Pink Floyd Dark side of the moon LP A11B9 3rd master

	£		15
	$		20

You are bidding on a very early pressing of the Pink Floyd album the dark side of the moon.

The Dark Side of the Moon is the eighth studio album by English rock band Pink Floyd, released on 1 March 1973 by Harvest Records. It built on ideas explored in Pink Floyd's earlier recordings and performances, but without the extended instrumentals that characterised their earlier work. A concept album, its themes explore conflict, greed, time, and mental illness, the latter partly inspired by the deteriorating health of founding member Syd Barrett, who left in 1968.

1. "Money" / "Any Colour You Like"
   Released: 7 May 1973
2. "Us and Them" / "Time"
   Released: 4 February 1974

Developed during live performances, Pink Floyd premiered an early version of The Dark Side of the Moon several months before recording began. New material was recorded in two sessions in 1972 and 1973 at Abbey Road Studios in London. The group used advanced recording techniques at the time, including multitrack recording and tape loops; analogue synthesizers are prominent, and snippets from interviews with Pink Floyd's road crew and others provide philosophical quotations. Engineer Alan Parsons was responsible for many sonic aspects and the recruitment of singer Clare Torry, who appears on "The Great Gig in the Sky". The iconic sleeve was designed by Storm Thorgerson; following keyboardist Richard Wright's request for a "simple and bold" design, it depicts a prism spectrum, representing the band's lighting and the record's themes. 

The Dark Side of the Moon produced two singles: "Money" and "Us and Them". The album topped the Billboard chart for a week, and remained on the chart for 741 weeks from 1973 to 1988. Following a change in how Billboardcounts sales in 2009, it re-entered the chart and has since appeared for over 900 weeks. 

With estimated sales of over 45 million copies, it is Pink Floyd's bestselling album and one of the best-selling albums worldwide. It has been remasteredand re-released several times, and covered in its entirety by several acts. It is regarded as one of the greatest albums of all time.

Contents

BackgroundEdit

Following Meddle in 1971, Pink Floyd assembled for a tour of Britain, Japan and the United States in December of that year. In a band meeting at drummer Nick Mason's home in Camden, bassist Roger Waters proposed that a new album could form part of the tour. Waters' idea was for an album that dealt with things that "make people mad", focusing on the pressures faced by the band during their arduous lifestyle, and dealing with the apparent mental problems suffered by former band member Syd Barrett. The band had explored a similar idea with 1969's The Man and The Journey. In an interview for Rolling Stone, guitarist David Gilmour said: "I think we all thought – and Roger definitely thought – that a lot of the lyrics that we had been using were a little too indirect. There was definitely a feeling that the words were going to be very clear and specific."

Generally, all four members agreed that Waters' album concept unified by a single theme was a good idea. Waters, Gilmour, Mason and keyboardist Richard Wright participated in the writing and production of the new material, and Waters created the early demo tracks at his Islington home in a small studio built in his garden shed. Parts of the new album were taken from previously unused material; the opening line of "Breathe" came from an earlier work by Waters and Ron Geesin, written for the soundtrack of The Body, and the basic structure of "Us and Them" borrowed from an original composition by Wright for Zabriskie Point. The band rehearsed at a warehouse in London owned by The Rolling Stones, and then at the Rainbow Theatre in Finsbury Park, London. They also purchased extra equipment, which included new speakers, a PA system, a 28-track mixing desk with a four channel quadraphonic output, and a custom-built lighting rig. Nine tonnes of kit was transported in three lorries; this would be the first time the band had taken an entire album on tour. The album had been given the provisional title of Dark Side of the Moon (an allusion to lunacy, rather than astronomy). However, after discovering that that title had already been used by another band, Medicine Head, it was temporarily changed to Eclipse. The new material premièred at The Dome in Brighton, on 20 January 1972, and after the commercial failure of Medicine Head's album the title was changed back to the band's original preference.

Dark Side of the Moon: A Piece for Assorted Lunatics, as it was then known, was performed in the presence of an assembled press on 17 February 1972 – more than a year before its release – at the Rainbow Theatre, and was critically acclaimed.Michael Wale of The Timesdescribed the piece as "bringing tears to the eyes. It was so completely understanding and musically questioning." Derek Jewell of The Sunday Times wrote "The ambition of the Floyd's artistic intention is now vast." Melody Maker was less enthusiastic: "Musically, there were some great ideas, but the sound effects often left me wondering if I was in a bird-cage at London zoo." The following tour was praised by the public. The new material was performed in the same order in which it was eventually recorded; differences included the lack of synthesizers in tracks such as "On the Run", and Bible readings replaced by Clare Torry's vocals on "The Great Gig in the Sky".

Pink Floyd's lengthy tour through Europe and North America gave them the opportunity to make continual improvements to the scale and quality of their performances. Work on the album was interrupted in late February when the band travelled to France and recorded music for French director Barbet Schroeder's film La Vallée. They then performed in Japan and returned to France in March to complete work on the film. After a series of dates in North America, the band flew to London to begin recording, from 24 May to 25 June. More concerts in Europe and North America followed before the band returned on 9 January 1973 to complete the album.