50 years of dark side

there is no dark side of the moon, really

It’s 4am and I am listening to Dark Side of the Moon. It’s Saturday and the world won’t wake for another couple of hours, so I keep the volume soft, as if I could wake the neighborhood. The lights are out and I am high. Conditions are perfect for a listen to this album.

I was eleven in March, 1973, when Dark Side came out. Even though I was already dipping my feet into the rock pool thanks to older cousins who introduced me to Black Sabbath and The Who, I was not ready for Pink Floyd. I was not ready for this specific record. There was too much nuance, too much “weird stuff” as I put it back then. “Money” was all over the radio and I liked the song a lot, but I just didn’t want to labor through the whole album.

The years between 11 and 14 are wild. You go from being a dumb little kid to being an all-knowing teenager. Those three years determine so much and it’s too bad we don’t know that while it’s happening. In those years I went from David Cassidy worshiping to Robert Plant marriage fantasies. And my music taste changed dramatically. I decided at 14 that I was ready for Pink Floyd, specifically Dark Side of the Moon. At that point I was listening to Led Zeppelin and Black Sabbath practically 24/7 and I knew Pink Floyd would be a departure.

And so it was, in 1976, in Maryanne’s basement, when I finally sat down with the record. She had an “egg” chair and I curled up inside of it with my bong and prepared myself for my first full listen. Maryanne, by virtue of having an older brother, had already devoured the album and was there for moral support, and to keep other friends away from me as I wanted to listen undisturbed. I took my music listening seriously, especially when I was diving into a new-to-me album.

What I felt as I listened to DSotM was akin to an awakening. I was mesmerized from the start, from the intense, panicky pace of “Speak to Me” to the overwhelming calm of “Breathe.” I was startled by the clocks and bells of “Time” and floored by the vocals on “Great Gig in the Sky.” Each song was a revelation, an extracting of emotions. I cried during “Us and Them” and felt a great elation during “Any Colour You Like.” It wasn’t the lyrics that did me in. For the most part it’s the way the music is carried out that breaks me, lifts me, sets me free. I was used to the in-your-face rock and roll of Led Zeppelin. This was subtle, nuanced, orchestral. I felt like I was listening to a great work of art.

When it was over, I felt drained, my emotional strength gone. I asked Maryanne to start it again, and she smiled, glad to have me in the fold, and dropped the needle on “Speak to Me” once more. I sat back in that egg chair and lost myself the next 45 minutes.

It’s been 47 years since I first listened, 50 years this March since the album was released. Dark Side of the Moon has been a constant in my life since that night in Maryanne’s basement. It’s a comfort album, one I reach for when I need to feel enveloped. It’s a heavy lifting album, the one I reach for when I’m bottling up emotions and need to feel something. Listening to DSotM is part nostalgia, but also does not feel dated at all. It’s the music that is always playing when I walk into my mother’s house (she is the biggest Pink Floyd fan I know). It’s also a great album to listen to when you just want to hear some good music.

I’ve listened to DSotM four times already this morning. It is not even 10am. Once I listen to it, there are things I’ll need to hear again. Sometimes I’ll play a song twice, or three times, just to pick up all the little bits and pieces, to really feel all the despair within. Dark Side of the Moon is a triumph in so many ways. I love that it ties me to a certain time, a time I don’t mind going back to. I’m thankful to Maryanne - who would later own a car named Floyd - for taking me on that journey, and her older brother Bill for supplying the record. I loved listening to music in their egg chair, feeling enveloped by my surroundings as well as the music. It was comforting and transcendent, and it was the perfect place and time for my introduction to Dark Side of the Moon.

This was intended to be about DSotM turning 50, and the sands of time, and aging and death and how Pink Floyd has been a constant in my life. It took a turn of its own and I’m glad. It’s an album to be celebrated, not mourned as if its life is over. Sure, those days in the finished basement on Terrace Lane were so long ago that some of the memories will fade soon, and I could have tied this all into listening to “Time” but it’s better this way. Dark Side of the Moon is a masterpiece. Happy 50th birthday.