“I rather regret that”: the Pink Floyd album Nick Mason thought was a “mistake”
It’s a cliche to think of drummers as disposable in a rock band context. Although it might seem simple to make the same beat on nearly every song, it takes a certain amount of finesse to go from someone who just keeps time to living inside the track for a few minutes and providing the perfect pulse. Nick Mason may have delivered perfectly whenever Pink Floyd went into the studio. Still, he considered the performances in A Momentary Lapse of Reason to be a bit of a botched job.
Then again, even some fans probably knew not to get their hopes up that much about the album. Roger Waters leaving the group was always going to leave a gigantic hole in their sound, and the idea of David Gilmour taking the reins seemed like the band were in suitable, if not shaky, hands.
From the minute you push play on the album, though, you can tell exactly when this was made. While Dark Side of the Moon still sounds timeless today after years of production, no Pink Floyd project has sounded more like it was from the 1980s, with Gilmour’s liberal use of reverb on his voice and what sounds like electronic drums in the background.
The other important factor came from Mason’s other problem with the album…he didn’t show up for work. Instead of doing what is the bare minimum to be the drummer in a band, Mason figured that he was out of practice behind the kit and relinquished his sticks to someone else. He does show up on the album in spots, but his role was better served in playing effects and drum textures rather than carrying the song.
Looking back, Mason thought that his approach should have never happened, telling Galore, “In retrospect, I rather regret that… The thing is that on A Momentary Lapse Of Reason, too many things were played by other people. That was a mistake, but at the time, David Gilmour had an awful lot on his plate.”
It’s not like those extra players didn’t carry their weight. As much as Gilmour’s guitar solo tone is enough to make any progressive rock fan happy, some of the best playing on the record comes from the session players, including some amazing saxophone work across the entire album. The versions we heard may have sounded good, but it was just preparation for the tour.
Compared to the studio version, the live version of pieces like ‘Learning to Fly’ and ‘On the Turning Away’ is far superior, with more passion in Gilmour’s vocals and actually having Mason behind the kit a bit more. The solos on the road also let the band cut loose a bit more, including some spellbinding backing vocals on the back half of the songs that should have never been cut from the studio version.
Regarding the album that fans were presented with, A Momentary Lapse of Reason feels like the makings of a great studio record that should have been relegated to Gilmour’s solo career. Considering the title of the project, though, maybe the fact that it’s so disjointed was just truth in advertising.
