Scream Thy Last Scream
TITLE: "Scream Thy Last Scream"
ARTIST: Pink Floyd
ALBUM: Pinkie Milkie (bootleg)
RELEASE DATE: 196?
Inspired by a bout of strenuous air-guitaring prompted by hearing "Time" off Dark Side of The Moon on the radio whilst feeding my kids breakfast the other morning, I've been on a bit of a Pink Floyd kick of late. Although they singularly personify everything Punk Rock sought to destroy, I've always loved the Floyd. Back in grade school, in between giving up on the diminishing returns of Kiss and discovering the slack-jawed blitzkrieg of the Ramones, Pink Floyd served as "my favorite band" for a little while. The bug-eyed immediacy and intoxicating angst of Punk may have temporarily rendered Pink Floyd's cinematic brand of progressive rock bloated, pretentious, effetely intellectual and arty-farty, but I never subscribed to the scorched earth, "Year Zero" mentality that renounced everything that came before 1977. Somewhat ironically, it was in that year that Pink Floyd recorded my favorite record of theirs, Animals -- although you're hard pressed to hear a single track off that album on classic rock radio.
It's the afore-mentioned Dark Side... that is invariably the cake-taker, and it's not hard to fathom why. Given its history-making sales trajectory, it's fair to suggest that any self-professed rock fan who says he doesn't own a copy of the album is a bald-faced liar. But as ubiquitous and hoarily warhorsey as Dark Side of The Moon has become, I still love every nano-second of it, especially "Time," which found Dave Gilmour's angelic voice taking on a vengeful edge. And when he launches into that solo (at exactly 03:33 into the song), all Punk's arguments about the needless, masturbatory excesses of guitar solos go right down the toilet. For that minute and 26 seconds, Gilmour's guitar soars between a baleful grind and a mournful, lyrical cry that is genuinely moving and virtually inimitable (although the Britpop also-rans in Kula Shaker shamelessly attempt to mimic it in the middle of their 1996 single, "Tattva"). I'd post the song here to drive home my point, but who am I kidding? You all own it already.
The track I'm citing here, meanwhile, is from an entirely different era and incarnation of the band. "Scream Thy Last Scream" dates back to the days when the band was fronted by the late Syd Barett, the wide eyed golden child of the psychedelic era. A good deal stranger than the Floyd's normal fare at the time ("Scream Thy Last..." makes "See Emily Play" sound fairly straightforward), this song features Syd harmonizing with what sounds like Alvin & the Chipmunks after heady night of hashish-laden brownies and brown acid. For whatever reason, it never made its way onto any Floyd album, but can be prized on a widely-circulated bootleg called Pinkie Milkie which is well worth seeking out.
I didn't hear this song until about four or five years ago. My then-colleague at the TIME News Desk, Hot Johnny, downloaded it off the `net and we'd regularly play it very loudly at odd hours of the night, laughing like idiots while doing so. As I type this, a brand new box set of all Pink Floyd's albums (lovingly re-re-re-re-packaged -- yet not remastered) is hitting store shelves. Can't imagine who is buying it, though -- who doesn't have all that stuff already? In any event, for no good reason, "Scream Thy Last Scream" isn't included. So enjoy it here while you can.
Alas, still no legit release for "Vegetable Man" either, sadly.
Posted by: robin | January 10, 2008 at 06:36 PM