Getting deep inside Pink Floyd

If you’re a Pink Floyd fan, or know one, you might want to pick up a Pigs Might Fly: The Inside Story of Pink Floyd, on sale now at all major book retailers.

“I think (Pigs Might Fly is) the most complete and rounded story that you’ll find of the band,” said author Mark Blake from his London office in a recent phone interview with The Rock Report. “At least, until they die, or one dies, and someone else comes in and writes a book and fills in a few of the little blanks that I’ve left.”

Blake is a former Assistant Editor of Q, one of the UK’s biggest selling music magazines and currently Editor-in-Chief of Q  and Mojo’s special edition titles.  As well as writing for numerous music publications like Mojo and Blender, Blake began his career in rock journalism in the 1980s and is also the author of Dylan: Visions, Portraits and Back Pages and Punk: The Whole Story.

That early experience served him well.  Pigs Might Fly is a thorough examination of arguably classic rock’s favourite psychedelic band.  According to the author, crafting the book required hours of research and interviews.

“I think I had a bit of a run-up at it from having interviewed all of the band members in the past for various magazine articles,” said Blake.  “I’d also interviewed some of the people and their producers and musicians, again for other magazines.  So I felt like I had a head start on it.

“But you’re looking at a couple of years of research on and off.  I did a lot of interviews in a short period of time and then there was a longer period of time when I didn’t do so much.  It came together over quite a long period of time.”

Coming in just over 400 pages, Pigs Might Fly takes an in-depth look at Pink Floyd’s history, stretching back to each individual band member’s early days in school, first musical experiments and into founder Syd Barrett’s mental breakdown and departure from the group.

“It’s very evocative of (Pink Floyd’s) upbringing,” said Blake of Pink Floyd’s debut album, 1967’s Piper at the Gates of Dawn.  “They lived in this beautiful city called Cambridge and that sort of comes across in the music.  Even after (Syd Barrett)’s long gone, I think there’s still something very English about Pink Floyd’s music and that continues right through the David Gilmour and Roger Waters years.

“I also think there’s a little bit of guilt about what happened to Syd Barrett and the way he left the band and the fact that his life didn’t take such a good turn.  I think there’s an element of guilt there, among some of the band members.  There was this feeling as they got older that they could’ve done more to help him.”

The book also features numerous anecdotes about Floyd’s later albums, including 1973’s Dark Side of the Moon and 1975’s Wish You Were Here.

“By time they’d started work on what became Wish You Were Here, obviously their stock had risen considerably.  Dark Side of the Moon had been a hugely successful album, and not just in the U.K., but in America, it had been the album that really broke them in North America.  That made a big difference, they were suddenly playing bigger venues and they were earning considerably more money.  During that period of time, they all kind of went off and bought bigger houses, went off and had families.  Their lifestyles were changing.  They were growing a little bit apart from each other and a lot of that is reflected when they came in to work on Wish You Were Here.  There was a general feeling of ‘What do you we do next?’  Even at the time, in some of the interviews, the band (is) quite bullish, but they still acknowledge that they had the problem that all bands have following up a very successful album.

“I think Wish You Were Here is a great record, but it’s a very different album from Dark Side of the Moon.  There’s quite a lot of dissatisfaction in the lyrics.  Roger Waters’ lyrics are starting to become a little more scathing and again, very, very self-critical.”

Perhaps most interestingly, Pigs Might Fly also chronicles how the band reunited for their performance at Live 8 on July 2nd, 2005.  When asked, Blake was quick to give his thoughts on why Pink Floyd hasn’t reunited for a full-fledged tour.

“David Gilmour.  In a word.  I think David Gilmour is the sticking point on this.  He’s very up front about this.  He’s talked about it quite openly.  He says he doesn’t want to get involved in doing a huge tour again.  The logistics of a Pink Floyd tour (are) extraordinary.  That’s a lot of money, a lot of work, a lot of time.  He didn’t really feel he wants to do that.  He made a very successful album (2006’s On An Island), toured that album.  He can be the boss.  He can do what he wants.

“He’s also suggested more than once that the same amount of money would be on the table for Pink Floyd to tour without Roger Waters as with Roger Waters.  But I think from a fan’s point of view, to see them touring without the guy that wrote so many of those songs, having seen him on-stage at Live 8, it would just feel a little…not quite the real thing.  We’ve had a glimpse of the real thing, so to see it without Waters wouldn’t be the same.”

As one could figure, Blake thinks rather highly of Pink Floyd’s career output.

“It’s music you can kind of get your teeth into.  It hasn’t dated.  Not all of it, some of it has.  The great albums haven’t dated.  I think you can get off on the musicality of it.  There’s a wonderful sound.  I never tire of hearing Dave Gilmour playing guitar and singing.  I think it’s the kind of music that stands up to repeated listening.  You leave it for a year or two, go back and play those records again, you always hear something new.”

Pigs Might Fly: The Inside Story of Pink Floyd by Mark Blake is on sale now at all major book retailers.

Originally published on the Q107 Rock Report Blog
March 5, 2008