A Saucerful of Secrets

Saucerful of Secrets is my second favorite 60's Pink Floyd album (next to Ummagumma). The songs are much longer than on the PATGOD album, and that makes it much better. However, one of the songs is very annoying to listen to, Remember a Day. But that song, ironically, was recorded during the PATGOD sessions. This explains the horrible sound quality, which doesn't mix well with the high-pitch slide guitar. Every other song on the album are some of my favorite Floyd songs. A lot of this album has to do with outer-space.

Set the Controls for the Heart of the Sun is an awesome song, especially when played live. It has a definable climax, which is always important for an exciting piece. It's a very ominous piece which uses Chinese poetry, always a good choice for wierdo lyrics. Even though this version of the song are good, the Ummagumma and Pompeii versions are better. Corporal Clegg is another funny song, like Bike. It's about a war veteran who never amounted to much at all. The song uses heavy sarcasm, saying he won his wooden leg in the war. The musical interlude is a kazoo-ish polka. This song is pretty funny. The next song, Saucerful of Secrets, is another awesome live piece. It's an instrumental consisting of three parts. The first is a gloomy, dark build up of organ and slide guitar which explodes into the second section, a wild freak out, probably one of the Floyd's best. Nick provides a steady and fast drum beat (or is it a tape loop?). After the freak out, the song settles into a nice beautiful church organ solo, with good harmonizing vocals in the background. Jugband Blues was the last song Syd wrote with the Floyd. It's a very sloppy song, with no real theme or direction. The lyrics make no sense at all, and apparently Syd hired a Salvation Army Band to play in the interlude. However, Syd didn't tell them what to play, this adds more insanity to the song. You can just hear the band struggling to stay together with the music. It's actually a pretty funny song.