Eclipse

I think this song is in order today... Oh and long live Pink Floyd. The greatest rock band ever.

Hey Hey Rise Up

Big news in the musical world: Pink Floyd,which is incidentally my favourite rock band, has reunited after 28 years to compose a song to support Ukraine. Sure, it will not change everything, in the great scheme of things. And sure, this is not The Dark Side of the Moon or Wish You Were Here. That said... Hell yes!

"We don't need no education..."

And you know the rest, or at least I hope you do. If there is a song that  illustrates everything wrong (or that can be wrong) with the school system, it might be that one. So to all the kids going back to school this week, I give you this song and the clip from the movie The Wall by the greatest rock group of all, Pink Floyd. Okay, so everything is not that bad, but when it does get bad, it feels like it, like you are in the meat grinder.

Grimble Gromble the Gnome

I thought this blog needed a bit more Pink Floyd, as I have not uploaded any of their song since 2015. So here is The Gnome from their first album. It is kind of silly compared to their greatest works, but it's a catchy tune and it's a million times better than the rubbish we get on radio these days. The Piper at the Gate of Dawn had plenty of folkloric elements, come to think of it.

Comfortably Numb

I haven't uploaded a Pink Floyd song on this blog since April. A song from The Wall, not my favourite album, which might surprise you. Still quality stuff. I enjoyed the movie too, however unsettling way. Anyway, Comfortably Numb is not how I feel tonight, but it is how I long to feel. Without pain or worries. Without the LSD of course. This was during their performance on Live 8. Back in 2005, it was not aired in Canada, which got me outraged. So uploading it today is a bit of a revenge for me.

Pink Floyd for Earth Day

Just like every year, Google reminded me with his Doodle that today is Earth Day. I was not sure how to commemorate it this year, then I thought that we didn't have Pink Floyd for a while on Vraie Fiction. So I decided to upload here Take it Back from The Division Bell. Not my favourite Pink Floyd album by far, but it is an eco-friendly song and I cannot put every year the Discovery Channel's jingle. And Pink Floyd, even a tad preachy, is still Pink Floyd.

To warm my bones beside the fire...

Picture taken at my wife's friends' place in Derbyshire. It illustrates my state of mind and what I long for: a warm fire. It happens to me sometimes. Because, while winter is not often cold in this country, it is often cool and wet and rather unpleasant and, while you would still rather stay home, you are forced for whatever reason to go out. When I am home, I wish I could just lit a fire and just sit down and keep myself warm, wrapped up in a blanket. But there is no fireplace here. So I have to use hot (very hot) showers instead and well, a blanket. Also we don't have the Peak District surrounding us, so a fire would be slightly less romantic. All the same, I wish I had a fireplace now. And so accompany this post, I have decided to add a bit of Pink Floyd music, the last segment of Time. Because it is magnificent. And because it is my state of mind.

Astronomy Domine

I thought I would put a bit of Pink Floyd on this blog, since I haven't done so for more than a year and since Vraie Fiction needs a bit of music. It is from their first album, The Piper at the Gates of Dawn and it is Astronomy Domine. Quality psychedelic music like they don't make it anymore. For me, Pink Floyd is the Alpha and the Omega of rock music. Of modern music, period.

Syd Barrett (1946-2006)

Today is the anniversary of the death of Syd Barrett, the founder of Pink Floyd, my favourite group, bare none. He died on the 7th of July 2006, overshadowed by the group he had created. We owe him a lot. To commemorate his death and to put everyone in a psychedelic mood, I have decided to upload a song from The Piper at the Gates of Dawn. It is Flaming. You can't get more psychedelic than this song. Enjoy.

The Dark Side of the Moon

I thought I would blog tonight about the upcoming Easter, as it is the Holy Week and all, but I discovered today, one day late, that it was the 40th year anniversary of the UK release of The Dark Side of the Moon. So I ditched my Easter post. But not quite, I guess, as my intention was/is to show Easter in a different light. Or a different darkness. Pink Floyd made psychedelic music that could easily be considered religious or spiritual. Psychedelic is, in essence, spiritual. Or as spiritual as something can be for a Godless heathen like me. Pink Floyd is also, maybe more so, existentialist. And existentialism is what replaced Christianity in my way of seeing the world in my late teen. And it mentions a rabbit in Breathe, so it is sort of Easter related. Okay I am stretching things here. I could also say it has ten songs, like the Bible has Ten Commandments. Stretching again, but not nearly as much as saying it is linked to The Wizard of Oz. I have decided to upload tonight Brain Damage and Eclipse. Maybe Breathe would have been more appropriate, what with its rabbit digging holes to catch the sun (son?), and this verse about an early grave. But I did upload Breathe on Vraie Fiction before and these two tunes have, well, the dark side of the moon and the eclipse. So enjoy.

Money by Pink Floyd

I did not upload a song of Pink Floyd on this blog since September 2012. I thought it was time to put some more. Because Vraie Fiction needs some sound and music as it sometimes needs some colour. And just because I love Pink Floyd. There is plenty I did not upload yet, I decided it is Money this time. Why Money? Why not? It is short enough to listen to on a Thursday night and it has that pleasurable, cynical, borderline nasty beat. Like a YouTube commenter said, it is an anthem to capitalism. ironic since the group made a lot of money with it. But I guess it is part of the interest of this song. I don't want to comment too much on it, I think it is already getting long. The best way to appreciate it is to listen to it. This is both real music and real poetry. So enjoy.

Lucifer Sam

I love cats. I love how mysterious they are and how spooky they can be, even when people think they look devilish. I don't care: they have the charm and beauty of the devil. I love Pink Floyd. And Halloween is getting closer and closer. So I had in the head all day Lucifer Sam, an early song of their first album. Since I don't put enough Pink Floyd on Vraie Fiction, I decided to upload the song here. This is pure primitive psychedelic pleasure.

Pink Floyd and Sisyphus

I am feeling quite tired these days, trying to deal with a jet lag that never really seems to dwindle and at work I feel a bit like Sisyphus (never a good sign).And well, for some obvious reason I had this Pink Floyd Song in the head when I got home. I had noticed it before: it does have allusion to the myth of Sisyphus, what with the rabbit catching the sun and digging holes repeatedly. With the other existentialist themes oftene xpressed in Pink Floyd's music and this piece in particular, I wonder if they read Camus or if it is just a coincidence. Anyway, this is my second post this week about a Memento Mori. A more profound, poetic one this time. A more beautiful too. Unlike me, Pink Floyd is ageless and immortal.

Every year is getting shorter

"And then one day you find
Ten years have got behind you
No one told you when to run
You missed the starting gun"

Time, Pink Floyd

I have decided to blog on Pink Floyd inspired by my brother's comment on this post. I was thinking about the quote he put there and it got stuck in my head. The Dark Side of the Moon is the first Pink Floyd album I listened to back to back and it is still my favourite one.

I put Time on the blog when Richard Wright died. As it says on the Wikipedia entry, the song is a Memento mori (something I sometimes blog about) and I am in a mood to think about such things because July is almost gone and I have barely seen it. August is starting tomorrow and August often gives me melancholia (as mentioned here). But is started earlier this year, in this July month that was so busy and which I could barely feel because I got so busy. The last few days, I have been listening to The Dark Side of the Moon over and over again and this song in particular, looking at the sunset, wondering where the year has gone. I find the last lyrics particularly poignant:

"Every year is getting shorter
Never seem to find the time
Plans that either come to nought
Or half a page of scribbled lines
Hanging on in quiet desparation is the English way
The time is gone
The song is over
Thought I'd something more to say "

I don't hang on in quiet desperation because that is not quite me (I guess I am not English), but I do think if I do all the things I want to do in a year, or even a day. Funny how a song one listened countless times still find new meaning when one reaches a certain maturity. I was a teenager and just loved the music and barely understood the lyrics. I mean, I understood English enough to know what they meant, but not quite what it was about. So I know I put the song here before, but I will put it here again nevertheless, to share my mood. There might be a hint of cruelty in this, but take it as a catharsis.

The Scarecrow

"...and the spectacle of a scarecrow in a field late on a winter afternoon has cost him more than one sleepless night."

M.R. James, "Oh, Whistle, and I'll Come to You, My Lad"

A blogging friend put yesterday a song of Pink Floyd on her blog. Being in a psychedelic mood and since any reason is good to listen to Pink Floyd, I decided to put here a song from their earliest album, The Piper at the Gates of Dawn. It was back when they still had Syd Barrett as the leader. Sure, it's no Dark Side of the Moon, but it was a promising debut nevertheless. I decided to put The Scarecrow here,for many reasons. The wikipedia entry says that the song has existentialist themes, which is true of maybe any good Pink Floyd song, and you know how into existentialism I am. Scarecrows are also autumnal creatures, that I associate with Halloween. There is something just unsettling and threatening about them, these still, ghostly watchers. Of course, there is also the Batman villain of the same name that popularises the scarecrow as a malevolent entity. His scenes in Batman Begins are among my favourite (have a look here and here).

Anyway, the scarecrow of Pink Floyd is not a dangerous fellow, he is actually a sympathetic figure. Nevertheless, even the rare video clip I will show has something a bit spooky, even if the background is summery. Maybe it is the look of the scarecrow itself, maybe it is the strange (meant to be drug induced?) trance of Roger Water and Nick Mason at the end of the clip. Maybe it is because English summers can have autumnal undertones, maybe because the scarecrow looks mummified and skeletal. Anyway,enjoy the music and shine on.

The Great Gig in the Sky

Not quite a feel-good Friday song (and I guess I could have given you Learning to Fly, which I grew to love and is quite upbeat), but this is a great song, from probably their greatest album, and it is about death in an exhilarating way. Rest in Peace Rick, you are missed.

Wish You Were Here

It might look like I cannot stop grieving Richard Wright, and I know I said that putting Wish You Were Here on this blog would be cliché, but there is this nice tribute I found on youtube and I don't see why I wouldn't put more Pink Floyd here anyway, especially since it's a great song. Unoriginality be damned.

Why do I love Pink Floyd that much? Well, because they made symphonic music more than modern ones, and is one of the very few rock groups that has both powerful music and powerful text. In other words, Pink Floyd was not marshmallow and fluffy stuff, it was music with content. Dealing with teenage alienation (like all teenager) in the 90s, the music seemed to illustrate my feelings and thoughts. I guess my choice of music never varied that much. I like "classical" music, whatever the time period, and opera. Pink Floyd is as operatic as a modern group can be. The Wall is, in essence, a modern opera (not a rock opera or a psychedelic opera or a musical, an opera, period). But the way the music does not merely accompany the voice but carries it is quite close to opera music. Of course, there is no story/plot in a Pink Floyd album (except The Wall, and even then), so maybe their music belongs to the form of the oratorio. Oh, well enough musing and let's get to the music.

RIP Richard Wright

I thought I wouldn't blog today, but I just learnt some very sad news. Richard Wright is dead. At 65. Being dead was sad enough, but at this relatively young age, and from cancer, that's quite depressing. He was one of the original members of Pink Floyd. I can't express how much their music meant to me when I was a teenager growing up in 90s Québec. I absolutely, utterly love Pink Floyd. I could live without almost any music from the XXth century, but theirs. I was guttered when I learned the death of Syd Barrett in 2006. I am guttered today.

I put here in his honour the song Time, from their great albukm Dark Side of the Moon, which made me discover them. And the song is de circonstances (and Wish you Were Here might have been a bit cliché now). RIP Richard Wright, but the music survives, per omnia seculae seculorum.

Bang Bang, You're Dead

My wife says I am conservative when it comes to music, and it's absolutely true. I don't like much of the modern stuff, music production could have stopped after Pink Floyd and I wouldn't have missed much in my collection. That said, according to my wife I enjoy new songs and groups only when the music they play is old-fashioned. I discovered recently (well, almost two years ago) through the BBC short-lived series Sorted (a shame they axed that one, by the way), the tune Bang Bang, You're Dead, by Dirty Pretty Things. Love it to bits. I don't know exactly what I love so much about it: it's sort of good old rock beat, it has a bit of a Ennio Morricone feel, juuuuuust enough to be perceived, there is the British accent, and it all mixes so well.

So here you are, here's the official clip from youtube, so you can judge for yourself: