Rejecting the psychedelic clangs and embracing scratches of progressive rock would prove, ultimately, the successful period Pink Floyd was made for. They had pulled through A Saucerful of Secrets – the Syd Barrett-led rambles which tried to tie itself to the blues and rock influences of the time while also firing warning shots at Captain Beefheart – and landed on Ummagumma. As Pink Floyd records go, Ummagumma is not exactly remembered. It marks an hour and a half of the band bashing one another in clipped live recordings, boulder-pushing references to Sisyphus and extraordinary instrumental work from the soon-to-be pioneers, Roger Waters and David Gilmour. A pocket full of live appearances open Ummagumma, the old-hat sex slang title is viewed as lukewarm in hindsight. It is better not to trust the men choosing artificial intelligence works over hard craft when it comes to opinions on their own music. They have remastered it enough to lose insight.
Ummagumma remains a startling and delightful experience which pools the many influences of individual members. Infighting be damned. Each member is given a section to explore themselves and their outlook on the band at the time of their fourth album. In turn, it leads to fascinating evaluations of themselves, of their comrades in arms and of their live work before this release. Astronomy Domine and Set the Controls for the Heart of The Sun linger as fascinating opening works. It still gives off the feel of a thrown-together package searching for a home. But it is heartwarming to hear an album so at odds with itself, so creatively vibrant as it howls at and strikes through the core members. Those live slots are intense and electric – the proper way to listen to A Saucerful of Secrets is buried deep on Ummagumma. The late Richard Wright wins over listeners with his piano work on Sysyphus, particularly the heartbreaking quiet which comes through Pt. 2, a direct contrast to the loud and wailing detail of the live works preceding it.
He builds the confidence to incorporate those wilder cries and wails Barrett popularised in the earliest works of Pink Floyd but the gradual disassociation with this period reflects not a maturity but a shift in the works around the band at the time. Waters would find himself marching with the band at the front of the line but his additions here, the middling Grantchester Meadows and the dire documentary-like state of yelping animals on Several Species of Small Furry Animals Gathered Together in a Cave and Grooving with a Pict sounds almost mocking. It is up to David Gilmour to pick up the pieces, and not for the first time, with his work on The Narrow Way. Gilmour delivers the band’s biggest prog rock push on Ummagumma, a monumental change which casts away most of those flickering, maddening instrumentals.
Yet even with its dismissal they make a return and feature prominently in the hefty, space-age sounds of The Narrow Way, an instrumental beauty which paves the road to a liberated Nick Mason closer. Where the members now see their efforts as anything from pretentious to half-baked, the useful experiences they each come up with on their respective half-LP side is masterful. Ummagumma serves as a keen example of how talented the individual members of Pink Floyd are – and how these collective notions turned the band into a progressive rock titan. The Grand Vizier’s Garden Party serves as a wonderful conclusion to a project which in the hands of warring bandmates would have been dead on arrival. But it is a credit to each member pulling their own and stocking themselves with strong and innovative attempts, all of which hold up fifty-five years on.
