Tag Archives: rock

Descending On A Point Of Flame: Ten Underrated Pink Floyd Songs

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For all the praise endlessly heaped upon ‘Dark Side of The Moon’, ‘Wish You Were Here’ and ‘The Wall’, there are bits of the Pink Floyd back catalogue that never seem to get the attention they deserve. The release of the massive ‘Early Years’ box set in 2016 allowed for a much deeper exploration of the band’s pre-’Dark Side’ output via several discs’ worth of rare and unreleased gems, and yet it still feels as if there are things nestled within the band’s rich catalogue that never seem to get their full due.

Here are a few thoughts on some vastly underrated Pink Floyd recordings. Other fans can argue – and likely will – but these ten tunes often feel as if they deserve far more love.

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THE LARIMORES – Hail Mary EP

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At the close of 2019, Great Affairs man Denny Smith released an excellent solo album ‘From The Dark’. It’s choice of title was inspired by his receiving the all clear from a serious illness and its stripped down arrangements were a direct reaction to the amount of time the singer-songwriter had spent pondering life, the universe and everything during the writing and recording process. Despite the following year being sidelined by a global pandemic, Smith’s world trucked on, and The Great Affairs released ‘Everybody Moves, Nobody Gets Hurt’, an album of enjoyable retro rockers that very much showed the band taking a very much business as usual approach.

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VARIOUS ARTISTS – Riding The Rock Machine: British Seventies Classic Rock

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Ever since the CD boom of the 90s, the market has been flooded with easily affordable and easily accessible rock compilations. These sets, often adorned by artwork showing a guitar or having a car and open road theme have typically been aimed at the undemanding listener – the kind of person wishing to revisit the classic rock singles of their radio filled youth; the kind of person who’d happily listen to Thin Lizzy’s greatest hits in their car forever. You’d think the market would eventually run out of these people as their target market, and yet year after year, cheap comps featuring Thin Lizzy’s ‘Boys Are Back In Town’, Rainbow’s ‘Since You Been Gone’ and Free’s ‘All Right Now’ seem to fill supermarket shelves continually.

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THE END MACHINE – Phase 2

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The End Machine’s 2019 debut for Frontiers Records presented almost an hour’s worth of classic sounding hard rock. Its sound was exactly as you’d expect from a couple of musicians associated with Dokken and the ex-vocalist from Lynch Mob. It’s higher octane tracks gave George Lynch every opportunity to hammer his fretboard, while the darker and slower workouts put bassist Jeff Pilson squarely in the spotlight. Most importantly, a lot of the numbers wielded huge choruses to great effect, often giving vocalist Robert Mason (ex-Cry of Love/Warrant) plenty to work with. In terms of melodic metal, it was a great disc – certainly much better than Dokken had managed in a few years.

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