Ummagumma
Capitol - Capitol
Pink Floyd
Release date: 1990-10-25
Audio CD
Album Rock, British Psychedelia, Pop, Pop/Rock Music, Prog-Rock/Art Rock, Psychedelic, Rock, Rock/Pop
1. Astronomy Domine - Pink Floyd, Barrett, Syd
2. Careful With That Axe, Eugene - Pink Floyd, Waters, Roger
3. Set the Controls for the Heart of the Sun - Pink Floyd, Waters, Roger
4. A Saucerful of Secrets - Pink Floyd, Waters, Roger
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Ummagumma
Date undefinedThat line from a much later song could be an unintentional self-review of this album. What you're getting here is the last hurrah of a much earlier permutation of the band. Half of it is a four-cut live set that I think is their first live album, extended with a smattering of solo works. The live disc contains a version of "Astronomy Domine" that is described by another reviewer with some accuracy as too close to the studio version, but you're also getting "Careful With That Axe Eugene", a slash movie without picture. The intro eases in, someone whispers ominously the warning in the song's title, then guitars and voices start shrieking bloody murder. That track has a shorter studio version that never made either of the first two albums and is next to impossible to find even as a rarity. You also get "Set the Controls" and "Saucerful Of Secrets", those first two albums' extended tracks. The studio disc has "Sisyphus", a mellotron/ piano exercise from Rick Wright; Grantchester Meadows, a pensive Syd Barrett folk song which ends in the sound of a fly buzzing around until someone runs down a flight of stairs and swats the thing (how he heard the fly from upstairs is beyond me); "Several Species Od Small Furry Animals", an intersting sequencing of animal sounds on a multi-track tape machine into a zoological drum machine (maybe you could call it "Masontronics" as in Robert Fripp's "Frippertronics"); David Gilmour's "The Narrow Way"; and yet another drum-based analog sampling of drum sounds. The problem with this album is that most Pink Floyd listeners came onboard with "Dark Side Of the Moon" and are mainstream radio fare fans, so they tend to be turned off by all of this "artsy, obscure-sounding crapola", not knowing that this is pretty much what Pink Floyd used to sound like before and slightly after Syd Barrett left.
Ummagumma
Date undefinedAround this time period Pink Floyd was a psychedelic band but more progressive rock band that had lost there original singer Syd Barrett, and then hired a new singer, David Gilmour and were bassicly at this time trying too become a successful band. There third album, Ummagumma is a double album with live tracks and experimental studio recordings. The live part of the album was recorded live in 1969 and shows Pink Floyd developing jams they would use later in there carrerrs, Careful With That Axe Eugene, and also still using some Syd Barrett material(Astronomy Domine) Then the album part of this is composed in sections each written by members of the band and is quite experimental. This album for anyone who craves early David Gilmour Pink Floyd and people who need every Pink Floyd album ever made
Ummagumma
Date undefinedThis is a CLASSIC album from Pink Floyd. I've loved it since it's release.
Not only do you have live tracks of songs from their earliest albums (A Saucerful of Secrets, Astronomy Domine, etc.), but you have a suite of pieces each from Richard Wright (Sysyphus, Parts 1-4), David Gilmour (The Narrow Way, Parts 1-3), and Nick Mason (The Grand Vizier's Garden Party, Parts 1,2, & 3). ...Ans don't miss Roger Waters' 2 pieces: Grantchester Meadows and the inimitable (not that any have tried, to my knowledge) Several Species of Small Furry Aninals Gathered Together in a Cave and Grooving With a Pict!
This album covers Floyd's gamut up to the time of its release (1969) and presages their future from that vantage point. A MUST purchase for anyone wanting to know Pink Floyd from all sides.
