The Dark Side of the Moon

1	Speak to Me/Breathe 4:00
2	On the Run 3:33
3	Time 7:06
4	The Great Gig in the Sky 4:44
5	Money 6:31
6	Us and Them 7:40
7	Any Colour You Like 3:25
8	Brain Damage 3:50
9	Eclipse 2:04

Barnes & Noble

No one was ready for Dark Side of the Moon. Released in 1973, the album signaled that the '60s were over for good, and that rock's search for mind expansion was moribund in the face of ever more intellectualized progressive rock (Emerson, Lake and Palmer), ever more arch art rock (Roxy Music), and ever more sensitive singer-songwriters (Jackson Browne). Into this breach stepped a veteran '60s band, whose one-time leader, Syd Barrett, had disappeared into a psychedelic haze some years before. DSOTM was Pink Floyd redux, largely under the decisive ascension of Roger Waters as the group's leading creative force. While the record was more of a team effort than later Floyd works, it put into play many of Waters's cognitive concerns: personal anomie, social frigidity, and facelessness. But unlike those later albums, Dark Side burns with hope and the sound of humanity. Maybe it's the spaciousness of the production (few groups have ever achieved the Floyd's reverberating vivacity) or the grounding touches (those massive Hammond swells, that saxophone). But there's also a hint of optimism in the band's everyman vocals, from the outraged consumer in "Money" to the beatific promise inherent in the closing suite of "Brain Damage" and "Eclipse." Bill Wyman

All Music Guide

By condensing the sonic explorations of Meddle to actual songs and adding a lush, immaculate production to their trippiest instrumental sections, Pink Floyd inadvertently designed their commercial breakthrough with Dark Side of the Moon. The primary revelation of Dark Side of the Moon is what a little focus does for the band. Roger Waters wrote a series of songs about mundane, everyday details which aren't that impressive by themselves, but when given the sonic backdrop of Floyd's slow, atmospheric soundscapes and carefully placed sound effects, they achieve an emotional resonance. But what gives the album true power is the subtly textured music, which evolves from ponderous, neo-psychedelic art rock to jazz fusion and blues-rock before turning back to psychedelia. It's dense with detail, but leisurely paced, creating its own dark, haunting world. Pink Floyd may have better albums than Dark Side of the Moon, but no other record defines them quite as well as this one. Stephen Thomas Erlewine