It is clearly Waters playing the acoustic guitar (the Gibson J-45?), on which he lays down an excellent groove. He is also playing his Precision bass and takes the lead vocal for the first and last time on the album. His voice is gentle, sensual, and displays certain inflections of which Gilmour himself would not have been ashamed. He doubles himself on a second track without trying to harmonize with his other part. He is supported by Nick Mason, who delivers a pop-style drum part rather than seeking to bring out the song’s jazz side. Rick Wright plays a prominent role because his excellent piano part is recorded in stereo and therefore foregrounded in the mix. He colors the song with quite harmonically rich chords, jazz having been one of his favorite musical genres ever since his teenage years.
David Gilmour does not come in until the end of the second verse, when he plays a slide solo in two parts. In the first (at 1:15), he is almost certainly playing his (here clear-toned) “Black Strat” and harmonizes with himself on a second track. The result reinforces the cool character of the song. In the second (from 1:31), the sound has more of an edge to it and he may be using his Lewis with a different setting and very light distortion. Here he does not harmonize with himself but simply doubles his solo. For the remainder of the song he goes back to a clear tone in order to support his bandmates rhythmically, but takes the opportunity to throw in the odd little lick to wonderful effect (for example at 2:00).
The last section of “San Tropez” belongs to Rick Wright, who delivers a superb solo improvisation on the piano, here and there recalling Duke Ellington, whom he greatly admired.
THE BB LEGEND
Legend has it that David Gilmour had a liaison with Brigitte Bardot during his stay in Saint-Tropez in 1965. “It’s a myth,” he told the newspaper Le Parisien (the edition of September 18, 2015). “We played with Pink Floyd at a party in Deauville in 1967 which she attended with her husband Günter Sachs. But I didn’t really meet her.”
Seamus
Nick Mason, David Gilmour, Roger Waters, Rick Wright/2:17
Musicians
David Gilmour: vocals, acoustic guitar, harmonica
Rick Wright: piano
Roger Waters: bass
Seamus (the dog): barking
Recorded
AIR Studios, London: May 24, 25, 28, 1971 (Studio Two)
Morgan Studios, London: July 26, 1971 (Studio Two)
Technical Team
Producer: Pink Floyd
Sound Engineers: Peter Bown (AIR), Rob Black (Morgan)
Assistant Sound Engineers: John Leckie (AIR), Roger Quested (Morgan)
Genesis
The group brings side one of Meddle to a close with a blues number in the form of a “novelty track,”5 to borrow Nick Mason’s expression. The words glorify an old dog named Seamus, a border collie. Nick Mason explains: “Dave was looking after a dog, the Seamus in question, for Steve Marriott of the Small Faces. [In reality Marriott had already left that group and joined Humble Pie.] Steve had trained Seamus to howl whenever music was played. It was extraordinary, so we set up a couple of guitars and recorded the piece in the afternoon.”5 For David Gilmour, the piece connects with the old acoustic blues tradition of Leadbelly and Bill Broonzy…
Production
Although the writing credit goes to all four members of Pink Floyd, in reality this twelve-bar blues was improvised in the studio. Having come up with the words, all that remained was to get the song down on tape. This was done at George Martin’s AIR Studios on May 24. The working title was “Shamus,” a phonetic (mis)spelling of the dog’s name. The song opens with an acoustic rhythm guitar (the Gibson J-45 in the right-hand channel) whose strings have probably been lowered by a tone (to D, G, C, F, A, D) in order to better match the howling of the dog. It is Gilmour on guitar, and he also delivers a second acoustic guitar part (stereo left), this time played slide, which sounds as if it is tuned to drop D (in other words with just the bottom E string lowered a tone). Waters follows on bass, no doubt tuned the same way, and then Rick Wright on piano, taking a solo at 1:28. In addition to playing the guitar and singing, Gilmour also recorded a harmonica part that can be heard throughout the first verse, although not without some difficulty. Nick Mason, meanwhile, is not involved at all. The next day saw the recording of piano overdubs and May 28 the addition of further howling from the dog, harmonica (again buried in the mix), and slide guitar. Finally, on July 26, the track was mixed at Morgan Studios, with instructions to lower the volume of Seamus’s contribution in the intro!
The Floyd would return to the song when shooting Pink Floyd: Live at Pompeii, renaming it “Mademoiselle Nobs.” On this recording Waters plays Gilmour’s “Black Strat,” while Gilmour plays the harmonica but does not sing. (A bass can be heard that was added in the studio.)
IN YOUR HEADPHONES
At precisely 1:00, someone can be heard uttering a phrase at the back of the studio, but what exactly is being said? Speculation ranges from “here is… [?]” to “very theatrical.”
For Pink Floyd Addicts
The second part of this blues song was chosen by Tom Stoppard for the self-directed movie of his play Rosencrantz & Guildenstern Are Dead (1990).
Echoes
Roger Waters, Rick Wright, Nick Mason, David Gilmour/23:31
Musicians
David Gilmour: vocals, electric rhythm and lead guitar, effects
Rick Wright: vocals, piano, organ, fuzz organ, effects
Roger Waters: bass, fuzz bass, effects
Nick Mason: drums, percussion (?), effects
Recorded
Abbey Road Studios, London: March 7, 11, 12, 15, 19, 1971 (Studio Three)
AIR Studios, London: March 30, April 8, 9, 10, 13, 14, 26, 27, 28, May 1, 1971 (Studio Two)
Morgan Studios, London: July (precise dates not known) 1971 (Studios One and Two)
Technical Team
Producer: Pink Floyd
Sound Engineers: Peter Bown (Abbey Road and AIR), Rob Black (Morgan)
Assistant Sound Engineers: John Leckie (Abbey Road and AIR), Roger Quested (Morgan)
Genesis
“Echoes” is the final version of another long musical piece that the members of Pink Floyd had been working on since January 1971 in Abbey Road Studios and that they performed live for the first time in Norwich on April 22 under the title “Return of the Son of Nothings” (or “Son of Nothings” or “Nothings”). However, it was a brilliant discovery by Rick Wright and Roger Waters that would lead to the shaping of this legendary track into its final form. While Rick was playing the piano in the studio, Roger suddenly asked him whether it would be possible to feed his piano through a Leslie speaker via a microphone. “That’s what started it,” confirms Wright, adding: “That’s how all the best Floyd tracks start, I believe.”39 Nick Mason recalls how the idea was then implemented: “The most useful piece was simply a sound, a single note struck on the piano and played through a Leslie speaker. This curious device, normally used with a Hammond organ, employs a rotating horn that amplifies the given sound. The horn, revolving at a variable speed, creates a Doppler effect, just as a car passing the listener at constant speed appears to change its note at it goes by. By putting the piano through the Leslie, this wonder note of Rick’s had an element of the sound of Asdic, the submarine hunter, about it.” He continues: “Combined with a wistful guitar phrase from David, we had enough inspiration to devise a complex piece, which evolved into ‘Echoes.’”5 And this is how the space opera that was “The Return of the Son of Nothings” turned into an aquatic epic…
In his very last interview, given to Mojo magazine in July 2007, Rick Wright claimed “Echoes” as being his own idea. “The whole piano thing at the beginning and the chord structure for the song is mine, so I had a large part in writing that. But it’s credited to other people, of course.”72
Roger Waters, who wrote the words, claims that the inspiration for them came to him shortly after Syd Barrett left the group, in the London flat he shared with his future
wife, Judy Trim, in Shepherd’s Bush, while watching people come and go in the street. Whereas the initial live versions had lyrics that evoked the planets, the ultimate version contains various marine references.
What is the message Waters wanted to convey through these words? Could the albatross that hangs motionless upon the air and the rolling waves in labyrinths of coral caves be allegories of a journey into the narrator’s subconscious? An introspective journey that leads to the main idea of the third verse, which seems to be saying that the world would be a better place if people communicated through empathy rather than allowing antipathy or aggression to bring them into conflict. And do I take you by the hand and lead you through the land could be an attempt to convey the idea that fulfillment can be achieved with the help of other people. This would make “Echoes” an appeal for unity and perhaps even the announcement of a new era.
A different interpretation is also possible. We could see Wright’s note imitating the echo of a sonar and the marine allusions as evoking an aquatic big bang, or more specifically the birth of life on Earth, which started in the ocean depths. No one knows the wheres or whys. This phrase in the second verse poses the question that has haunted humankind since time immemorial: does the universe have a creator or it all the result of mere chance? Waters ventures to provide an answer at the end of the fourth verse with the implacable declaration: And no one flies around the sun. Hence (perhaps) the early titles of this piece: “Son of Nothings” and “Return of the Son of Nothings.” Hence also the cry of despair in the form of a conclusion: And so I throw the windows wide and call to you across the sky. Rarely has the sound of a song’s words been in such perfect harmony with the purity of its melodies and the simultaneous impression of desolation and nostalgia.
Although the structure of “Echoes” is very similar to that of “Atom Heart Mother,” the song differs from the earlier work in one important respect: the absence of brass and choir, which makes it far easier to perform live. Says Rick Wright: “[…] it’s fantastic to play live. I love playing it.”72 A performance of “Echoes” had already been given under its definitive title prior to the worldwide release of Meddle in November 1971, when Adrian Maben’s cameras filmed Pink Floyd playing the piece (in a two-part version) in October for the documentary Pink Floyd: Live at Pompeii. Waters, Gilmour, Wright, and Mason would continue to include it in their set list until the mid-seventies with a saxophone solo from Dick Parry in the 1971–1973 concerts and with contributions from the backing singers Venetta Fields and Carlena Williams in the 1974–1975 performances. Having been reduced to a trio following the departure of Roger Waters, the group returned to the work again on the “Momentary Lapse of Reason Tour” (1987–1990). The most astonishing version of all, however, is the acoustic one that Gilmour, quite properly accompanied by Rick Wright, performed live at Abbey Road Studios. This version is included as a “hidden track” on the DVD Remember That Night, Live at the Royal Albert Hall, which was recorded in May 2006.
Production
Running for more than twenty-three minutes, “Echoes” is one of Pink Floyd’s three longest pieces, along with “Atom Heart Mother” and the nine-part “Shine On You Crazy Diamond.” According to the sound engineer John Leckie, it would never have seen the light of day but for Roy Harper and his 1971 album Stormcock. Consisting of four tracks of between seven and thirteen minutes’ duration, Harper’s album (also recorded at Abbey Road) is thought to have influenced the group in the length of its songs. Nick Mason disputes this, but it seems highly likely that Harper—who would later sing lead vocal on “Have a Cigar”—strengthened their resolve to reiterate what they had undertaken the previous year with “Atom Heart Mother.”
It was on the basis of various parts of the Nothings project, recorded and assembled in January 1971, that the group defined the structure of “Return of the Son of Nothings,” the future “Echoes.” One of the early sketches, “Nothing Part 14,” can be found in the box set The Early Years 1965–1972, released in November 2016. This takes the form of a seven-minute improvisation on four chords that prefigures one of the sections in the final version.
Properly speaking, the “Echoes” sessions took place between March 3 and 19. It was the sixteenth take that was used as the base track for the various overdubs. The musicians were still recording on an eight-track tape recorder at Abbey Road. It was only on March 30 that they abandoned EMI to continue in George Martin’s AIR Studios, which were equipped with a sixteen-track machine. Ten or so sessions are documented, the last of which took place on May 1. Unfortunately there are no precise details concerning Morgan Studios, if the Floyd really did work on the piece there. All that is known is that the atmosphere was good, that one of the driving forces was Roger Waters, who spent a lot of time in the control room, monopolizing to a considerable extent the role of producer, that David Gilmour was at the forefront of things in the studio, and that Rick Wright and Nick Mason assumed a more reserved role. “Roger and Dave were running the show, but everybody was contributing,”72 John Leckie would reveal, while Rick Wright would admit in an interview that it had been “a glorious song to make in the studio.”72
“Echoes” can be divided into seven parts.
An Extraordinary Epic in Seven Acts
The first section begins with that introductory note played on the piano by Rick Wright, a note that could be described as the undisputable signature of the piece, if not of Meddle as a whole. Before obtaining this very special sound, the famous ping, the group had had to fight hard to convince the technical team at Abbey Road to comply with their wishes, that is to say to feed the piano signal, captured by a mic, through a Leslie speaker. Having finally argued their case successfully, Wright was able to test the result. Things suddenly fell into place for the four members of the group: that one note acted as a catalyst that inspired them to compose the rest of their masterpiece. In his very last interview, Rick Wright confirms the power of that B: “I’d hit that one note on piano and the whole place would erupt.”72 Resonating like a submarine sonar, this note invites the listener to embark on a journey and at the same time is a call to awakening. Curiously enough, the note that can be heard on the album version derives from the very first trials, which proved impossible to reproduce later with the same resonance and richness!
This first part develops toward an improvisation by Wright on the piano, his sound still colored by the Leslie speaker, and an initial intervention by David Gilmour on his “Black Strat,” which he plays here without distortion. In his infinitely expressive, distinctly bluesy playing, he displays an exceptional touch. A background accompaniment can be heard that seems to be made up of pedal steel guitar and Farfisa pads, both drenched in Binson Echorec. After Roger Waters’s entry on his Fender Precision, the bassist is joined by Nick Mason on his Ludwig kit, and backward cymbal effects contribute to the overall picture. Wright also fleshes out the arrangement on his Hammond organ.
The second section (from 2:57) gives way to the lyrics. Gilmour and Wright share the lead vocal in the first two verses, Wright singing the higher voice and Gilmour the lower. Their respective vocal timbres combine wonderfully, each singer possessing a natural gentleness that results in one of the best-ever vocal performances by Pink Floyd. Gilmour would concur in September 2008: “The blend of his and my voices and our musical telepathy reached their first major flowering in 1971 on “Echoes.”75 The end of each verse is followed by a superb riff played simultaneously by Gilmour and Waters in the style of “Astronomy Dominé” and “Interstellar Overdrive.” There then follows a second guitar solo with Gilmour literally in a state of grace, the notes leaping from his Stratocaster with consummate feeling before taking on more of a rock feel with Fuzz Face distortion. This sequence ends with a return to the main riff.
The third section (from 7:01) comprises a funky sequence in exactly the same spirit as “Funky Dung” on “Atom Heart Mother.” Mason’s drumming suddenly switches to stereo (in all likelihood thanks to ADT) with the exc
eption of the overdubbed cymbal crashes in mono. The rhythm section functions supremely well here, with Waters energetically pumping the beat on his Precision bass, Wright delivering a excellent Hammond organ part featuring some great soul licks (each positioned at one extremity or other of the stereo image) and Gilmour playing two rhythm parts, the first clear-toned and the second distorted. The guitarist takes another solo at 7:25, this time with a far more aggressive, spacey feel. As Phil Taylor, Gilmour’s guitar technician, clearly explains, all the guitar parts in “Echoes” are played on his “Black Strat” alone, the Lewis not getting a lick in.
The fourth section (from around 11:20) is the most startling. It begins with a somewhat disturbing sonic backdrop that Waters creates by sliding a bottleneck along his bass strings with plenty of Echorec. The sonority is that of a kind of magnetic wind or a fearsome insect, and indeed this section was referred to during the sessions as the “Bumble Bee Bass Section.” During the March 12 session at Abbey Road, the Floyd decided to add some sound clips from the EMI sound library: a wind effect from 12:40 (taken from volume 56) and cawing crows from 13:15 (taken from volume 7).
And to intensify this bleak atmosphere even further, David Gilmour adds one of the most distinctive features of the piece: lugubrious seagull calls on his “Black Strat,” this time overdubbed at AIR Studios, presumably on April 26. In reality, chance played an important part in the creation of this particular effect, explains Rick Wright: “One of the roadies had plugged his wah-wah pedal in back to front, which created this huge wall of feedback. He played around with that and created this beautiful sound.”72 With the connections reversed, precise handling of the wah-wah, immoderate use of the Binson Echorec, and perfect mastery of technology, Gilmour was able to create some incredible sounds rarely associated with the sonorities produced by a guitar.
Pink Floyd All the Songs Page 32