Pink Floyd and The Incredible String Band.
Pink Floyd.
Track 2 on Side 2 is “The Gnome”, a typically charming and childish Syd Barret song “about a gnome named Grimble Crumble”. As ever, despite its childishness, it is superb.
Track 3 is “Chapter 24”, which is undoubtedly the most profound, philosophical and serious track on the album, and as such stands out like a sore thumb. “The movement is accomplished in six stages; and the seventh brings return” is how the song kicks off. It is quite brilliant in all respects, and is arguably the best track on the LP.
The penultimate track on the record, being Track 4 on Side 2, is “Scarecrow”, another Syd Barrett classic, but with a minor key middle 8 which fits in with the slightly more sensible nature of the song. It was used for the B side of “See Emily Play”.
The album ends with Track 5, a Syd Barrett romp called “Bike”, which starts with the song, which is based on a schoolyard chant: “Ive got a bike you can ride it if you like its got a basket a bell that rings and things to make it look good I’d give it to you if I could but I borrowed it…” After the singing stops there is a long instrumental bit which has a number of burpy phases, a most fitting cadence to this extraordinary LP.
The band in this form only released one LP, but they clearly enjoyed themselves:
However, I do have another slightly odd LP by this line-up, to which I shall refer in the next Pink Floyd post.
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