The 1973 Pink Floyd album David Gilmour thought was “perfect”
Artists like David Gilmour don’t hit such magnificent heights through sheer luck; it takes blood, sweat, tears, and more often than not, being your own harshest critic.
The complex songs that he’s made with and without Pink Floyd don’t just arrive from thin air. There’s a meticulous level of craftsmanship in each creation, including having to approach the artistry with the eye of a perfectionist, a tendency that can be both a blessing and a curse as a musician.
On the one hand, it is the disposition required by some in order for them to fulfil their potential, and stops them from being prepared to settle for anything less than the best. However, it can also create a never-ending cycle of discontent as the goalposts continue to shift, and can prevent an artist from ever appreciating their own greatness.
With Pink Floyd, who specialised in sounds that were more layered and textured than any of their peers, they had no choice but to take their time in the studio. They weren’t a punk band that could thrash out an album in a matter of days, and as the years went on, so did Pink Floyd’s time spent in the studio.
While this painstaking approach was essential for crafting their mind-altering psychedelic masterpieces, it also led to tension and disagreements within the band. However, this was a compromise they were willing to make for the sake of the final product.
The first time Pink Floyd truly took their time in the studio to record an album was for The Dark Side of the Moon in 1973. It’s no coincidence that the increased number of hours they poured into the project resulted in their finest body of work.
Due to their strenuous process, Pink Floyd facilitated lengthy pauses to stop them from losing their minds. Importantly, these intervals allowed the band to catch their breath, and upon returning, they could examine the recorded material from a brand new perspective.
In total, it took around nine months before Pink Floyd finally reached a common consensus that The Dark Side of the Moon couldn’t be improved further. Every element of the album had been fawned over by the band a million times, but thankfully, the countless sleepless nights paid off in epic proportions.
At this point, Pink Floyd were already beloved, but The Dark Side of the Moon catapulted them to unprecedented heights and cemented their legacy for the rest of time. It marked a significant leap in quality from their previous records, setting a new standard that proved challenging to follow. Despite the pressure, there’s not a single second on the LP that David Gilmour regrets.
During a conversation with Clear Soul Productions, over 30 years after the release of The Dark Side of the Moon, Gilmour was asked what he’d change about the record with the benefit of hindsight, to which he proudly replied, “Oh, there’s nothing I would change about it.”
When explaining why he feels this way about the legendary album, Gilmour credited their intense work ethic as the sole reason behind the triumph, noting, “Nope. We worked on it until we thought it was pretty well perfect. If one were to go change it, whatever you might add would be something you take away as well.”
Following The Dark Side of the Moon, Pink Floyd continued to create a series of vital albums, such as Wish You Were Here and The Wall, but for Gilmour, none of them came close to the excellence of the 1973 record, which is still his benchmark.
To this day, The Dark Side of the Moon sits comfortably in the top spot above anything else he’s made. Ahead of releasing his solo album, Luck and Strange, in 2024, Gilmour referenced The Dark Side of the Moon as the high point of his career and claimed his newest body of work was the closest to matching it in terms of quality.
He shared, “It’s over 50 years now since The Dark Side Of The Moon. My feeling is that this album is the best album I’ve made in all those years since 1973 when The Dark Side Of The Moon came out.”
Every artist with a new album says that it’s the best they’ve ever made, but nobody would buy that sales pitch from Gilmour, considering he was partly responsible for The Dark Side of the Moon. All these years later, it remains a faultless record that elevated the album format to dizzy new heights.
