Dark side of the Hoon

Pink Floyd — Leicester — 1972. You will always recall the first time you saw your favourite bands. Pink Floyd were not then mainstream — still less known all around the world. Dark Side of the Moon was one continuous piece of music that filled the first half of the show before they went on to perform better-known early favourites such as ‘A Saucerful of Secrets’ and ‘Set the Controls for the Heart of the Sun’. Their music was still experimental, slightly dangerous and certainly difficult. On the seats were the lyrics — a ‘Hymnsheet for Assorted Lunatics’. If you liked ‘The Floyd’, you were different, you liked albums not singles, you liked prolonged, sometimes shapeless pieces of music and crashing guitar chords and special lighting and electronic effects.

Later you loved the dissected finished version of Dark Side of the Moon, although part of you couldn’t help slightly regretting that everyone else loved it too.