Echoes (Pink Floyd song)
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| “Echoes” | |||||
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| Song by Pink Floyd | |||||
| Album | Meddle | ||||
| Released | October 30, 1971 (US) November 5, 1971 (UK) |
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| Recorded | January 1971 Abbey Road, London March, April 1971 AIR Studios, London May 1971 Morgan Studios, London June, July 1971 Morgan Studios, London AIR Studios, London August 1971 AIR Studios, London |
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| Genre | Progressive rock, Psychedelic rock | ||||
| Length | 23:30 | ||||
| Writer | Roger Waters Richard Wright Nick Mason David Gilmour |
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| Meddle track listing | |||||
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| Echoes: The Best of Pink Floyd track listing | |||||
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- This article is about the Pink Floyd song. For other meanings see Echoes.
"Echoes" is a song by Pink Floyd, including lengthy instrumental passages, sound effects, and rock improvisation. Written by all four members of the group (Roger Waters, Richard Wright, David Gilmour, and Nick Mason), "Echoes" provides the extended finale to Pink Floyd's album Meddle. The track has a running time of 23:31 and takes up the entire B-side of the vinyl recording. It is widely considered one of Pink Floyd's most ambitious and musically diverse compositions.
It also appears in shortened form as the fifth track on the compilation album which took its name, Echoes: The Best of Pink Floyd. "Echoes" is the third-longest song in Pink Floyd's catalogue, after Atom Heart Mother (23:44) and the combined segments of Shine On You Crazy Diamond (26:01). Unlike those pieces, it is not explicitly divided into separate parts; however, the composition was originally assembled from separate fragments, and was later split in two parts to serve as both the opening and closing numbers in the band's film Live At Pompeii.
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[edit] Composition
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This section may contain original research or unverified claims. Please improve the article by adding references. See the talk page for details. (February 2008) |
The song begins with a single sound, a distinctive "ping" played by Wright at the grand piano. Reportedly the result of an experiment at the very beginning of the Meddle sessions, the "ping" was created by amplifying a grand piano, playing the instrument's second-highest B natural, and sending the signal through a Leslie rotating speaker. The result is a piercing yet liquid sound, somewhat reminiscent of a sonar signal.
Wright continues with a piano improvisation, mostly in the instrument's upper register (and still played through the Leslie), that gradually articulates the song's home key of C♯ minor. Gilmour soon enters with a soft, restrained guitar solo, featuring extensive use of expressive string bends. As the introduction progresses, bass enters, followed by drums and, later, Hammond organ.
The opening lyrics, sung in harmony by Gilmour and Wright, place the listener at an underwater location where 'everything is green and submarine'. Each verse of the song follows a pattern of three strophes in which the first two strophes have the chord progression of C♯m, G♯m, F♯m, G♯, while the third shifts to the parallel major of C♯ major. Between verses Gilmour plays a chromatic riff that oscillates between C♯ and A.
After the second verse, the song segues into a guitar solo that incorporates many of Gilmour's trademark gestures, including use of multiple overdubbed guitars. This second solo eventually gives way to the song's first break, as the guitar solos and backing riffs are replaced by a comparatively spare drum and bass groove with an almost funk-like character.
Another guitar solo soon begins, making use of distortion, feedback, wah pedal and whammy bar effects; the latter technique allows for exaggerated pitch bends, resembling those of a slide guitar (Gilmour did use the slide for certain sound effects on the studio recording, and for the introduction in live performances from 1971 to 1975). Wright plays brief phrases on the Hammond organ, which is double-tracked and panned hard left and right, slowly increasing in intensity.
These organ fills, along with the bass and drum groove, begin fading away as the lead guitar gradually becomes more distant. A throbbing wind-like sound is introduced, created by Waters vibrating the strings of his bass guitar with a steel slide and feeding the signal through a Binson Echorec. Wind sound effects then fade in as high pitched electronic 'screams' enter, resembling a distorted whale song. Gilmour discovered the sound by accidentally reversing the cables to his wah pedal[1]. (This sound was first introduced in live performances of the song "Embryo" during 1970 and the first half of 1971, and was used again eight years later as a background noise in Is There Anybody Out There? from The Wall album.) Throughout this section harmonic "whistles" can be heard produced by Wright pulling certain drawbars in and out on the Hammond organ.
In the second half of the interlude, the screams die down to become background noises under the sound of rooks, which were added to the music from a tape archive recording (as had been done for some of the band's earlier songs, including "Set the Controls for the Heart of the Sun"). Eventually, the entire ensemble is faded into a sustained B minor chord on the Farfisa organ, accompanied by more of the sonar-like 'pings' from the introduction. Wright soon begins an organ solo, while Gilmour starts picking muted notes, sliding from B to F♯ to D to E. This distinctive guitar part was reportedly inspired by the Beach Boys song "Good Vibrations"[2] where similar muted triplets are used (albeit played by cellos).
Eventually, the section climaxes in a guitar riff laden with echo and distortion, before abruptly modulating back to C♯ minor, with a return to the soft vocal strains of the third verse. Unlike the previous verses, this is accompanied by intermittent guitar fills. After a final refrain, the song recedes into a tape loop of multi-tracked ascending male voice glissandos, similar to the effect of a Shepard tone. After a brief coda for guitar and keyboards, the song gradually fades.
[edit] Early versions
The piece had its genesis in a collection of musical experiments written separately by each band member, referred to as "Nothing, Parts 1-24". Subsequent tapes of work in progress were labelled "The Son of Nothing" and "The Return of the Son of Nothing"; the latter title was eventually used to introduce the as-yet unreleased work during its first live performances in early 1971[3].
During this stage of its development, the song's first verse had yet to be finalized. It originally referred to the meeting of two celestial bodies, but perhaps because of Waters' increasing concerns that Pink Floyd was being pigeonholed as a space rock band, the lyrics were rewritten to use underwater imagery instead.
Echoes (excerpt, early version, August 1971)
The title "Echoes" was also subjected to significant revisions before and after the release of Meddle: Waters, a devoted football fan, proposed that the band call its new piece "We Won the Double" in celebration of Arsenal's 1971 victory, and during a 1972 tour of Germany he jovially introduced it on two consecutive nights as "Looking Through the Knothole in Granny's Wooden Leg" and "The March of the Dam Busters", respectively. [3]
[edit] Live performances
The song, then entitled "The Return of the Son of Nothing", was first performed in public on April 22, 1971 at the Lads Club in Norwich, England, with the unrevised 'planetary' lyrics. These remained in place until September of that year, when they were replaced by the more familiar 'albatross' lyrics. The song was first introduced as "Echoes" on the sixth of August, 1971, at a performance in Japan. It was a staple of Pink Floyd's live performances from then until 1975 and was also played eleven times in 1987, near the beginning of the A Momentary Lapse of Reason tour. Most recently, David Gilmour has performed the song on his 2006 solo tour.
Unlike the Atom Heart Mother suite, it was relatively easy for Pink Floyd to reproduce "Echoes" onstage (as can be seen in the Live at Pompeii film) without requiring additional musicians, though the swapping of keyboard sounds during the piece sometimes proved problematic in live performances. Originally, Wright would start the song by playing his grand piano through a Leslie speaker, then switch to the Hammond organ just before the first verse, switch again to the Farfisa organ for the re-entry after the 'seagull' middle section, back to the Hammond again for the last verse, and finally to piano for the outro. This required Roger Waters to provide the piano 'pings' at their re-entry after the middle section. The Farfisa was later dropped from the band's live keyboard setup and all its parts were played on the Hammond instead. The 1987 performances had synthesizers replacing the Farfisa. Unlike Pompeii, regular live performances played the song as a whole - the bridge between "Part 1" and "Part 2" was simply done by Waters stopping the bass riff of the jam section in the former and starting to play the wind sounds of the latter. The rest of the band would just play quieter and quieter until silent. Live performances featured Roger playing his bass for the intro, rather than Gilmour's guitar.
Starting in 1974, the musical arrangement was augmented by backing vocals from Venetta Fields and Carlena Williams and saxophone solos by Dick Parry added directly after the second verse and at the song's finale. All three of these additional artists joined Pink Floyd's touring party to take the latter Dark Side of the Moon performances, and added their own parts to the remainder of the concert (largely because the former artist was reluctant to leave and re-enter the stage throughout the show). [4] The last time the song was played by all four members of Pink Floyd was at the concert in Knebworth closing their 1975 world tour. During performances given by the 'three-man' Pink Floyd in 1987, "Echoes" was played in a much shorter form than usual (with Gilmour singing the higher harmonies instead of Wright and Wright singing Gilmour's original harmonies). It was ultimately dropped from the set (and replaced with "Shine On You Crazy Diamond (Parts 1-5)") because Gilmour did not feel 'right' about singing the lyrics at the time, and his backing artists played its music without the touches of improvisation that make "Echoes" a powerfully affecting piece.
On Gilmour's 2006 tour in support of On An Island, Wright plays a key part in the touring band, performing the vocals and keyboard parts on "Echoes" (he sang in the same pitch as Gilmour originally did (this time melding with Gilmour) and Jon Carin singing the higher harmonies that Rick originally sang in 1970s performances). This new arrangement of the song is close to full-length (Often clocking at 22 minutes at the beginning of the tour, later performances even outlengthed the studio version by sometimes three minutes.) It also saw the return of Rick's Farfisa organ, which was pulled out of storage and brought on tour specifically for "Echoes." There is a full performance of Echoes on Gilmour's DVD Remember That Night, taken from the Royal Albert Hall. This performance clocks in at 22:18.
[edit] Echoes and the 2001: A Space Odyssey Synchronization Rumours
It is rumoured[5] that "Echoes" synchronizes with Stanley Kubrick's 1968 film 2001: A Space Odyssey when played concurrently with the final segment (entitled "Jupiter and Beyond the Infinite").
"Echoes" was released 3 years after the film and is 23 minutes and 31 seconds in length, similar to the "Infinite" segment. Sounds in the middle part of the song suggest to some listeners the feeling of travelling through an alien world. The drone vocalizations heard in the final scenes of 2001 seem to match with the discordant bass vibrations in the middle of "Echoes" as well the choral glissandos of its finale. Some argue that there are moments when the song and film soundtrack are nearly indistinguishable. Another notable link occurs during a change in scene at precisely the moment when guitar and keyboards crescendo as the lyrics re-enter for the final verse. Almost as a bonus, the early lyrics contain references to planets, which seems entirely suitable for the film's depiction of Jupiter and its moons. Adrian Maben re-created this marriage of music and image in his director's cut of Live at Pompeii using CGI.
Although no member of the band has ever declared the synchronization intentional and the technology to play back film in a recording studio circa 1971 would have been expensive and difficult for the band to acquire, Roger Waters is sometimes quoted as saying that the band's failure to contribute music on 2001's official score was his "greatest regret"[5].
The 1973 George Greenough film "Crystal Voyager" concludes with a 23 minute segment in which the full length of "Echoes" accompanies a montage of images shot by Greenough from a camera mounted on his back while surfing on his kneeboard.
[edit] Plagiarism
In interviews promoting Amused to Death, Waters asserted that Andrew Lloyd Webber had plagiarized themes from "Echoes" for sections of the musical The Phantom of the Opera; nevertheless, he decided not to file a lawsuit regarding the matter.
Yeah, the beginning of that bloody Phantom song is from Echoes. *DAAAA-da-da-da-da-da* [sic]. I couldn't believe it when I heard it. It's the same time signature - it's 12/8 - and it's the same structure and it's the same notes and it's the same everything. Bastard. It probably is actionable. It really is! But I think that life's too long to bother with suing Andrew fucking Lloyd Webber.[6]
Waters did, however, respond by adding a reference to Webber in the song "It's a Miracle" on the Amused to Death album:
We cower in our shelters, with our hands over our ears
Lloyd Webber's awful stuff runs for years and years and years
An earthquake hits the theatre, but the operetta lingers
Then the piano lid comes down and breaks his fucking fingers
It's a miracle
[edit] Parodies and Tributes
The final song ("Ooby-Scooby Doomsday Or The D-day DJ's Got The D.D.T. Blues") on the CD version of Gong's 1973 album Angel's Egg ends with an ascending glissando of male voices that is exactly like the finale of "Echoes". However, in Gong's rendition the glissando, beginning with "Ahhhhh", ends with "choooo", thus mimicking a long sneeze. This is only on the CD version of Angel's Egg.
The Flaming Lips song "Pompeii Am Götterdammerung" from the album At War with the Mystics seems to refer to Pink Floyd. The title is likely a reference to Live at Pompeii, and the song starts with a keyboard sound identical to the one at the beginning of "Echoes."
The Beastie Boys' "Gratitude" music video reflects and tributes "Echoes" from Live at Pompeii. "Pink Floyd London" is painted on the back of the amp when the camera rotates behind the band. There are also shots of Leslie rotating speakers.[1]
The band Between the Buried And Me released a song on their Colors album title 'The Son of Nothing,' which may be a reference to this song.
[edit] Personnel
- Richard Wright - Keyboards, sound effects, vocals
- David Gilmour - Vocals, guitars, bass guitar, sound effects
- Roger Waters - Bass guitar, sound effects
- Nick Mason - Drums, percussion
[edit] References
- ^ http://davidgilmour.musicblog.co.uk/archives/2006/07/night_28_vienne_1.html
- ^ http://brain-damage.co.uk/old/general/dg06z.html
- ^ a b Echoes FAQ. Retrieved on August 29, 2006.
- ^ Turner, Col (2004). An Interview with Venetta Fields (HTML). A Fleeting Glimpse. Retrieved on 2006-06-02.
- ^ a b Jupiter And Beyond The Infinite | Synchronicity Arkive
- ^ Who the hell does Roger Waters think he is?
