# Favorite Pink Floyd Album **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [April 11, 2003, 8:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/favorite-pink-floyd-album/167996 "2003-04-11T08:05:08Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![LifeOnWry](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/96bed5/32.png) [@LifeOnWry](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LifeOnWry)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2003, 5:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/favorite-pink-floyd-album/167996/21 "2003-04-12T05:24:51Z")
For me it’s The Wall, Dark Side, Wish You Were Here and Animals in that order. I once scared myself listening to Ummagumma (note: never get stoned for the first time all by yourself and listen to Ummagumma… you hear all kinds of stuff that’s not there when you’re sober.) One thing I figured out in my oh-so-stony teenage days: what makes Pink Floyd’s music work so well for me is that the music is (often) very nearly hypnotic, while the lyrics are (often) downright creepy. It’s an unsettling juxtaposition that I never find boring or overdone. ---
**Author:** ![Fingolfin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/eada6e/32.png) [@Fingolfin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fingolfin)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2003, 6:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/favorite-pink-floyd-album/167996/22 "2003-04-12T18:08:38Z")
**The Wall** The album I listen to the most is the newly released, 2 CD “greatist hits” collection **Echoes**. You get Syd-Floyd, Roger-Floyd, and David-Floyd all rolled into one remasterd collection. Awesome stuff! It even has **When The Tigers Broke Free** on it! 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![yawndave](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/43a26b/32.png) [@yawndave](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/yawndave)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2003, 6:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/favorite-pink-floyd-album/167996/23 "2003-04-12T18:38:58Z")
Meddle has been a favorite ever since I heard the winds swirling around at the beginning of ‘One Of These Days’. Although Dark Side suffers from being played to death, it really is an amazing work… I strap on the old headphones and try to recapture what it was like to listen to it the first time, all those years ago. ---
**Author:** ![Tuckerfan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/eada6e/32.png) [@Tuckerfan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tuckerfan)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2003, 7:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/favorite-pink-floyd-album/167996/24 "2003-04-12T19:14:33Z")
_Wish You Were Here_ is mine for rather long reasons. After that, it’s _Dark Side of the Moon_, and then they kind of all are about equal. I think that while _musically_ Floyd has improved since Waters left, _lyrically_, it hasn’t done as well, with only a few songs on the albums being worthy of having the Floyd name plastered on them. It’s a shame, really, because David Gilmour’s _first_ solo album ( **not** _About Face_) was certainly very similar in tone to _DSOTM_ and with a few minor touches, would been a _great_ Floyd album. ---
**Author:** ![HeatMiser](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/ecd19e/32.png) [@HeatMiser](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HeatMiser)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2003, 8:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/favorite-pink-floyd-album/167996/25 "2003-04-12T20:50:17Z")
I’m torn. I want to say _Animals_, but when I really look closely it’s that I think “Dogs” is such an amazing piece of work it deserves accolades in any form. But the rest of the album really doesn’t maintain that level of craftsmanship IMHO. Not that it isn’t quite good, but “Dogs” is head and shoulders above the rest, so the album as a whole loses. I want to say _Ummagumma_, mostly because of the endless hours (days, weeks, eons) spent stoned in headphones in the company of that album. The experimental studio stuff is exceedingly cool, and the live stuff is amazing. (I realize it represents a post-Syd rendering of Syd-era music, but it was certainly well done. I haven’t heard live performances of those pieces featuring Syd, and I have a hard time imagining how it could approach the magical insanity that Gilmour achieved with a slide and an Echoplex. But I digress.) I can’t credit it, however, with listenability beyond once a year or so these days. I want to say _Dark Side Of The Moon_, and there is a case to be made, I think, that it’s the paradigmatic example of Album-Length Art, as opposed to a collection of songs. It’s hard for me to listen to any part of it without listening to the whole thing straight through. But as previously pointed out, in gaining accessibility it lost something. I don’t know if I’d say “watered down” or “Floyd Lite”, but the best Floyd songs to me are masterpieces of controlled cynical rage, and it’s just not there. _Meddle_ has “Echoes” and “One Of These Days”, but I have no taste for the folky stuff, so this album and all earlier ones lose by default. _The Wall_ is where Waters’ writing devolved from biting cynical observations to angsty self-pity. The music is brilliant, and the work is certainly admirable in how well they conveyed the message, but I didn’t particularly care for the message. Sorry, this isn’t intended as flamebait. that’s just my humble opinion. That pretty much leaves _Wish You Were Here_. Yep, that’s the one. They managed to get it all mostly right, and wrapped it around a touching tribute to their fallen comrade to boot, pretty tough to do and maintain that attitude I prize so highly. \ :smack: ---
**Author:** ![Orange\_Skinner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/3be4f8/32.png) [@Orange\_Skinner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Orange_Skinner)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2003, 10:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/favorite-pink-floyd-album/167996/26 "2003-04-12T22:15:23Z")
Pink Floyd doesn’t have an album I don’t like, and while my current favorite goes back in forth, the one that’s in my first place slot with the most consistancy is _Animals_. The conceptual theme of the whole album is amazing. The amount of attention paid to each of the personality types, and the way they different species tie in with one another at various parts of the album (in _Sheep_, for instance, “you’d better watch out, there may be dogs about” gives the album a polished, full-circle feel. (Plus, it literally is full-circle, with _Pigs on the Wing I and II_ blending perfectly into one another, like the heartbeat on _Dark Side of the Moon_, and “isn’t this where/we came in” from _The Wall_. It’s not too Waters-era dark, not too Barrett-ifiedly whimsical, not too Gilmour-period 80’s-sounding and (as post-Waters Floyd was, with some exceptions) lyrically lacking. Lyrically, it shows Waters at some of his best. It’s truthful, biting and beautiful…yet, it he manages not to delve too deeply (or at least for too long) into depression. The lyrics are personal, defiant, satirical, political. They contain some of Water’s best lines, and for a writer with as many fucking great lines as Roger Waters, that’s saying something. The effect of “Pigs on the Wing, I and II” serve as introduction and afterward, which I really like. They give the album meaning, and relate it back on a personal level. The lyrics give a sense of hope, of dependence, and a very humanistic feel, the music is simplistic, folky, and give a sense of one man reflecting on the world, by himself…then offering somebody he’s come to love his spin of things. And, of course, there’s _Dogs_. _shiver_ In my opinion, _Dogs_ features David Gilmour’s best guitar work ever. Yes, better than _Comfortably Numb_; (a _ton_ better than _Comfortably Numb_). Plus, you can make out to _Dogs_. It’s just one of those songs–the epitome of slow, stoner-music to have sex to. (The fact that you don’t have to get up and change the track for over seventeen minutes is a definite plus). Regarding the rest of the album, to some extent, I do agree with **HeatMiser**. _Dogs_ is the best track, but the _Pigs (Three Different Ones)_ and _Sheep_, I think, are still, at least, solidly _good_. The special effects in _Pigs_ are great, and then the lyrics regarding Mary Whitehouse–(the woman who led a censorship crusade against PF’s music)–gives the audience members in the know a sense of retribution. I also like how the word “charade” is pronounced when spoken with an English accent, and the line the word “charade” is in brief and biting. Oh, and I love the little “whooo” in between the first and second couple of verses. It’s like, the anti-pop. The slow upwind into _Sheep_…mmmm. I love the baa-ing on _Sheep_ even more than the oinking on _Pigs_. The effects put on Waters’ voice to stretch out his notes to an impossible length and not sound completely digitialized are absolutely revolutionary-sounding. The progression from the sound at the intro to the fade out is huge. Picture the first few seconds, then the huge build-up at the end. Oh yeah, _Sheep_ is satrical foreplay. Honorable mentions are _Wish You Were Here_, _The Final Cut_, and _The Division Bell_. Then there’s _Echoes_, great variety, and a lot of great songs, but it doesn’t have the sense of flow a non-greatest hits album has…and that flow is one of my favorite aspects of Pink Floyd. ---
**Author:** ![moonchilde](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/3e96dc/32.png) [@moonchilde](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/moonchilde)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2003, 11:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/favorite-pink-floyd-album/167996/27 "2003-04-12T23:30:07Z")
I second Life’s note on UmmaGumma…stoned alone listening to “Be Careful With That Axe, Eugene” was an interesting experience. So I did it a couple more times to be sure 🙂 I’d have to say Wish You Were Here is probably my favorite, but only because I wore out three albums and two cassettes of DSOTM. ---
**Author:** ![Coriolanus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/coriolanus/32/18769_2.png) [@Coriolanus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Coriolanus)\ **Post date:** [April 13, 2003, 12:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/favorite-pink-floyd-album/167996/28 "2003-04-13T00:05:32Z")
Animals is one of the greatest albums ever - more than a concept (stoner) album it tells a story - often from the POV of the Dogs, or those within the circle of Pigs. Nobody expected the Sheep uprising. [In this thread](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?s=&threadid=176797) which included a link to [time.com](http://time.com) featuring a flying pig. [http://www.time.com/time/potw/20030411/11.html](http://www.time.com/time/potw/20030411/11.html) I laughed when I saw the _potw_ part of the URL. ---
**Author:** ![Skillet38](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/8797f3/32.png) [@Skillet38](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skillet38)\ **Post date:** [April 13, 2003, 1:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/favorite-pink-floyd-album/167996/29 "2003-04-13T01:06:24Z")
If you’ll, notice, I lauded Animals firstly because of Gilmore’s brilliant guitar arrangement, but in this author’s humble opinion, The Final Cut was the last Pink Floyd album. If I want to hear David Gilmore rock out during the later time frame, I’ll put on Kate Bush’s “Rocket Man” off of “The Sensual World”. He really cuts loose on that and she wrote it with him in mind. Very “Wallish”. I’m all out of "'s ---
**Author:** ![Skillet38](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/8797f3/32.png) [@Skillet38](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skillet38)\ **Post date:** [April 13, 2003, 1:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/favorite-pink-floyd-album/167996/30 "2003-04-13T01:11:56Z")
It’s funny, I just thought of it, because somehow I got sucked into reading a thread about Ayn Rand and whether you could enjoy her writing unless you agreed with her political philosophy / creedo… I thought Maggie Thatcher rocked, because I’m a good Reaganite, and even though Waters spends a good deal of time bashing her for The Falklands conflict, I still love the work because the music comes first for me, then the message, and it’s from “family”, ie I can disagree with Water’s politics, but still love every note that he can wrack out of his tortured vocal chords. you can tell it’s the end though… oh well ---
**Author:** ![Skillet38](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/8797f3/32.png) [@Skillet38](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skillet38)\ **Post date:** [April 13, 2003, 1:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/favorite-pink-floyd-album/167996/31 "2003-04-13T01:13:10Z")
I was referring to “The Final Cut” btw :smack: ---
**Author:** ![kambuckta](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/53a042/32.png) [@kambuckta](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kambuckta)\ **Post date:** [April 13, 2003, 4:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/favorite-pink-floyd-album/167996/32 "2003-04-13T04:32:33Z")
I think Atom Heart Mother would have to get my vote, if for no other reason than it was the first Floyd album I ever owned. My very sophisticated BIL decided that I needed to broaden my musical horizons when I was 15, so that I could be weaned-off what he considered the ‘CRAP’ I was listening to. He bought me AHM for my birthday, and I was blown away. But I do think The Wall is probably the easiest to listen to, and like **Cartooniverse** , enjoyed many evenings of Floyd-filled late teenage angst playing the records over and over and over and… ---
**Author:** ![neutron\_star](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/51bf81/32.png) [@neutron\_star](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/neutron_star)\ **Post date:** [April 13, 2003, 6:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/favorite-pink-floyd-album/167996/33 "2003-04-13T06:46:28Z")
Another vote for “Animals”… I think. It’s not a choice that’s easy to even narrow down, let alone pin on one album. And I may have just chosen that one because I’m more burned-out on the other ones. It takes me a long time to get sick of really long songs and that’s why “Animals” is great. I also like the later stuff, though. “The Division Bell” came out at the height of my high school Pink Floyd obsession and I devoured it. I saw them in Philadelphia on that tour, on their third (!) sold-out night at Veterans Stadium. Boy, did they give us our money’s worth. Three and a half hours of sheer bliss, including lasers and a giant disco ball. I didn’t use any drugs or alcohol that night, but when I walked out of the stadium, I felt dazed, disoriented, and a little bit stoned. I wish they would release another album and tour again. Or at least just tour. Theirs was the first concert I ever attended. I still consider it to be the best. ---
**Author:** ![Qadgop\_the\_Mercotan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/qadgop_the_mercotan/32/83_2.png) [@Qadgop\_the\_Mercotan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Qadgop_the_Mercotan)\ **Post date:** [April 13, 2003, 9:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/favorite-pink-floyd-album/167996/34 "2003-04-13T21:54:21Z")
Depends on my mood. Either Animals or Wish You Were Here. After that its a tossup; Dark Side of The Moon, The Wall, or Meddle. I never could get into The Final Cut. And I really never listened closely after Waters. ---
**Author:** ![Cartooniverse](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cartooniverse/32/3084_2.png) [@Cartooniverse](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cartooniverse)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2003, 12:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/favorite-pink-floyd-album/167996/35 "2003-04-14T00:42:13Z")
After Waters? -blink- AFTER? What is this After Waters of which you speak??? 😃 I love **When The Tigers Broke Free**. ---
**Author:** ![lawoot](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/35a633/32.png) [@lawoot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lawoot)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2003, 1:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/favorite-pink-floyd-album/167996/36 "2003-04-14T01:34:55Z")
1. **Animals** - for all of the reasons listed above (not to mention I first heard it on, of all things, _WKRP in Cincinatti_) 2. **Wish You Were Here** Just a great album, over all. 3. **The Wall** - What can I say - I was about 16 when it came out - the perfect time. It’s still my favorite ‘sing-along with Roger’ album 4. **The Dark Side of the Moon** - would have beaten out \*\*the Wall \*\*, if it weren’t for _Money_. I just don’t think that the song _fits_ with the rest of the album (still a good song, though). ---
**Author:** ![KarlGauss](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/karlgauss/32/3713_2.png) [@KarlGauss](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/KarlGauss)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2003, 3:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/favorite-pink-floyd-album/167996/37 "2003-04-14T03:50:13Z")
While it is not my favourite (that would have to be _Atom Heart Mother_), I must mention **Relics**. Relics is sort of a greatest hits of Barrett-era Floyd but also contains some magnificent, otherwise unreleased cuts like “Bike” and “Biding My Time”. ---
**Author:** ![minor7flat5](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/minor7flat5/32/258_2.png) [@minor7flat5](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/minor7flat5)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2003, 11:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/favorite-pink-floyd-album/167996/38 "2003-04-14T11:56:12Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Cartooniverse \* > \*\*I love **When The Tigers Broke Free**. \*\* I’ll second that! A slight hijack: I have a 45 of that song, released back when the movie The Wall was released, and it has always sounded defective. It sounds like a record that was left in the sun, even though it is totally smooth. Does anybody else have this 45? Was it released defective, or did I just ruin my own copy? ---
**Author:** ![lieu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/c2a13f/32.png) [@lieu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lieu)\ **Post date:** [April 14, 2003, 3:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/favorite-pink-floyd-album/167996/39 "2003-04-14T15:19:07Z")
Another big fan of **Meddle** here. I find the music creative and interesting but perhaps best of all it’s not overplayed on the radio so I’ve not been pounded senseless by it ubiquity. ---
**Author:** ![Yeticus\_Rex](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/a698b9/32.png) [@Yeticus\_Rex](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Yeticus_Rex)\ **Post date:** [April 15, 2003, 9:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/favorite-pink-floyd-album/167996/40 "2003-04-15T21:22:20Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Cartooniverse \* > \*\* > I love **When The Tigers Broke Free**. \*\* The same way I love **“Bring The Boys Back Home”** , the actual antithesis for “When The Tigers Broke Free”, down to the titles having 5 words each…put those two songs back to back - you’ll see what I mean. When I was 12, my first taste of Pink Floyd was virtually an out of body experience. My step-brother was driving at night down highway 395 from Mammoth Mountain to home in Fontana, California. I had the back seat to myself, so I laid out and stared at the crystal clear dark skies filled with stars and a half moon overhead, framed by the Sierra Nevadas and the White Mountains. My step-brother was playing different 8-tracks (yep - 8 tracks!) and then he stuck this new 8 track in and I just stared at the sky and listened to the music…the music (Which I found out later to be Wish You Were Here) coaxed me into a trance where I couldn’t even hear the engine of the car running (until the stupid 8 track switched over to another track). I begged him to play it again and he did, but when I begged a third time, he stuck in Dark Side Of The Moon and I got treated to a second helping of great music. Those are my two favorites of ALL of Pink Floyd albums, especially when the stars are out. I missed the Wall tour due to a flat tire, but I did see Roger Waters in Radio KAOS tour and that was definitely the bomb, because Jim Ladd from KLOS (Radio station in L.A.) was there also (the DJ from the KAOS album), and they had this phone booth in the middle of the Forum where you “called” (and asked questions) Jim who was interviewing Roger during the intermission of the concert! Saw Gilmour live too, he was great in his own way, but Waters is the original Pink in my book… [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/favorite-pink-floyd-album/167996.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/favorite-pink-floyd-album/167996.md?page=3)