Legendary Rock Songs: ANOTHER BRICK IN THE WALL, PT. 2: PINK FLOYD.
My people I hope you are all super well a big hug on this day, today I want to present this editorial which is about one of the most emblematic themes of rock music, which has inspired many for years, which belongs to a mega legendary band, which is a legend, I'm talking about PINK FLOYD, so I hope you enjoy this reading.
Disc:The Wall.
Year:1979.
Pink Floyd was always a band from another galaxy. Born experimenters, they searched for atmospheric effects, passages of overwhelming intensity and sentimental tension without resorting, contrary to popular belief, to the intricate approaches of other bands of the progressive-symphonic genre. They already had little to prove in 1979 when in a period of four years they had shaped three masterful works such as “The Dark Side Of The Moon” and its sales records (1973), the elegant “Wish You Were Here” (1975) and the hallucinogenic “Animals” (1977).
But the ambition of their leader Rogers Waters, who had taken over after Syd Barrett disappeared in a parallel dimension of schizophrenia and LSD, had no end. So he set out to create one of the most monumental works of the movement, and the result was the double album “The Wall” (23 million records in American homes), a full-fledged rock opera centered on the figure of Pink, the neurotic music star haunted by the ghosts of frustration, fame and madness.
The biographical connections with Waters himself and even with Barrett were easily identifiable, so the eccentric Rogers decided to make the project his own from the beginning. In the end he was right, since it was 90% a work of his own creation, but that caused hard tensions within the group, especially between the megalomaniac and narcissistic Waters and guitarist David Gilmour, which ended in an irreconcilable enmity for life.
The fact is that in the musical thread of “The Wall” we find a little bit of everything, from hard heavy rock guitars to operatic musical passages. But what is most striking is precisely the song “Another Brick In The Wall, pt. 2” - which was released as a single in November '79, a month before the album - because it broke with all the preconceived schemes of the British band.
The song itself was a full-fledged single, something certainly strange for a band whose “songs” (except for such not very clear cases as “Money” or “Wish You Were Here”) were the least likely to be played on the radio. Much of the blame went to producer Bod Ezrin (Alice Cooper, Kiss, Lou Reed), almost a surrogate ally of Waters, whose contribution to the album is undoubtedly much more than officially credited.
Ezrin achieved what seemed impossible, that this disco track was released as a single and in only five days it sold 340,000 copies. The truth is that it had a hook, with that catchy “we don't need no education” that in its last verses was sung by a children's choir. A contribution for which each boy received a copy of the album and his school, Brittania Row, a good sum of money. Many will remember when hearing the song the animated scenes of the parade of the hammers created by the cartoonist Gerald Scarfe for Alan Parker's film based on the album and starring Bod Geldof, or the images of the massive tour of presentation of the album in which the group played in front of a monstrous recreation of the wall that appeared on the cover of the album.
As you can see, there was no end to Waters' desire for greatness. Perhaps because of this relationship between the theme and the almost military march of those drawings, but also because of the anti-educational content of its chorus, the song in question was adopted as a protest slogan in some student revolts, even being banned in a South Africa that was still living the hangover of the violent anti-segregationist demonstrations of apartheid. Anything is possible in the pink floydian universe.
Friends thanks for reading me and I hope that this edition of legendary rock songs, you liked it, enjoy the theme which I leave you in the link, and excuse me that I did not put the original photo of my magazine as I always show it, is that this part was damaged, thank goodness that I digitized all the reports as they are a jewel which I can now bring to you through this platform. A thousand blessings and see you in a next post of legendary rock songs.
