Roger Waters and Pink Floyd

The Concept Albums

By (author) Phil Rose

Publication date:

14 January 2015

Length of book:

278 pages

Publisher

Fairleigh Dickinson University Press

ISBN-13: 9781611477603

Beyond its elucidation and critique of traditional ‘notation-centric’ musicology, this book's primary emphasis is on the negotiation and construction of meaning within the extended musical multimedia works of the classic British group Pink Floyd. Encompassing the concept albums that the group released from 1973 to 1983, during Roger Waters’ final period with the band, chapters are devoted to Dark Side of the Moon (1973), Wish You Were Here (1975), Animals (1977), The Wall (1979) and The Final Cut (1983), along with Waters’ third solo album Amused to Death (1993). This book's analysis of album covers, lyrics, music and film makes use of techniques of literary and film criticism, while employing the combined lenses of musical hermeneutics and discourse analysis, so as to illustrate how sonic and musical information contribute to listeners’ interpretations of the discerning messages of these monumental musical artifacts. Ultimately, it demonstrates how their words, sounds, and images work together in order to communicate one fundamental concern, which—to paraphrase the music journalist Karl Dallas—is to affirm human values against everything in life that should conspire against them.

Preface
Introduction
Chapter 1: Dark Side of the Moon
Chapter 2: Wish You Were Here
Chapter 3: Animals
Chapter 4: The Wall
Chapter 5: The Final Cut
Chapter 6: Amused to Death
Appendix: Interview with Roger Waters
Works Cited and Consulted
Album Information
Index
About the Author

Rogers Waters and Pink Floyd: The Concept Albums represents a welcome and focused effort to examine something the author finds largely missing in popular commercial culture.... [F]rom the start the reader encounters an in-depth and assured investigation of the musical dimensions of this remarkable group.