pink floyd | "fearless" | meddle | 1971
although i had braved the territory of my high school enemies by stepping out of wber’s range, i wasn’t rash about it. i was getting into the hippie folk music, not the classic rock that the jocks liked. members of the mainstream clique at fhs were all fans of two bands i swore i would never like: pink floyd and the grateful dead. of course, all i had heard of them was the crap these bands made in the 80s and the radio singles from the wall.
perhaps it was the move to utah (and away from the rigid caste system of upstate new york) that allowed me to re-consider my position. by this time i was increasingly interested in psychedelic music. i had always been attracted to the stranger sounds out there, and i was now actively seeking them out. i heard weird rumors about pink floyd: the original guitarist went crazy from too much lsd; if you watched one of their albums with the wizard of oz...; their music sped up and made more sense if you listened while high; and so on.
drugs never interested me more than the curiosity i had about alternate perceptions of the sensory world. i have always thought music and meditation and travel can open one’s mind to different vistas as much as, if not more than, drugs. but the drug rumors made me curious about this mr. floyd -- i’ve tended to like music by musicians who use. (the next question might be, “what musicians don’t use?”) i bought an old vinyl copy of meddle at tower records in salt lake on a field trip for art class in the spring of 1992. i chose it merely because it had a song that was 23 minutes long. my philosophy: not all long songs are good, but there’s a better chance that the band is doing something interesting if they’re willing to break the radio ditty time barrier.
“echoes” made me an instant fan. this song, “fearless” is a persistent favorite of mine.
