There is a fine line between "homage" and "sabotage", a precarious line to walk when it comes to Pink Floyd, made all the more harrowing when focusing on "The Dark Side of the Moon". It takes some nerve to think you can cover this legendary landmark recording in its entirety. It takes balls to actually attempt to do so. And it takes skill to succeed.
These guys clearly have all three.
Thanks to a music conversation with a summer intern, I've been made aware of a group named "Dream Theater", and discovered their recordings. They're the quintessential progressive rock band, somehow freed from the chains and shackles that were the mid-70's, surfacing in the late 1990's instead, and still going strong. Their sound is incredibly clean, crisp, multi-layered and very intense. As was the case for many of the aforementioned progressive rock bands, concepts play as heavily in their compositions as does the need to have almost operatic or symphonic length songs.
My initial introduction to their catalog continues, but of particular note in this post is a full length cover they performed of "The Dark Side of the Moon".
They apparently have done more then one cover tribute performance, and this particular one was recorded in London in late 2005. Now, If I had to line up all of the recordings in order of how many times I've listened to it during my lifetime, DSOTM would be at the front of the line. Without question. I have listened to that recording from start to finish more then any other release, including the Beatles. I've owned it on standard vinyl, an 'Original Master Recording" version, CD, Enhanced CD, the Classic Album's DVD documentary of it's making, and even my MP3 encoding of it is at optimal quality. I've quoted passages from it on may occasion throughout my life, and know the words by heart. I even got to see Roger Water's perform it live last year. So I know, all too well, how it sounds. And I can only imagine how brutally it could be damaged in the wrong hands.
That's what's so note-worthy [pun intended] about this recording. It's wonderful. It's pristine. This band is an extremely talented group of musicians, and their performance is an almost note-for-note recreation of the entire record. In addition to that, the sound recording is amazing. The audio clarity is spectacular. As I started listening, I was and remain incredibly impressed at their skilled playing and successful recreation of such a classic. And tacked onto the end of the recording are numerous other Floyd tunes, all played with great respect to the originals
I can now add a new sentence to my personal list of things I never expected I would ever say, yet somehow, end up doing so. "These Pink covers are incredible."
