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“Time” – Pink Floyd
(Words/music: David Gilmour/Nick Mason/Roger Waters/Rick Wright, available on The Dark Side of the Moon, Capitol 1973)

Today I officially went back to work at my day job as my students started class.  Every year, the generational gap widens between my students and me, so I’m fascinated by the pop culture that’s on their radar (or, more appropriately, what’s not on mine).  I work in the suburbs, so classic rock has a tight grip on the teenagers in town.  At first, this surprised me; I expected teenagers to generally care more about current artists.  On further thought, it makes more sense that classic guitar rock would be more up their alley – too much of contemporary “alternative” rock (in the rock radio sense) comes with a label – “emo,” “metal,” etc. – and comes with all of the related cultural baggage.  Classic rock also outnumbers contemporary rock on the radio by a three-to-one ratio around here, so these songs get played more than the new angryband on the modern rock charts.  Classic rock also comes with a story, especially with a record like The Dark Side of the Moon; it too has its own “emotional baggage,” yet it seems more like a rite of passage than a clique.  The Dark Side of the Moon has the Wizard of Oz legend and remains one of those cultural touchstones, at least among budding music aficionados.  Suddenly, The Dark Side of the Moon t-shirts (which are trailing to Led Zeppelin in my current tally after day one) make sense.

I remember the first time these songs clicked with me in high school.  I was in my friend’s car waiting to leave a regional fair parking lot when the opening of “Time” kicked in.  We had been talking through the first couple of songs, but as soon as the bells rang, my friend’s replies silenced and the volume climbed.  I knew Pink Floyd but I never really paid too much attention to their songs until my friend silently focused my attention on the introduction.  Specifically, I remember marveling at the seamless shifts in time, jumping in and out of half time without calling attention to the metrical shift.  From there, I started noticing all of the other details about the song – the dry guitar tone foiled by the languid keyboards, the soulful backing vocals, and the way reverb made the guitar solo feel like it was played in the middle of outer space.  I didn’t necessarily have the words to describe it, but I marveled from the back seat nonetheless.  It led me to an atypical introduction to the album – I ended up playing “Time” on repeat several times before delving into the whole album.  I wasn’t quite ready to delve into the album (and all of its associated mythology) until I was done with this single song. Eventually, I gave up on trying to figure out all of its tricks and took on the album as a whole.  While I often think of it as one extended suite of songs, I still think back to that moment where “Time” baffled me.

More on Pink Floyd: Allmusic | Amazon MP3 | Emusic | Last.fm