Thursday, March 18, 2010

Sleep

Sleep 3:38
     (written by Richard Wright)

Instrumental

Following Doing It, of course, is Sleep, another original piece never to be recorded. This is an eerie instrumental, probably composed by Rick Wright, though it may also have been a group composition. The piece begins with the heavy breathing of a sleeping man, and slowly Rick's organ comes in. The sustained organ chords and cymbals from Quicksilver, off the recently recorded More soundtrack, form the basis for Sleep, with additional sound effects and strange instrumentation rounding things out and creating a very 'spacey' sound. It is with pieces like this one that the band earned a reputation for writing 'science-fiction' music.

Sleep was intended mostly as a prelude to Nightmare. After about three minutes, the organ chords from Nightmare come in, followed by the bass at about 3:30. At 3:38, Nightmare's guitar begins, and Sleep has blended absolutely seamlessly into Nightmare. It is during these song cycles that the band demonstrated their unsurpassed mastery of the art of the segue, much more difficult in live performance than on record.

TRACK LISTING
The Man
Daybreak
Work
Doing It
Sleep
Nightmare
Daybreak part two
The Journey
Beginning, The
Beset by the Creatures of the Deep
Narrow Way, The
Pink Jungle, The
Labyrinths of Auximenes, The
Behold the Temple of Light
End of the Beginning, The

1 comment:

  1. Richard Wright was the most important member of Pink Floyd.

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