The Thumbnail Book Reviews
by John Q McDonald --- 18 April 2005
by Nick Mason
Pink Floyd remains one of those bands that set the soundtrack for a certain subset of the college-aged population. They are still extremely popular. Dark Side of the Moon was on the charts for an impossibly long time, only kicked off by Michael Jackson's Thriller (a darn shame, too). Bands still cover the Floyd's tunes. A friend of this reader led his band, the Aesthetic Pig, when they performed all of Dark Side... live in Harvard Square in the mid 80s. The strains of Shine on You Crazy Diamond and the loony Bike still echo in memory. Here, at last, one of the band members assembles a more or less authorized memoir of the colorful and turbulent history of this landmark group. Numerous books and web sites have documented the legendary aspects of Pink Floyd's history, perhaps, most notably, the 1968 breakdown of their original singer-songwriter, Syd Barrett. Nick Mason admits there is a lot out there already, and says that he'll clear some stuff up, add his own memories, but will not belabor the legends nor detail every song and style change the band made. He does write with style and fluidity about his band-mates, David Gilmour, Rick Wright, Roger Waters, and the infamous Syd. He met Waters in architectural college back in the early 60s, and Mason's architectural sensibility may be expressed here as his acute recollection of technical details in the band's history. He might not detail all the songs on the albums, but he will remember specific details of the recording equipment used. While Mason was the only band member to have endured the entire run of this "dinosaur rock" band, he seems to have a more or less background role, and some significant events have to be told from a slight distance. Nevertheless, his chatty tone and first-hand narrative is engaging, and many of the details enticing. What ever really happened to Syd? Did he have a mental breakdown, or was it all the LSD? Mason doesn't really tell, or he doesn't really know. He does have regrets, though. The sordid details of band life, sex, drugs and rock & roll, won't be found here, though there are plenty of allusions to such. This isn't the personal life of the band members, but the overall life of the band itself. In that, it is still worth the read. This reader would like to have known more about how Mason felt about the music he was making with his friends. But, in the end, there is an emotional touch to Mason's remeniscences, and he does seem to have done justice to history. His band-mates had some input into the final version of the book, giving it the "authorized" tone it has. It would be good to think that Mason took their edits with a grain of salt, to preserve his own voice and recollections.
This volume could only be described as lavishly illustrated. Hardly a page goes by without another revealing picture of the band and the scene. Perhaps Chronicle Books can be credited with that. The sheer number of pictures and the large format of this book by themselves make it worth the price.
See another band in: [A Long Strange Trip]