A fresh release of Live at Pompeii is delightful news. A Pink Floyd performance tipped as a career-best moment, perhaps the best of their performances pre-The Dark Side of the Moon. Fans do not have long to wait. What we do in the meantime is sift through the bootlegs and so-called director cuts, which feel more like leaks than releases. Live at Pompeii is the performance, sure, but a refresher, a tidier version, is not far off. For those who cannot wait to hear the remaster, or at least want a point of reference, this version is likely one of the best. Live at Pompeii in this form is not an immaculate experience, but it is the best you can get until an official release. Not long now. Even then, the heavy breathing which opens Live at Pompeii sets the scene.
There is a beauty to behold in the crackling, in the unmastered and spliced-sounding collection. It is how fans have listened to Live at Pompeii for decades and is worth experiencing at least once. Even without the visuals, which no doubt add to the performance, Live at Pompeii is an intense, incredible experience. Opener Echoes (Part I) is a thrill, an example of Pink Floyd at their lengthy progressive rock best, something Wish You Were Here would adapt so well. Slick instrumental work from David Gilmour follows on with Careful with that Axe, Eugene, somewhat of a surprise given his disdain for Ummagumma. It is a piece relied on in those pre-The Dark Side of the Moon days, though as an instrumental, it stands tall with the best of Pink Floyd’s work. It has that uncomfortable edge to it, a suggestive spirit which comes from whispered vocals and softer, slower tempo choices.
It is certainly of the times. Live at Pompeii sometime sounds like it should be backing a giallo horror film. The crashes of cymbals and whining, electronic thrills of Saucerful of Secrets eventually give way to an incredible moment for Nick Mason, smashing away at his kit and bringing the urgency to the band, lacking up to this moment for they chase the cooler instrumental grooves. An outstanding performance from Mason, the beating heart of Live at Pompeii. Rock is not dying, as the band puts it in one of the interviews spliced into Live at Pompeii. They spoke the truth and backed it up with a powerful performance of One of These Days. Instrumentally impressionable work which opened a whole other side to what progressive rock could do, what the psychedelic flickers of the previous decade could still offer. Innovation is the core of Live at Pompeii.
Chilling moments which feed into the surroundings, the magnitude of what occurred is matched by Pink Floyd’s earliest works. Their psychedelic-tinged pieces feel like they are woven into the fabric of the abandoned arena. Set The Controls for the Heart of the Sun feels transcendental, not just because of the instruments used but because of the knock-on effect. Pink Floyd explores their music with the backdrop of history influencing them and their live performance. Pompeii and Pink Floyd feels like a cosmic pairing where the music compliments the location and vice versa. There is a flicker of doubt, at times present when you wonder what the true effect of performing a song like Echoes or Set the Controls for the Heart of the Sun in abandoned venues is, but for the most part, Live at Pompeii is an inward-looking experience. A tremendous assessment of their work so far, an end to a chapter of interesting materials which, compared to what the band would accomplish just a few years later, feels more like a footnote.
