coolermaster

I didn't understand the phrase: "strangely" is by Wright. I’d like to remind someone that Wright in Pink Floyd was like Harrison in The Beatles: very underrated, yet essential.
His are "Summer 68," "Remember a Day," "See-Saw" (or did you think they were by Barrett??) "Us And Them," "The Great Gig In The Sky," "Sysyphus," "It Would Be So Nice," and I could go on...

Sorry, I forgot the grades.
PS Take it from David John Gilmour... he may have been a fan of D'Alassio, but he shows incredible expertise in the "rock" field and above all expresses his thoughts intelligently.

Syd Barrett created the Floyd, along with a couple of Frikkettoni back in the days of the "Abdabs." Period. Syd Barrett, like a vengeful God, was destroying them! Waters was more intellectual than crazy. The Floyd sound was shaped by Gilmour's guitars and Wright's "inventions." And that's a fact, not an opinion. Klaus Schulze founded Tangerine Dream... And when he left, he did the band a favor, because from the post-psychedelic deliriums of "electronic meditation" and partly "Alpha Centauri," the TD would have never reached the electrical (not electronic) synthesis of "Phaedra" or "Stratosphear" (their masterpiece IMHO, snubbed by everyone).
Just because someone is a founder doesn’t mean they must have an aura of infallibility: what would have happened to FIAT if, at some point, the Caryatid Agnelli hadn’t been ousted? What would have happened to Pirelli if Leopoldo Pirelli hadn’t been "dismissed" from the board in favor of the young (at the time) Tronchetti Provera?
These are nonsensical discussions: I have great affection for Barrett, I own his solo works, and I adore the "piper" (which I consider the manifesto of psychedelia and more), but Barrett was not the Pink Floyd! Just as Waters wasn’t! And if I have to be honest, at the cost of being labeled an iconoclast, I find much more of the "spirit" (please read between the lines) of Pink Floyd in "A Momentary Lapse of Reason" and even in Gilmour's solo works (maybe the first among them) than in "The Wall" or "The Final Cut"...
Many years ago, I wrote in a magazine that the "real" Pink Floyd ended their career with "Animals," and I confirm that even today. Not to take anything away from absolute gems like "Hey You," "Mother," "Comfortably Numb" (chilling!) on The Wall, "Two Suns in the Sunset," "The Gunner's Dream," and the title track on "The Final Cut." It's just that they were no longer the Floyd... they were just a good, actually excellent Pop/Rock band, definitely skilled in their instruments and even more in arrangements (just think of the holophony part in The Wall and the gripping one in the subsequent album).
However, every time I put on the DVD of "At Pompeii" (the VHS I wore out 20 years ago), a thrill, an arcane, indescribable emotion overtakes me... That knight (without a cape) with long hair, but with a "flaming black sword" who first recites a poem that seems born from the most inspired William Blake (Echoes) and then delights with that crescendo lullaby (celestial voices) well... you can call them, if you want, emotions :-)))

I forgot to vote, I apologize...
PS The Floyd don’t need reassessment. In the '80s, following their comeback with AMLOR, they experienced another period of glory that might have even surpassed the one in the '70s! There were even bars called Pink Floyd or named after some of their songs... I mean, my generation suddenly stopped listening to Duran Duran, Wham, and Madonna and either dug out (those of us who had them at home) or bought records by the Floyd... I remember the drunken nights, the joints while watching "At Pompeii" on Loop... I truly believe that the '80s ended (at least for those of us who were still teens in 1987/88) with the return of the Floyd and “great music”… Then grunge (or new rock) soon swept everything away again, but it did so IMHO mooltooo better than Punk.

Years ago, when they launched Voyager into space, a probe that is exploring the remote corners of our galaxy and is set to serve as a testament to the music of humankind, they included 4 artists: Bach, Beethoven, Beatles, and PINK FLOYD!!! There must be a reason for this, given that they conducted an international consultation and then made their decision...
I believe that Punk (at least the English version from '77) was the greatest musical scam of all time. It was nothing but "post-Beat" (let's call it Mod a la Who or Small Faces, Kinks, Troggs) combined with the American "garage Rock" of "Standells," "Chocolate Watchband," and many others with the gritty sounds borrowed from Hard Rock and early Metal.
The greatest Punk artists... (who weren't really punk) from the legendary Stranglers to the Clash and even Elvis Costello shifted direction within a couple of years... others like the Police played an absolutely detached Punk from the context of Generation X, Dead Kennedys, Sex Pistols, and assorted trivialities...
The Pink Floyd are immortal, just like the Beatles, Hendrix, the Zeppelins, the Stones, King Crimson, and all those who shook up "popular music" of the 20th century... Not to forget Miles Davis, Coltrane, Parker, and before them, Ellington and Goodman...
AHM is the first album I (re)listened to as an "adult" by the Floyd, and it was the one that literally shocked me. From there, I listened to everything from Piper to The Final Cut, but I agree with the reviewer: the atmospheres of AHM are unique in the Prog landscape, much closer to the German cosmic Rock of Tangerine Dream, Popol Vuh, and Ash Ra Tempel than to the symphonic sounds of Moody Blues or Procol Harum.

Scaruffi has strung together a series of nonsense like few I've read: if my father were to read it, I'm sure he would be waiting for him outside his house... and my father belongs to that generation, having lived through rock from Elvis to the "coldplay" and continues to do so! Fine for music criticism as long as it is self-contained, but when comparisons start, it’s another story. Groups before the Beatles? Yes, there were vocal groups, Tamla (Motown), Surf Rock, the Beach Boys, and the Shadows. However, the Beatles created, or rather redefined, what either didn't exist or was dead. Enough about Rock! I’m so tired of saying it! The Beatles were not ROCK. The Beatles were the inventors of modern Pop, which had stalled since the days of Bing Crosby and Frank Sinatra!! I hope Scaruffi understands this.... When he brings in the social aspect, it’s heartbreaking: in my father's, my aunt's, and my mother's time, Dylan (whom my father listened to anyway) and Baez were at least rare in Italy! Even today, my parent knows little and nothing about the DOORS (who only arrived in Italy in the late '70s) and even "Jefferson Airplane"... But do the censors understand that this stuff didn’t exist in Italy?! That it wasn’t imported... and if you found it, you had to be a follower? In England, the Beatles, despite new groups, continued to enjoy fame and respect, even during the Pink Floyd era... unlike in America, where THEIR MUSIC (Byrds, Dylan, Doors, Jefferson, Dead, Love, Neil Young, Stephen Stills, and whoever else you can name) always dominated even during the Beatles era :-))

First of all, writing a review of a compilation, especially if this compilation is by the Beatles, is like writing about Hegel after having read the summary 5 minutes before the class test. That said, I agree in saying that the Beatles before "Rubber Soul," for me the first truly "new" album in pop, were certainly not "monsters" of skill... Just as Elvis was not the greatest rocker... no, I'm very sorry, the greatest rockers were "Chuck Berry," "Eddie Cochran," and "Buddy Holly"... speaking of technique, creativity, genius! There, I've said it... The point is that when the "scarrafoni" (a colloquial term for Beatles) started to get serious, their little ones had long since surpassed their masters: just think of the Kinks, but also the Small Faces, the Zombies, the aforementioned Stones, and all those groups that in the second half of the sixties created a rock that broke free from the paths of psychedelia (ah, it's also good to remember that the masterpiece/manifesto of psychedelia is not Sgt. Pepper's, but THE PIPER AT THE GATES OF DAWN by Floyd... I'm sorry) and began to play strange music made up of improbable classical and pop contraptions: it was called Symphonic Rock or Baroque Rock, and the vanguards were undoubtedly Keith Emerson's Nice, the Moody Blues, and Procol Harum...
After a couple of years with King Crimson, the genre became more codified: thus was born progressive rock, the highest expression that rock has given to humanity, demonstrating that it is the only musical genre without barriers or boundaries. But it was in that second half of the sixties, when the Beatles were dominating the charts, that "the others" were overturning rock 'n' roll: giants like Eric Clapton, Steve Marriot, Rod Argent (not to mention America with the Byrds, the Doors, and Love) were going beyond... much beyond... And the only significant response "in terms of originality" that the 4 from Liverpool gave was undoubtedly "THE WHITE ALBUM"... and even before that "Revolver," which with the stunning "Eleanor Rigby" is worth the whole album on its own...
What needs to be explored is the social phenomenon... The Beatles were the first to (re)propose Rock/Pop when it was dead along with Buddy Holly and Eddie Cochran in those dreadful plane crashes that killed them... Perhaps the "Shadows" (and their American clones) could have done it, but their music was far too ahead, predominantly instrumental, with fiery guitars and drums...
Guys, if we're talking about technique and innovation: where do we place Misirlou?? Or the epic "Apache"? As I said, however, that music was too ahead even if part of the rock that emerged ten years later can be traced back to it...

Abbey Road doesn't possess the historical epicness of "Rubber Soul" or "Revolver," nor does it carry the subversiveness of the White Album (which will always remain for me the Beatles' masterpiece and one of pop music's finest). However, it's still a beautiful album, indeed stunning, adorned with absolute masterpieces like "Something" and "Come Together." Some excessive lengthiness doesn't make me shout "it’s a miracle," but it's still perhaps among the three albums I love most by the Beatles...
Regarding the usual Lennon-McCartney debate, I have to say that I've always preferred Macca, in my opinion a more complete musician than his friend/rival... and indeed I feel quite angered by those who, taking their two solo careers into account, launch attacks against Macca! Lennon has made some pretty terrible and indefensible mistakes... Macca, on the other hand, when he was with the Wings, really stepped up! I'm sorry for the detractors... Anyway, great review... and don't argue over these things: think about politics.

The Black Sabbath are the Black Sabbath! To put it bluntly, in 1970 they released that masterpiece of rock, the self-titled album, which is everything (for me). Those funeral bells that start the record forever shattered the very concept of rock as it had been expressed until then: and they did it much better than the Purple or the Zeppelin, at least in my modest opinion... Everything came from them; without them, rock would already be dead. What many still struggle to separate is the concept of Rock and Pop... For heaven's sake, Pop can also be cultured, indeed very cultured, as in the case of Lennon, but it's still POP! Hence the big difference between the Beatles and the Rolling Stones... The Stones always made that "ugly-dirty-bad" mix of Blues, R'n'B, and Country that was called Rock'n'roll... just like AC/DC, Aerosmith... etc... etc... The Beatles predominantly made pop (despite the rock origins of the Quarrymen taken up by Lennon himself). This is a fact. So comparisons are more awkward than useless... It's like comparing Frank Sinatra to Miles Davis, Beethoven to Bach... how can you?

Perhaps it seems that someone hasn't understood the high dose of irony contained in Vic's (superlative) review!! This often happens, especially in Italy (the country of the Status Quo), when touching upon myths: whether these myths are called Aldo Moro (who was a son of a good woman... come on now) Carlo Alberto Dalla Chiesa or Giovanni Falcone or John Lennon or Elvis Presley or Jim Morrison, it doesn’t matter much.
Double Fantasy (except for 2 or 3 songs) is an album that, had it come from the guitar of any "Al Stewart" or "Joe Jackson," would have been shattered by critics, but above all by the public. While it’s established that of the 4 beetles, Lennon was the one I liked the least (for me, McCartney is much better, not to mention the greatly underrated Harrison), I must say that he did well in the early albums up to "rock'n'roll"... However, we need to reason with serenity, folks: if Lennon hadn't been the co-creator of the Beatles, he would have been yet another "one-hit wonder" (Imagine) chasing after the first sensational success without ever finding it again.
Vic was much more caustic than I am, but he expressed concepts that I partly agree with. "The Japanese whore" really messed with his brain! and I think this is beyond discussion, especially among die-hard Beatles fans. If we also consider that his first wife, Cynthia, was a charming piece of... English and (they say) also had a disarming sweetness... I'm convinced that the witch from Tokyo must have entranced him with some strange spell... could she be a relative of Queen Himika??
Yes, if he had lived, I believe that Lennon’s artistic decline would have been certain as well as inevitable... unless.... perhaps a reunion with the other 3.
Best regards.