The Man and the Journey

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The Man and the Journey is the name of a conceptual music piece performed at Pink Floyd live shows in 1969. It consists of several of their early songs coupled with material that would appear on Soundtrack from the Film More and Ummagumma, as well as unreleased songs. The material was incorporated into two album-length suites, The Man and The Journey. The concerts also included visual performance elements such as the sawing and construction of a table and consumption of afternoon tea onstage.

The concept was first performed 14 April, 1969 at the Royal Festival Hall in a show billed as The Massed Gadgets of Auximenes - More Furious Madness from Pink Floyd. A truncated version of the show was recorded 12 May, 1969 for the Top Gear radio programme. The 17 September performance in Amsterdam is the most widely bootlegged of the shows on the tour because it was broadcast by radio station VPRO. Plans for an official live album release of The Man and the Journey were considered, but abandoned due to overlap of material with Ummagumma.

To most fans, the work is either entirely unknown or at least unrecognized as the genesis of Pink Floyd's 'themed pieces'. The band themselves have seldom made reference to it in later interviews. Yet the unique combination of quadraphonic sound effects, abstract program music, and recursive themes — all of which can be traced to The Man and The Journey — were to become further developed in the band's most enduring music.

[edit] Example track list (from the Amsterdam show, 1969)

Part I: The Man

  1. "Daybreak, Pt. I" ("Grantchester Meadows", from Ummagumma) – 8:09
  2. "Work" (Percussion and xylophone with musical sawing & hammering) – 3:50
  3. "Teatime" (Pink Floyd were served tea on stage at this point)
  4. "Afternoon" ("Biding My Time", from Relics) – 5:15
  5. "Doing It!" ("The Grand Vizier's Garden Party (Entertainment)" [6:12 onwards], from Ummagumma) – 3:49
  6. "Sleep" ("Quicksilver", from Soundtrack from the Film More) - 4:40
  7. "Nightmare" ("Cymbaline", from More) – 8:57
  8. "Daybreak, Pt. II" ("Grantchester Meadows" instrumental reprise) – 1:13

Part II: The Journey

  1. "The Beginning" ("Green Is the Colour", from Soundtrack from the Film More) – 4:49
  2. "Beset By Creatures of the Deep" ("Careful with That Axe, Eugene") – 6:18
  3. "The Narrow Way" ("The Narrow Way Pt. 3", from Ummagumma) – 5:09
  4. "The Pink Jungle" ("Pow R. Toc H.", from The Piper at the Gates of Dawn) – 4:49
  5. "The Labyrinths of Auximines" (Part of "Interstellar Overdrive", from The Piper at the Gates of Dawn) – 5:28
  6. "Behold the Temple of Light" – 6:14
  7. "The End of the Beginning" ("A Saucerful of Secrets, Pt. IV - Celestial Voices" [8:38 onwards], from A Saucerful of Secrets) – 6:34

[1]

Note, this is an example track listing only. Often, "Doing It" is cited as being "Up the Khyber", "Syncopated Pandemoneum" (part 2 of "A Saucerful of Secrets" - the first show of the tour featured this) or "Party Sequence". Sometimes, "The End of the Beginning" is cited to also include "Storm Signal," another part of "A Saucerful of Secrets."

[edit] Trivia

During a performance at the Royal Albert Hall in London, one of Pink Floyd's crew members dressed up in gorilla costume and began firing a cannon. This incident caused the management of the Royal Albert Hall to ban Pink Floyd from playing there. (This ban, if it actually occurred, was anything but permanent. Pink Floyd played the Royal Albert Hall again just seven months later.) The encore that night was Set the Controls for the Heart of the Sun.

[edit] References

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