Pink Floyd’s album, The Dark Side of the Moon, released 50 years ago, remains one of the best-selling records of all time, its lyrics and music touching upon universal themes such as greed, madness, and mortality.
The album’s sound effects, heavy treatments of echo and reverb, and quadraphonic mix were designed to create an atmosphere of paranoia and evoke the enormity of the universe. Dark Side’s success established Pink Floyd as a legendary band that pursued perfection in the name of success. However, it also resulted in 50 years of bitterness and business for the band members. The once close-knit group has had many public feuds, with former bassist Roger Waters and guitarist David Gilmour being at the forefront of many of them. There are reports that Waters has rerecorded the album, with spoken word poetry pieces added, which is to be released in May. The other members of Pink Floyd did not speak to the author for this story, and Waters has recently been accused of antisemitism and Putin apologism by Gilmour’s wife, Polly Samson.
