Pink Floyd
Atom Heart Mother

I believe that every person, passionate about music that is, has had a guiding artist who accompanied them in the discovery of great music. I mean an artist who opens your eyes, who revolutionizes your way of seeing music, as a supreme and total art, the most immediate and accessible that can sometimes give true emotions. Sometimes it's also just an album that changes your perception.
I am aware that there are so many Pink Floyd reviews on the site that they could make you nauseous; but I didn't decide to review Atom Heart Mother for personal whim, nor do I consider it the best album by the English band. In fact, knowing their discography well, I agree that, as the "Floydian" experts never tire of repeating, their great masterpieces are "The Piper At the Gates Of Dawn" and "Meddle."

However, Atom is my favorite album. And I will try to make you understand why.

In 1970, the Pink Floyd, after two very difficult albums, More and Ummagumma, decided to embark on an extremely ambitious project, creating a symphonic-rock work without precedent. Despite its strictly experimental aspect, in line with the previous Ummagumma, the album in question managed to climb the UK charts. For the first time, a Floyd album reached the top spot. And there must be a reason.

The feelings that the album in question gives are unique and different from any other work by the band. I believe I can say that the album is the result of Ummagumma's experiments, and for this reason (don't hold it against me) I consider it superior to the previous one. In fact, while UG is characterized by a certain discontinuity between the various parts recorded in the studio, ATH is more compact, also thanks to the support of the orchestra.

The suite, titled like the album, is divided into six parts.

Father's Shout is the introduction which, as in any respectable symphonic suite, declares the central theme, which is a magnificent explosion of winds accompanied by Nick's drums and Richard's movements.
Following is Breast Milky which features a fast keyboard sequence accompanied by a touching viola, then replaced by the rarefied sound of David's guitar which becomes increasingly intense, more aggressive until it buries the entire orchestra.
Mother Fore is a choir, extraordinary, beautiful. The emerging female voice communicates perfection, complete serenity to me. It is Roger's bass that maintains the band's presence in the affair, until Nick's drums return to accompany us to the next part.
Funky Dung is a funky passage where rhythmic guitar and keyboards chase each other on a foundation of a hypnotic bass riff. This part, although devoid of orchestral parts, does not break with the previous music. That's the beauty of the suite. There's never a breaking point. The rhythm changes, but the central theme occasionally returns, always in new and different forms.
Mind Your Throats Please strongly recalls the sounds of Ummagumma, and in some ways, it is even disturbing. The sensation is of falling into a dark abyss of dissonance and noise until the ascent (at the end of this part, it indeed feels like taking a breath of fresh air).
All the themes the listener has sensed return and blend in Remergence (which indeed means "blend") that readapts the main theme. The part of Mother Fore also returns. This time it ends with the most extraordinary music I've ever heard. A total, immense, indescribable explosion.
If humanity possessed a video of the Big Bang and music had to be introduced for a documentary, I would use the finale of Atom Heart Mother.

The second part of the album aims to be radically opposed to the magnificence of the suite and in my opinion, it is dominated by what I like to call a "sense of everydayness".

It is precisely the everyday/extraordinary relationship that dominates the album. I don't mean just the music. Even the very structure of the album, the cover, and even the booklet of lyrics, all the images communicate what is general, crystalline, that doesn't need to be questioned. It communicates the sensation of the morning, of awakening, of reflection: above all, of reflection and desire.
Like in "If", where Roger lays bare his restless personality and his second thoughts, a very simple song, based on a few arpeggios and written, as the title suggests, in the conditional tense.
Even "Summer 68" highlights the nature of the band, always searching (and this unites even the opposing personalities of David and Roger) for happiness that should not be sought in the extreme or in pleasure, but in sincere friendship based on mutual respect.

"If I were a good man
I'd understand the spaces between friends"
from "If"

and in the search for a tranquility that knows no arrogance or sexual pride.

"I felt the cold far too soon
The wind of '95
My friends are lying in the sun
I wish that I was there
Tomorrow brings another town
Another girl like you"
from "Summer 68"

This ideal reaches its completion with David's acoustic song, "Fat Old Sun", with still serene lyrics and music, like an ode to joy that starts from an alternation of simple major chords until it culminates in an extraordinary solo, which never ends, fading slowly until the dripping of Alan's faucet.
I am talking about "Alan's Psychedelic Breakfast", a sound representation of the English breakfast, complete with bacon and marmalade, alternated with improvisations with psychedelic-progressive tones by the individual members, until the final union of the band in the extraordinary finale "Morning Glory".

I was fortunate enough to listen to the album for the first time on vinyl, and from the very first time, I was fascinated by the greatness of their music; I had never been able before to imagine music that brought rock music closer to the orchestral, and even though the result was not completely successful (the music is not recorded well), this album comes very close to my idea of fusion between light and symphonic music.

Pink Floyd's music has always matched my tastes and has undoubtedly been my true "guide." Ultimately, saying that Pink Floyd was the greatest band that ever existed is not enough. Because even just defining them as a "band" is reductive in proportion to what they were.