've gotten into that I never got around to in the script is just how many instruments Richard Wright is playing here. He's credited on five different keyboard instruments, all layered together. I couldn't find real stems for that so I wasn't able to spread them out and demonstrate all the different sounds, but all those layers of pads contribute a lot to the dense, oppressive atmosphere of the song, especially during the big riff sections.
3) In retrospect it might've been more demonstrative to notate both vocal parts in the harmonized demo, but I always try to avoid notating multi-note things wherever possible because the sharpie makes it hard to read, and I didn't really need to discuss any of the specific notes or anything.
4) I should note that the version of the story of Roy Harper's treatment by the band comes from Harper's own accounts, and since nothing was ever written down it's hard to say for sure if he's embellishing, but it's a story he's told multiple places and it seems to fit and I couldn't find any evidence of the band refuting it, so I think it's safe enough to say it probably happened at least roughly like that. I did try to keep the story much more generalized than Harper's retellings though, to account for any discrepancy between that and the truth.
In the sheet music book for Wish You Were Here, Gilmour says that he couldn't reach the notes, and they weren't happy with Roger's "vocal quality" or some such euphemism, which seems like the simplest and most likely explanation, and it's also pretty contemporary.
@@nazfrde £200 would be worth about £2500 today... presumably not enough for life time Lords access but maybe a good session rate?
Another aspect I heard about why Roy’s asking price was season tickets was because at the time, the team was not doing well and thus it was … cheap. In other words, pay me but don’t over do it.
Something that Roy has said before was he wasn’t mad about not being compensated, but rather the presumption that it wasn’t him singing the song. He has also noted that he would get some wag shouting “Have a Cigar” during a gig. I guess this is his “Freebird”.
At any rate, hats off to Roy 😉
"Roger's vocal quality"
Translation: Roger's notoriously pitchy vocals.
The dialogue always seemed to me that the band had released a top-charting single and Cigar Man wanted to capitalise on that success as quickly as possible with an album. Pink Floyd had success with their debut single "Arnold Layne" and that put pressure on Syd Barrett to write hit follow-ups. With the next song on the album being "Wish You Were Here" it follows the narrative of what happened next. I always loved Roy Harper's vocal jump on "Everybody else is just gree-een!" highlighting the petty glee and ego-centric nature of the executive.
That filter sweep followed by a compressed tinny sound exactly replicates the effect of blowing out the woofer on a ~1970 home speaker. I think it was designed to provoke a jolt of fear and 4th-wall-breaking in listeners, especially first-time listeners hearing it on their own stereos. That's certainly how it worked (and works) for me.
So it was like an Andy Kaufman prank? Wow
Wow! Great context!
now I wanna find some really old speaker set and hook it up to a pressing and see how it sounds compared to high quality speakers and digital recording.
Tell me about it. I used to listen to music relatively loud in my room with the lights off, laying on my bed. I bought the album as soon as it hit the stores. The first time I listened to it, at precisely that spot, I literally jumped off the bed because I thought something just went terribly wrong with my HiFi system until I realized a few seconds later that it was the recording. They certainly got me😅😂
Oh holy crap. Thank you so much for this comment. As a younger person absolutely obsessed with Pink Floyd... I never would have known this if you hadn't said. That makes so much sense (and is also a great prank lol).
It's hard to imagine a better demonstration of the fight between art and commerce than to have the discussion of "the needs of the artist... subsumed by the needs of the industry" interrupted by a toilet paper commercial.
Damn! The universe didn't need to come down on you like all that. lols 🤣
I guess all I can say is: well, it is all about Capitalism being a shytty experience all-around.😂
@@aylbdrmadison1051 As a demonstration of Pink Floyd's and 12Tone's point, it was VERY effective :)
As for the universe coming down on me, it ain't nothin' but a thing.
Oh my, sometimes the universe has a genuinely sick sense of humor.
I guess my ad blocker is working, teaching that you need to use your head to figure out ways to resist
You had TP? I had a Google AI ad. Talk about needs of an artist subsumed by the needs of industry. It's layers of irony, like an ogre.
I've always found it odd that arguably their best radio song is the most scathing indictment of the music industry.
That's what's called irony.
I remember hearing "Another Brick In The Wall, Part 2" being played over the loudspeaker at school when we couldn't go outside for recess due to the weather. I think when they realised what just happened they stopped playing the radio over the loudspeaker. 😂
It is pointed out that the song does make the point that cigar man does get his money does make his money back at the end of the song. And it's more of an inditement that we keep letting this happen. How much do we complain about the likes of Microsoft, Google, Sony, Apple, Amazon, etc. And yet, these companies somehow keep making Billions and Trillions of dollars. In the end, it doesn't matter what's the message of the song, so long as it's making the studio money. We like to espouse this idea that counter-culture stuff eschews the commercialization of mainstream media and we, in turn, should refuse to "listen to the stuff of sell-outs". The real irony is Cigar Man's got his hooks in the counter-culture stuff as well.
@@jackielinde7568
There’s a term for that: recuperation
Of course. The cigar man gets off on the fact they can tell you everything they’re doing and you’ll still eat it up. 🤑
They call it riding the gravy traaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa
n
so incredible, i read that with the echo that it has
@@シロダサンダー😂
I’m as simple as they come, I see a 12 tone video about Pink Floyd, I click immediately. A band that I came to love through the influence of my father and the pure enjoyment of their work.
Same, with the added bonus of sending it to friend.
And as he has seen it, but didn't respond, I have High Hopes he's currently watching. If so, Hej David, how did you like the video?
When I was like 14 (mid 90s), I found Dark Side in some record shop, and brought it home, listened to it for days. Then said to my dad "you gotta listen to this new band, they're great"
He laughed and showed me his old LPs
“…Something that doesn’t work” *draws a Tesla logo* has me rolling lol
Thematically it makes the most sense to have someone from outside the band sing Have a Cigar.
Thematically, it would have slide well in The Wall. And I've donne it. Took out that Vera Lynn/Bring The Boys bullshit, and put Have a Cigar instead. Went great before Confortably Numb.
Agreed
@@pedrorocha9722agree with getting rid of bring the boys back home and vera for what shall we do now next to empty spaces. Have a cigar is perfect with the cover of wish you were here
2:32 “Pink Floyd’s meddling”. I saw what you did there-well played!
Lol yes
@20:35 Yeah, if it was almost any other guitarist, I'd agree with the "it's difficult to nail pitch on a string bend..." but this is Gilmour we're talking about, who has a consistent/solid history of pitch-nailing bended notes (even of the step-and-a-half variety). The guy is just masterful in his purpose & execution. I definitely agree that this was an intentional "wail of anguish" note.
The superhuman pitch control is what makes David Gilmour's guitar sound like David Gilmour's guitar.
Its rather funky...one of my favorite things about the song.
Primus does a nice version on the excellent Miscellaneous Debris EP.
Floyd is craaaayyyyyzy funky… when they wanna be. They really let the funk out live, check out Young Lust on The Wall double-live.
Absolutely. I like how he pulled up Time as a comparison, but Young Lust works just as well. They were masters at so many things, but I rarely hear people give them credit for the way they built weird and powerful grooves like the greatest of funkmeisters. Each part is chaotic, but I disagree with Corey - I think the parts in this groove are pieces of a puzzle, just like in Time. The total groove is coherent, sensible, and very danceable - except when it's not. I think they intended to hit that solid groove, which in 1975 was filling the charts in funk and disco music.
9:22 I think you could make a case that great art comes, not from pain, but from honesty. I'm sure there's a million exceptions, but it sounds like they were creating something real here.
Definitely! My favorite Floyd album is still _Animals._ If you haven't yet, maybe read the book it's based off Animal Farm, or just watch the animated film. I first heard the album as kid, and that's the day I decided I was going to be a musician. I didn't know about the squabbles in the band, let alone that was it's height. But the sonic images they created was like watching a movie. It made me want to be part of something that's much more than the sum of it's parts.
Well said
Very well put. Pain doesn't equal great art. It's merely the material to turn into great art.
I think art really comes down to emotional expression. Strong emotions breed strong expression, any emotions, including pain, but others work as well. Look at Joy to the World and Shambala by Three Dog Night, The Boys Are Back in Town, or something from your preferred genre, or any of the billions of love songs that reach people. Pain doesn't have a special place in art, unless that's the expression you prefer.
I've always thought this song is really fascinating on the Wish You Were Here album because it plays immediately following Welcome to the Machine, which has a much more directly cynical and sinister tone to it, whereas this one feels almost jokish, like they're making fun of the whole thing and how stupid it all is. Think about "By the way, which one's Pink?" The line makes fun of an actual question they got from a record label, and mocks the need to create a rockstar. Meanwhile Welcome to the Machine has the singer cynically describe a troubled youth being molded into a marketable figure. The contrast between the two I always find really interesting.
Gilmour has always been the most precise stringbender I've known. He's also a blues guitarist. I think that high almost-D late in the solo is really just the blue note - the flatted 7th of the root, only a little flatter (microtonal). I don't think he was struggling to hit anything. I think he found what he wanted. He often bent notes way up there.
Harmonic 7th, 959 cents vs. the "normal" minor 7th of 1000 cents.
@@mal2ksc That's the one. I knew there was a standard name for it, and I really think that's what Gilmour was going for, or at least that bluesy attitude that getting close can have more power than actually getting there.
That little opening riff always gets me to mime flicking out the cigar into my hands, lighting it and leaning back into my chair to pose as some sleazy record exec.
Roy Harper has done some interesting songs himself. He's probably not that well known in America, but he was a big figure in the Britsh folk scene of the 60s and 70s. I'd recommend his album "Stormcock". He was also close with Jimmy Page, who contributed to several of his records.
Hats off to him, I'd say.
Dang it, you beat me to it! 🤣
Only reason I know Roy Harper is that Hipgnosis did a number of his album covers. I'll have to check him out.
@@BillPeschel Clearly, you don't listen to enough Led Zeppelin ;)
@@infinite1der You, sir, won the race 😂
Cool episode.
I think a lot of what made Pink Floyd special was the way Gilmore grafted blues guitar onto British psychedelic rock.
Thanks for the staff paper. I just bought some for my wife, who writes out a lot of violin parts for herself--on really poor quality staff paper.
I want a 12tone visual dictionary.
+1!
Oooo, I would absolutely buy that!
The raw live versions of this track are truly powerful and show how angry they were at the time
You should look into some of their early psychadelic stuff, interstellar overdrive, flaming, bike, paintbox
"I've got a bike, you can ride it if you like
It's got a basket, a bell that rings
And things to make it look good
I'd give it to you if I could, but I borrowed it"
That shit SUCKED
Outstanding. I immediately grabbed the best ear-goggles I have, and set aside all shenanigans in order to watch and listen very closely. Your snarkiness shows itself, only occasionally, in your sketches and they delight me deeply!
Strap on my ear goggles and I'm ready to go
Hats off to Roy Harper 13:29
I was hoping someone would say this.
It's a claw, ripping through the page! I've been watching this channel for YEARS and never knew what the hell that doodle was suppose to be. It just looked like a bunch of weirdly shaped knives. LOL. I don't know why, but today my mind decided to look at the negative space, and there it was.
I love it when that happens.
I love it when the new 12tone video is a song I know really well. (squeal of joy).
Having Harper do the vocals is also better for the narrator. It makes it more powerful that cigar man is not a band member.
Him being a separate entity helps the narrative a lot for me.
This one was really great! I've been subscribed for a long time, and I've enjoyed watching your progress over the years.
It's a challenge to analyze something that was so seismic, but you've almost created the illusion that you're hearing it for the first time. The only part that I suspect you glossed over was the solo near the end, which, I'm sure you know, contains much more than meandering.
I'm really excited that you've begun to mine this vein, and I hope you continue. Psych, in particular, is rich with material.
Again, great job.
So … this is a beautiful coincidence because I was thinking about this song this morning.
I was thinking about the whole Roy Harper involvement and how Roger ended up being disappointed in not singing what ended up being on the album. One of his issues with it was “he was singing a parody”. He elaborated even more by saying he would have it “less cynical, more vulnerable”. This is kinda rich coming from him given that he has consistently been about giving a message and having a very clear viewpoint. If you look at the words, it’s hard *not* to sing it “as a parody”. It showcases the worst and most annoying aspects of a record executive (“Oh, by the way, which one’s Pink?”).
Perhaps the best case to be made why Roy Harper was the best choice, even if Roger could have “persevered” with it, is the song is from someone else’s point of view and it isn’t the band. (Yes, “Welcome to the Machine” is also from someone else’s point of view but Dave pulled it off … as he would later do in the first half of Dogs). You needed that outside voice to make the point that this is about someone trying to seduce you into the group and yet making it clear that he calls the shots.
Funny enough, you pointed out the odd meter during the chorus’s vocal line. One would think “if it’s a train, wouldn’t be … regular?”. But then again, it’s not a train on rails and following an timed itinerary (some of the time 😉). It’s a “gravy train”. It flows … and it flows on his terms. No wonder, Dave praised the whole album in that it was a great marriage between conveying music and conveying ideas.
What’s brilliant about WYWH the album is that you have an album that’s just as thematically rich and conceptually complex as its predecessor yet made in about half the time. And while that could be seen as another “record executive” move (“make another Dark Side”), it’s still very true to the spirit of Pink Floyd (even when that spirit was starting to wane). People forget that The Dark Side of the Moon is an unusual album that just happened to be enormously successful. So it’s quite fitting that even if they were pressured to follow it up (either by themselves or from others or both), they followed it up … on their own terms.
Shine on indeed =]
What I've found amusing about artists is that they're not the best judges of their creations. Like, Conan Doyle disliked Sherlock Holmes, but kept writing the stories for the money. He thought his novels like The White Company were more important and of lasting value.
@@BillPeschel As I’ve said on a number of occasions, the one unique relationship with the art is the one the artist. And that one is always … complicated =]
Ever since I was little, this has been my favorite Pink Floyd song. Thx for this video 🙌🏽🔥🔥🔥🤙🏽
Floyd is that band I fell in love with in high school. 30 years later, and they are still one of my favorites. Genius music, and another brilliant breakdown by 12 Tone!
2:30 Pink Floyd's Meddling 🤣love that album, was that intended to be a pun?
You know it was ;-)
yup. It can easily be seen if a person listen to "echos", with the theme of "meddling" into a persons life in mind. "Meddling" is the whole meaning explored in echos. "Meddling" one person to another, or "getting into" their life. It starts with "strangers passing in the street". Then. Well, just listen.
The paper looks really cool. As a non music reader and guitar player, I'd love to find paper like that but with 6 lines to represent guitar strings. Bonus points if the bass strings were drawn darker/thicker than the treble strings.
If you're thinking about tablature, I think there is paper you can get for it. It's a very specific kind of transcription, so it doesn't really work for what he's doing, but it's pretty elegant.
so tabs?
That's not how music paper works :D
Anyway, people *buying* staved paper in the third millennium? I stopped when I got my first inkjet printer (because the dot matrix ones were terrible with plain paper).
@@IlBiggo I thought printing my own was a great idea, but it turned out that within a few years of having the ability to print staff paper, I could just print the completed music, so somewhere I must still have a notebook with 500 pages of the stuff. Other than emergencies where I have had to write down licks and the like without the benefit of a computer (like the time I had to write four 30-second jingles _and_ rehearse them in one hour), I don't think I've put pen to paper other than as a memory aid for myself. I had pretty legible handwriting, but clean, engraved charts are so much more convenient when the personnel is subject to change on a moment's notice.
@@mal2ksc Yeah, I don't write that much anymore (not that I've ever written symphonies anyway), but staved paper is a "personal" medium. Anything that has to be read by anyone else comes out of the computer. There's just something about writing by hand (be it music or lyrics or the grocery list) that forces my brain to engage. Projects I start on a computer tend to get stuck and forgotten, like, "it's saved on a computer, I can work on it anytime".
One of my favorite Floyd songs
Gotta say…wasn’t expecting an inscryption reference with my Pink Floyd analysis but am delighted all the same!
Roy Harper was recording HQ at the same time as Wish You Were Here, and he considers it one of his very best albums. It really is VERY good, and I recommend especially "When an old cricketer leaves the crease" - John Peel's choice of funeral elegy.
You mentioned that "making it" is mostly a hollow victory for a lot of bands because it doesn't really change things for the band members. I think Doug Hopkins of Gin Blossoms really illustrates that point. When Gin Blossoms finally made it with New Miserable Experience, Doug's demons really came back hard. A rumor I heard at the time was that Hopkins quit Gin Blossoms due to the band "selling out", but the truth is the record label forced him out because of his issues. He would go on to take his own life a short time after receiving a gold record for Hey Jealousy. Gin Blossoms would go one to make five more albums, but I don't think any of them really recaptured the popularity New Miserable Experience had.
I've often called Gilmour's solo on Cigar "funk-thrash".
He's certainly giving it some welly
"Giving it some welly" is a turn of phrase I'm unfamiliar with, is it a British idiom? I presume it refers to the application of a Wellington boot, another way of saying he was kicking it?
“Funk-thrash” is exquisitely perfect. Love it!
Thank you for this great analysis👍. Have a Cigar is in some way my favorite piece on that album, but I love the whole album as well.
Got a belt company ad that said “According to BILLIONS of our customers…” 😂
Edit: I watched enough of the ad to ensure you got paid. Np
And yet, those jaws made the creativity juices flow!
That Tesla - logo 😂
Also Amazon, UA-cam, Apple.
When he said "it doesn't work"?
Well this song, a number of other Floyd songs, and the entire album _Animals_ (and the book Animal Farm it's based off) are criticisms of Capitalism (and it's violent brother Fascism, in the case of Animals). So yea. lols
@@aylbdrmadison1051 You...didn't actually read Animal Farm, did you?
Animal Farm itself is a well known indictment of Communism (specifically, the blatantly clear direction that Stalinism was going), but by Mr. Waters' own statements he repurposed the imagery as a statement against capitalism.
Another great video and analysis. I like the 12 Tone manuscript paper idea.
Everyone PLEASE listen to the Main Squeeze cover of this song.
Seriously the greatest guitar solo of all time.
That Main Squeeze cover is really, really good! Thank you very much for the recommendation! Still, for my money, Lindsey Buckingham's solo in live versions of Fleetwood Mac's "So Afraid" is the best guitar solo I've ever heard.
Thank you very much. If I can repay you with a recommendation, *Dub Side of the Moon*. It’s a reggae version of Pink Floyd.
Truly awe inspiring breakdown of a deceptively complex, somewhat overshadowed tune. This video was really well done! Keep em comin!
The bend from b to d and the d being out of tune is a common guitar move. You usually play it like, " wwwhhhoooooaaaaa!"
I saw this and thought “wait, didn’t he already do a Pink Floyd video?” before I realized I had him confused with Polyphonic
Past few years have been a sort of golden age for Pink Floyd in the commentary/edutainment sphere
"It doesn't work" draws Telsa logo. 🔥
I don't know if you would ever do these kinds of songs but i've listened to a ton of kpop, more specifically blackpink and i've been impressed by the very unique song structures, songs like Pink Venom and Kill this love are such interesting minimalist blends of a bunch of different influences and i think it would be very interesting to break down why these songs work so well when they seem to lack or more likely opt out of usual song structure essentials. Maybe your not a big kpop head but i really think it would be a very interesting style to cover in contrast with the usual stuff you cover :). Keep up the good work :)
....and introducing Polyphonic as Roger Waters😉
I've always considered Have A Cigar
as a modern take on a blues jam.
But your analysis is, of course, better.
Please do Echoes next.
I would watch a 45 minute video of that.
Of course I watched this on Nebula.
✌✌
Woooo, Pink Floyd fan, music lover and film buff (dolly was a great comparison) - loved this! Animals is my favourite album but I do think WYWH is the best
Wish You Were Here is a certified classic album
Look at some Syd era stuff next. I'd love Astronome Domine or Interstellar Overdrive!
Love the song. So glad you decided to make it the topic of a video. Cheers mate!
Sorry. I love this song and I love Wish You Were Here. Fantastic album but Pink Floyd’s masterpiece is DSOTM. Unlike anything I’ve ever heard I have listened to it since I was 14 in 1973 when I was turned onto it and cannabis the same evening. Both blew me away back then but Dark Side of the Moon never gets old, which unfortunately is not the case with myself.
i feel like this kind of analysis will never be done to todays current muzak. talk about a deep dive..............................fantastic!
Bill was always, and will always be the culprit.
(@ 2:29) ""...weren't safe from Pink Floyd's Meddling." I see what you did there.
I always enjoyed this as a nice and simple little riff based rock song.
Well, those times are gone, thank you very much 😂
12:42 or, alternatively, each heard what the others played, and didn't feel compelled to tighten up, leaving the whole thing rawer, which definitely vibes with the vocal delivery
thank you so much,I can never count the beats in the chromatic part because I always get distracted by the synths
I always thought it was fitting Harper singing this as the character talkingvto the band, so it shouldn't be waters, gilmour, wright or mason. My 2 cents. One of the first basslines i tried to learn, 35 yrs ago...jesus time flies
YA GONNA GO FAR!
what a great video. thank you!
I would enjoy 12tone looking into more progrock songs.
I always thought of this song as being slimy. The same kinda slimy that record company suits would be. It could be used as background music while talking to a mob boss in a video game lol
(It could be used as background music) to say what is happening in the scene, with only a few notes. The song says so much. So much that it might take a person there whole life to understand. And now ALL that can be told in a couple notes. I've heard this in at least three movies/sitcoms lately. All the cinema I watch is old so they are not "new". I recently watched "Person of interest". This song was in that one (I think that was one of em'). BUT, yes. You are right.
And even that little act alone, plays right into the theme of the song. Money has to change hands to include that song in the "thing".
I imagine it's like having a boss when you're not used to having a boss. The boss is always pushing you to hurry up and make another record or to tour constantly. Plus, this boss seems to find ways to take even more money out of your pocket. The boss, of course, being the industry as a whole. Everyone from agents and record company execs to your whole road crew. They all depend on you to make a living. The upside to success is generally more and better resources to make music, wealth (hopefully) and all of the trappings that come with fame. I like Roger Waters' music, but he really is kind of whiny.
Could you do an analysis of Kashmir by Led Zeppelin?
This was so well done and utterly fascinating!
Amazing to be able to draw so well holding the marker this way. It hurts my hand just watching.
Another great analysis! Still love for you to tackle the cure’s pictures of you or disintegration. Thx for doing what you do.
Pink floyed be like : sid is fucking crazy (10 minutes guitar solo)
Thank you.
"it will come up later" wait how much is left? Ah 10 min
12:37 Apparently The Mars Volta albums Frances the Mute through Noctourniquet were recorded this way, which I think Omar said he got the idea from the way Miles Davis worked at some point
It always surprised me that this industry thuggery came as such a shock to Waters. After all the Beatles had gone through much worse in their fight being artists vs money makers. For example what other band had industry hacks releasing different versions of albums on both sides of the Atlantic, with no thought or input from the band. Not until Pepper did the “industry“ realize these guys will make us a ton of money if we just leave them alone. Of course left to their own devices (now that Epstein was gone) they made big mistakes (Magical Mystery Tour & Apple), but at least these missteps were theirs to make. So if you excuse the pun, after the Beatles broke up, the “artist vs industry” writing was already on the Wall.
Very true. Unfortunately, a number of bands and artists who've followed are easy targets. I've realized you don't get smart on your own until you're in your mid-20s.
I never thought about this so deeply. Great video....👍✌️❤️
"Pink Floyd's Meddling"
... Nice.
We need more political musicians again that aren’t cogs in the machine of the establishment. We need musicians with standards that go against the grain of Where the world‘s heading. The problem is that every musician who goes big nowadays goes big because they are part of the establishment i.e. system.
Some of them just wear their politics like a skin suit.
I've always thought that the way you hold a pen is absolutely insane.
I would say that the abrupt nature of the song starting being a reflection of the tearing away of the band from their ideals is a bit of a leap, but an interesting one. I imagine that it was more to do with the fact that it was the first song of the B side and they wanted something that was going to feel immediate. They did the same with Money, even if that does start with sound effects. It's still immediate and a little jarring. In fact I think they did this on quite a lot of records around that time. Pigs from Animals is an exception, I suppose. There are sides on The Wall that start fairly suddenly and with a jolt. In The Flesh? may well begin with "where we came in" but the first thing anyone listening like a normal person and not with serious intent to catch the loop, is a ginormous explosion and heavy guitars.
Amazing as always
One thing I just noticed about the walkup that gets talked about at 11:24 -
this is also used in Echoes, right? A 5-note chromatic walkup to the tonic, in straight quavers, landing on beat 1? The main hook of that song, a lick they must have played thousands of times together by 1975?
I don't know if that has any significance or anything. Could just be part of the vocabulary of the Pink Floyd Sound. But it's interesting to me anyway.
I would put $10 on it being an unintentional re-use.
@@acousvnt Oh absolutely! This observation felt a lot more mind-blowing before I remembered that the lick wasn't actually from Shine On after all. BUT STILL I find it fun to imagine it being intentional.
😻 Do the rest of them (every pink floyd song)
Something that isn’t addressed in this otherwise great video is that the band changed labels in America with Wish You Were Here, from Capitol to Columbia/CBS, so not only did Pink Floyd have to top one of the unassailable classic albums, they had to deal with a label they didn’t like before almost assuredly having US record execs saying much of the song’s lyrics to them without a hint of irony when negotiating with Columbia.
One of my favorite PF songs
My fav Pink floyd song. They manage to laught with guitars.
Dude!
(and sure, I know, this is just like my opinion, maan ;-)
I know of a world class music school, where "Sound BEGINNING & Sound ENDING" was the name of one of the Classes (for a semester)... Idk, since then, I kinda appreciate the beginnings of more and more things, events, happenings, songs, films, plays, days, 'ships... and so on... Beginnings are, for lack of a better one: sacred, it made me realize & remember... Many many of them...
Anyywhoo, Hugs.
I know, too many "...". I'm observing them too.
(Last week I wrote a positive comment, so not gonna try to balance this one out now.
he he he... Not that this is a negative one... Is it? More like a tangent of a comment? I would not call this a disagreement... ;-D
They not only did it, they did it at least 3 times (DSOTM, WYWH, The Wall)
Ok, but which one is Pink?
Roger's bare arse
That poor music executive is on the entirely wrong album. Everyone knows Pink is from the Wall, not Wish You Were Here!
Pink Anderson.
Definitely not in the band.
3:45 the Amazon diss for exploiting and mistreating their employees.
Much appreciated and enjoyed thankqu
I think gilmour played both bass and guitar on most floyd songs
From Animals on, yes he played most of the bass. The bass parts outgrew Roger's playing ability (the fretless on Pigs for instance). I'm not sure if that was the case for this song though, as it *sounds* like a Roger bass line. Not 100% sure though.
Animals broke Pink Floyd
Broken Pink Floyd gave us The Wall
And Animals!
In which way Animals broke them?
@@mar.pequen honestly, I'd say that it's the success of DSotM that got to them, with the subsequent three albums showing how they dealt with it.
Animals was the beginning of Roger taking more charge, and it having seemingly more consistent (if not universally liked) results. (Nick Mason said that he likes having direction to what he's doing, and WYWH didn't have that, whereas Animals did)
I regularly use a dolly zoom as a way to describe a feeling. But I got confused thinking “metric version” meant dolly zooms used inches, until I realised you meant metric as in the time meter 😅
I have always felt the "meaning" of the cigar-man song (corporate greed), is the story of what sent Syd over the edge. This song tries to tell the "reason" of his "departure". I think when he finally understood exactly what is making the world go around. He just didn't want to be a part of it anymore. The band went on a different "destination" after Syd left. Syd wasn't going there. nope. Listen to "piper at the gates of dawn" and tell me that the place Syd was going and the place the band went after he left were the same place. "Piper"was full of happy and joyful times. "Bells to tell the king the news". And the place he was being corraled to go was starting to show even then. in "our mission is accomplished in six stages". They told him, exactly, HOW, it is going to happen. and right then, nope.
1967 vs. 1975 are very different cultural eras both for the band, music and society at large.
@@tuirnb I "see" what you are saying. (With Syd) or (without Syd), it "probably" would have found the same turn. That really diminishes my resolve. But, what you say is very true. Very, very true. And that is where "feelings" have to come in. I feel this, or I feel that. And, I stay far away from "feelings". Least I try to.
The band didn't immediately go from Piper to Dark Side, the albums in between show the gradual progression. Likewise Syd's solo material shows a direction away from the happy kaleidoscope songs toward darker and more sombre tunes. "Opel" could have fit well with what Pink Floyd were doing at that time.
I wish I had some spare cash to buy some of that staff paper, it looks so nice :( Hopefully I get a new job soon.
Def not Roger's voice sounds Canadian, eh
You’re gonna fly high eh
The Wall is what broke Pink Floyd.
I cant help but be reminded of Nervana and "In Urturo"
2:30 "Pink Floyd's meddling" I see what you did there.
I don't recall offhand if you ever picked apart Red Right Hand, but both songs take very eloquent stabs at how broken and abusive the music industry had become in the late 20th century. I do think it would be an excellent one to analyze given the comparison both musically and lyrically.
Oh and to your additional point about Cigar Man wanting the band to sign with him... he does, but the song is broken into acts like a play. So he goes from speaking to them in the pitch and manipulating them to selling them by speaking about them in that fourth wall break. It's an allegory for the entire label/producer/band/audience relationship which ultimately strangled the band's sense of freedom and creativity. It's sad but they never really recover from this as a band and Final Cut does a brilliant job of expressing just exactly how done they were with the whole affair by that point.
Thank you so very much for analyzing this one. I have literally listened to Floyd since I was in a crib and it's woven into the fundamental of my brain so I never really grasped the depth of complexity within the beauty of the music due to the raw emotional resonance it carries for me. Now almost 50 years later I finally learn enough music theory to sort of follow your analysis and it brings such great joy to my heart to finally understand it in a logical way as well as emotionally.
Whats very interesting about all this is that the band pink floyd themselves, DIDN'T know music theory and DIDN'T INTENTIONALLY write the song with that much detail in mind... it was 100% a randomly started jam song, written on the spot, from scratch, and that's why theres so many different directions and personalities in it at the same time... it just shows you how naturally skilled and talented they were. They wrote a song with all this amazing theory in it completely on accident, not knowing exactly what it was they wrote. They just played what sounded good or what fit together, and it worked out...
I have a PhD. in music theory, and what's fascinating to me the most is that in all actuality, theory is called "theory" because it doesn't ACTUALLY matter all that much...ALL the notes are technically the SAME "key" or ALL notes can be USED in ANY key, its just about how you use the notes and pivot between them in a certain way or order called a "progression" that creates different "keys"... Artists who don't know music theory and just play what sounds good usually sell more or are more successful and sound better than bands who put more emphasis on theory, in my opinion if it sounds good and fits, its in key...because EVERY note is DIRECTLY connected to EVERY OTHER NOTE anyway in some way or another because ALL keys share root notes or other passing notes like 3rds, 4ths, 5ths, 6ths, tritones or octaves, and as long as ANY ONE of those types of notes is shared between 2 keys or progressions, it becomes a pivot note allowing you to "change keys" without actually technically changing keys because you can return to specific root notes OR to ANY note in the 3rd, 4th, 5th, 6th, tritone, or octave and it doesn't TECHNICALLY change the key...
a great example of this is "fell on black days" by "soundgarden" where during the bridge when he sings "how would I know" the instruments are in the same key as the rest of the song but Chris's voice is in a different key but since both keys share a common note SOMEWHERE in their progression Chris was able to get away with using a different key for his voice because it fit due to a common "connector" note or "pivot note"... it sounds amazing, too...
i learned theory to learn how to break the theory rules and still sound good, not to apply what i learned directly...
tool is another example of a band with amazing time signatures and accidental theory who also don't REALLY know theory and write completely by accident usually as jams... but it still sounds great...
mostly, i play by natural feeling and then slightly edit the theory later if i think something else sounds better... but despite knowing everything there is to possibly know about music theory, i dont DELIBERATELY sit down and USE theory to write songs, i more CREATE songs, and the theory comes out later, naturally... like in this video where pink floyd accidentally wrote a song with advanced music theory techniques, i compose songs by "accident" that have really good theory already just naturally because of how much i know...
That's also why theres countless arguments over what key a certain cover song is played in because either key is technically correct because a single passing or pivot note binds both keys into 1 key... or how adding a capo doesn't change keys, really... just forces a specific root note to be included in the progression...(Basically, it just changed the tuning, not the key)
if you don't know that stuff, it doesn't mean im wrong, it just means you haven't studied music theory long enough to get a PhD like i did and you didn't learn what i know... I've had many people say that just because THEY never heard of it being that way, that means its not true, so i have to put the disclaimer in that i learned that in school in advanced music theory classes at university of Washington in Seattle, its NOT MY personal opinion, it was taught by a professionally certified instructor as FACT...
Interesting comment, I read it all lol. I know Pink Floyd knew some theory. Roger mentions in an interview that Money is in 7/8, and Rick went to a music school for a decent amount of time, and David must know some theory in order to do what he does on guitar (like what a pentatonic scale is), but I doubt anyone but Rick knew exactly what they were doing some of the time, which is awesome.
Well said
“…Pink Floyd’s meddling.”
Well done.