This first CD of “new” Pink Floyd music in 20 years (still without Roger Waters) was largely put together by David Gilmour, co-producer Phil Manzanera and latter-day PF engineer Andy Jackson, mostly as a tribute to the group’s underrated late keyboardist, Richard Wright (d. 2008), who appears on all but two of the 18 tracks. Entirely instrumental except for the final song—Gilmour and wife Polly Samson’s “Louder Than Words”—the disc is a pastiche of relatively brief melodies, grooves and ambient textures originally recorded in the early ’90s during sessions for The Division Bell, and revisited, augmented and polished recently. A lot of this will sound warmly familiar to fans—pieces that sound a bit like the intro to “Shine on You Crazy Diamond,” another that recalls the much earlier “Saucerful of Secrets,” etc. But it’s deftly constructed, majestic and genuinely moving in places, and still just weird enough to work as true Pink Floyd.
Producers: David Gilmour, Phil Manzanera, Youth, Andy Jackson; (Bob Ezrin, ’93 sessions). Engineered and mixed by Jackson with Damon Iddins; (Phil Taylor, ’93). Studios: Astoria, Britannia Row, Medina and Olympic (all UK).
