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Rating: March 1969
The Pink Floyd are tasked with quickly scoring the film "More" by Barbet Schroeder, focusing on the story of a drug-addicted couple on a trip to Ibiza.
The absence of Barrett was still felt but only up to a point, as David Gilmour's role was becoming crucial, and the rest of the band certainly did not hesitate to sprinkle psychedelic colors into the sound. In "More" a perfect cohesion between vocal and instrumental tracks is evident, suitable for highlighting particular moments of Schroeder's film. The bird song that opens "Cirrus Minor" evokes the love binding those two protagonists at sunrise, in a possibly isolated countryside; gradually, the melody takes shape, and Roger Waters guides us with his voice through echoing dark recesses, then leaves us with Richard Wright's organ gusts that indeed shine, like the dawn of a new day. Subsequently, the group's hardest piece ever arrives, a "The Nile Song" suspended between a deliberately over-the-top progression with an angry Gilmour who makes his guitar literally bleed. "Crying song" wants to return to the realms of "Cirrus Minor", only to end with a melancholic electric solo in pure Gilmour style. The instrumental "Up the Khyber" recalls the more dissonant part of the suite "A Saucerful Of Secrets" with those muted piano beatings that dissipate after 2 minutes, going backward. More bucolic atmospheres with "Green Is The Colour" followed by the splendid ballad "Cymbaline", truly atypical for the Floyd. The Main Theme could be the ideal follow-up to "Set The Controls For The Heart Of The Sun", a spiritual ride towards sick minds.
"Ibiza Bar" could easily have been titled "The Nile Song-Part 2" and "More Blues" is a slow nocturnal Blues hastily interrupted by intrusive noises leading to the lysergic visions of the long "Quicksilver" (the best track, definitely to be listened to at night). A very peculiar Spanish-style intermezzo ("A Spanish Piece") anticipates the epilogue of the brief and flamboyant "Dramatic Theme".
Perhaps it's normal that the soundtrack of an unknown cult gains less importance than "A Saucerful Of Secrets" or "Atom Heart Mother", but that doesn't mean it should necessarily be forgotten.
PS: consider it as a 3.5, I want to be generous because giving it a 3 seemed a bit wasted.
Tracklist Lyrics and Videos
01 Cirrus Minor (05:15)
In a churchyard by a river,
Lazing in the haze of midday,
Laughing in the grasses and the graze.
Yellow bird, you are alone
In singing and in flying on,
In laughing and in leaving.
Willow weeping in the water,
Waving to the river daughters,
Swaying in the ripples and the reeds.
On a trip to Cirrus Minor,
Saw a crater in the sun
A thousand miles of moonlight later.
02 The Nile Song (03:24)
I was standing by the Nile
When I saw the lady smile.
I would take her out for a while,
For a while.
Oh, my tears wept like a child.
How her golden hair was blowing wild.
Then she spread her wings to fly,
For to fly.
Soaring high above the breezes,
Going always where she pleases.
She will make it to the islands in the sun.
I will follow in her shadow
As I watch her from my window.
One day I will catch her eye.
She is calling from the deep,
Summoning my soul to endless sleep.
She is bound to drag me down,
Drag me down.
06 Cymbaline (04:47)
The path you tread is narrow
And the drop is sheer and very high
The ravens all are watching
From a vantage point nearby
Apprehension creeping
Like a tube-train up your spine
Will the tightrope reach the end?
Will the final couplet rhyme?
And it's high time...
Cymbaline
Yes it's high time...
Cymbaline
Please wake me
A butterfly with broken wings
Is falling by your side
The ravens all are closing in
And there's nowhere you can hide
Your manager and agent
Are both busy on the phone
Selling coloured photographs
To magazines back home
And it's high time...
Cymbaline
Yes it's high time...
Cymbaline
Please wake me
The lines converging where you stand
They must have moved the picture plane
The leaves are heavy round your feet
You hear the thunder of the train
Suddenly it strikes you
That they're moving into range
And Doctor Strange is always changing size
And it's high time...
Cymbaline
Yes it's high time...
Cymbaline
Please wake me
And it's high time...
Cymbaline
Yes it's high time...
Cymbaline
Please wake me
09 Ibiza Bar (03:16)
I'm so afraid of the mistakes that I made
Taking every time that I wake
I feel like a hard-boiled and cut-up man
So give me a time when the countries will lie on the storyline if kind
Are days are made since the first page
I've lived every line that you wrote
Take me down, take me down, from the shelf above your head
So give me a time when the countries will lie on the storyline if kind
And if I live on the shelf like the rest
And if love bleeds like a sad song
Please pick-up your camera and use me again
So give me a time when the countries will lie on the storyline if kind
Yea
12 A Spanish Piece (01:05)
Pass the tequila, Manuel
(glug, snort)
Listen, gringo, laugh at my lisp and I kill you
I think
This Spanish music
It sets my soul on fire
Lovely seniorita
Your eyes are like stars
Your teeth are like pearls
Your ruby lips
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Other reviews
By valeriozappa
The predominant color is green, luminous, streaked with blue, as I stroll through the forest.
Perhaps now I feel a bit richer than before...
By pana
"Green is the Colour, which for me represents one of my favorite songs by the London group, (almost) like hits such as 'Time' and 'Wish You Were Here.'"
"It is a record that deserves to be listened to and evaluated, also for its great variety of musical genres that showcase the versatility of the great band."
