Pink Floyd - Animals 1977 ( 2011 remaster )
"The Floyd are gonna make an album with as much anger and attitude as the punks taking over the scene around them? Yeah, when pigs fly...."
In 1977, the pig took to the skies. The hippies had been chased from the field by the punks and rioters and the pissed-off cynicism which had been bubbling inside Roger Waters since DSOTM came surging to the surface like lava...
Punk Floyd, some would say. The difference here for me was that with
Animals, for all the sneering critique of the current human condition, the Floyd never completely gave up on the species. After all was said and done, after the dogs and pigs had pillaged and plundered while the sheep mindlessly let it all go sideways, good prevailed in the final accounting but with a warning to remain vigilant as the pigs were still on the wing and always would be. The band refused to completely cave in to the pessimism and resisted joining the riot. More Joe Strummer than Johnny Rotten, these particular punks.
The album itself is stellar. Not a note out of place anywhere and some of the best playing and writing in the catalogue. Gilmour in particular established himself in my eyes as an absolute master of his craft with his work on
Animals. To me, this is the high water mark of the Floyd's body of work. To come, the over-reach and pretension of
The Wall and the
Final Cut followed by the post-Waters albums which did little except to sully the once-great brand.
But that's just my opinion...and I could be wrong.
D.D.
