Pink Floyd - The Piper at the Gates of Dawn

I believe it to be over rated!

Believe me, I have given this CD several chances to grow on me but I just can't get through it. I don't get it. But not because of ignorance, or lack of 'musical appreciation' as some reviewers who love this album suggest. I get the music, I just don't get all the praise. This album at least had the potential to sound great, and should have sounded great. But it doesn't. Recorded at Abbey Road Studios (called, EMI at the time), the same studio that produced the Beatles, the Hollies, the Zombies and other great artists of the day. A studio proven capable of great sounds! Yet what we get is an amateurish and sloppy first record. The recording levels waver all over the place. The bass looses the drum beat several times. Guitars, at times, are out of tune and distorted due to recording levels being too hot. The performances and arrangements are also amateurish. Definitely acid driven! Some claim it to be experimental, and that's what gives it it's charm. I beleive it to be an experiment 'gone awry'. Syd may have had the potential to be a great artist (no genius) but there are only a few signs here, IMHO. That's just my opinion hardcore fans, so pull back the firing squad. There is much more genius to be found in several artists first outings, but not here. These guys were still learning their craft. Some good ideas, for sure, but nowhere near genius (I do like `Lucifer Sam'). April 29, 2008

Best value set of Piper

Whilst today stereo is the norm, in 1967 it was a small minority market and much more time was lavished on the monaural version than on the stereo mix, which would be done in a day or two, after the mono master had been completed, and was often not released until after the standard mono version. Consequently, there were often significant differences between the two. I can remember spending far too many teenage hours comparing mono and stereo versions of albums by the Beatles, the Pink Floyd and others on headphones using a customized mono record player with a stereo cartridge wired to a second amplifier. To me, a psychedelic record such as Piper cried out for stereo effects, and thanks to the crisp production of the late Norman Smith and the sound engineering of Peter Bown at Abbey Road, I was not disappointed.

It was an exciting time at Abbey Road, too, as the Beatles were ensconced at the same time in another studio working on Sergeant Pepper, and met the Floyd while they were working on Pow R Toc H. The Pretty Things also started work on SF Sorrow there, again with Norman Smith (who also engineered Sergeant Pepper), before the Floyd's sessions were complete.

Piper was the only album that Syd Barrett made in full with the Floyd. He wrote eight of the nine songs and contributed his unique space guitar flourishes to Interstellar Overdrive and the noodly Pow R Toc H. Piper At The Gates Of Dawn is really a benchmark album of the genre now known as psyche. Roger Waters may now dismiss it as juvenilia, but I still listen to it more often than is probably healthy.

The stereo version has been newly remastered for this edition, and sounds superb. A mono version of the album has been out before, but this is apparently the first time the authentic mono mix as on the original vinyl album has been remastered, and it clocks in some seventeen seconds longer than the new stereo re-master. In particular it seems an edit of Flaming (used as an American single which had The Gnome on the flipside) was used in error on some mono editions, though at 2.43 now it is barely a second longer than the 1997 mono CD version that I already had, but though I wonder now in what way the 1997 edition did differ from the original album and why, I certainly have no complaints with the 2007 re-mastering.

The bonus disc is probably the strongest bait to attract the Pink Floyd enthusiast. It is logical that it should contain the five tracks released on singles that year (the sixth, Scarecrow, was taken from the album), and it is good to have them in catalogue again, but many collectors will already have these on the 6-track mini-LP released in 1997 or from the Shine On 1992 box set. They collect in one place all the released material that feature Syd Barrett, apart from the three tracks on A Saucerful Of Secrets.

The real treats here are the final four tracks. The French Edit of Interstellar Overdrive is a substantially re-mixed mono version of Take Two (the one used on the album) of Interstellar Overdrive, unheard since it first turned up on the French EP of Arnold Layne in 1967, and the CD also includes Take Six, a previously unreleased take recorded three weeks later, which shows the extent of variation between performances of this largely improvised piece, and is great to have. There's a rare stereo mix of the extraordinary Apples And Oranges single, too, which is said to be previously unissued but might be the same as the one on the French vinyl LP The Best Of The Pink Floyd; and finally an unreleased early version of Matilda Mother, recorded at their first Abbey Road session. The song was inspired by Hilaire Belloc's Cautionary Tales and this version has lyrics that were changed on the released version, possibly to avoid copyright problems. Obviously missing are the unreleased gems Vegetable Man and Scream Thy Last Scream, although as these were recorded for a potential single for release in 1968, long after Piper had been released, they could just as justifiably be included on an edition of A Saucerful Of Secrets.

The packaging is nice and glossy and has a facsimile of a booklet of Syd's art collage notebook as well as photos and album lyrics. Given that the primary market for a package such as this must be the avid collector, the booklet surprisingly lacks any technical details at all about the mixes, recording dates, sources and so forth.

This clearly is the definitive ultimate edition of Pink Floyd's debut album, until the next re-issue of it, and corrects the shortcomings of previous releases that most of us hadn't been aware of. Cynicism aside, this is an important sixties album for a number of reasons and deserves to be heard in both mono and stereo mixes, and the bonus disc and lavish packaging make it a considerable treat, especially for collectors. April 16, 2008

First Floyd Concept Album

I find it surprising that no one can hear the concept in the record that the band made with Syd. It starts with outer space bleeps and ends with infant-like duckcall sounds very much back on earth. For me the first seven trax on "Piper" are all variations on the descending riff ideas bookended by "Astronomy" and "Interstellar" and shows Syd and gang exhausting the limits of British psychedelia. The last four numbers continue the ego subversion with bucolic metaphors and metaphysics and a special whimsical humor, but all indicate acceptance and retreat and a kind of fragile humanity. The Syd story is all right here encapsulated! March 3, 2008

Pink Floyd's best album

I know...I know..."but Dark Side of the Moon or The Wall is the greatest!". WRONG!

Will all due respect to these great albums Syd Barrett's Pink Floyd is the TRUE Floyd!

This album (and their previous singles) defines psychedelia with their wonderful, whimsical lyrics and music.

From the beginning..."Astronomy Domine" leads you to the center of the universe while "Chapter 24" (taken from the I Ching) makes a very positive statement that makes you believe that your place in the world is a good one as long as you believe.."action brings good fortune" as Syd would sing.

The last song "Bike" is a wonderful, catchy ditty that is on some other P.F. compilations like Relics for example.

In conclusion,

If you are a Pink Floyd fan and you don't have this album pick it up and I hope you'll enjoy it. February 22, 2008

An Update On A Highly Resonant Piece Of Art

Assuming that the reader already considers this LP to be one of the greatest albums ever recorded, I can curtail my sales pitch by mentioning that it is a timeless landmark in the psychedelic period of pop culture and a fascinating insight into the mind of an unfurling schizophrenic. This was the LP that made me want to write songs. I wasn't aware of the myriad possibilities that Syd Barrett pioneered. It should not be forgotten that the rest of the band (and producer Norman Smith) did an excellent job in translating Syd's tragic genius. The presence of the mono mix is quite revealing as certain instruments are more to the fore than in the stereo mix, and are often heard with less effect. "Interstellar Overdrive" and "Flaming" come to mind as examples. Also, the inclusion of the Syd-era singles make the collection more worthwhile, as they are amazing as well. However, with Syd now having passed, I have to wonder why the principles are holding back on such craved rarities as "Scream Thy Last Scream", "Vegetable Man", "Lucy Leave", "king Bee", "I Get Stoned", "In The Beechwoods" and the backing track to "She Was A Millionaire". The first two have been widely distributed on bootlegs and are quite objectively two of the greatest songs Syd ever composed, even if they are acutely unnerving. Moreover, "Millionaire" is a song that will be lost forever unless some record of its existence is produced. I'm afraid that no one has the lyrics anymore or could remember the melody. I do know that it was considered as a single. If Rick Wright could remember any of the missing parts, I and several other musicians would LOVE to finish that song. It was a waltz! (food for your imagination...)

To sum up, YES - BUY IT. But on behalf of Syd fans everywhere: when will we be able to hear the outtakes that we've been dying to hear? December 31, 2007

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