Roger Waters
The first album I was ever given was Dark Side of the Moon. Used to go to the local record shop in the arcade and ask Dougie (the nearest thing we had to a Rock Star - long blond hair and oversized aviator sunglasses even in winter) to play side one, track 3, over and over again. Last night I listened to it played live. And all the rest. Sang along with every song, remembered every word of the lyrics. All the Alan Parsons embelishments (of course I'm mad. I know I'm mad. I've been mad for fucking years..."). All in glorious quadraphonic surround sound.
Curiously, I first encountered Quad about the same time as I discovered Floyd. UK stereo equipment manufacturer Quad were touring a demonstration version of their new development 'Quadraphonics' as a sort of public entertainment/lecture, and held one such session in the local technical college. What was most impressive was not so much the music (which was indeed very impressive) but the atmospherics - imagine a large, low-ceilinged room, completely utilitarian space, set with school chairs and hung with institutional drapes, utterly functional and inert. Now close your eyes, and listen. Around you, behind you, far away from you, you can hear the coughs and small sounds of a congregation taking their pews in a vast medieaval cathedral, echoing and stone-built, where every sound lingers and resonates in the ringing air. In front, the orchestra are settling into their spaces, adjusting music stands, plucking strings, clearing tubes.
And it was this, the spaces between the music, that showed the awesome power of Quad. That spare, square room was transformed, and I have been a hi-fi nut ever since. Needless to say, I rushed out and bought a quad-encoded copy of Pink Floyd's Wish You Were Here (not sure now if it was SQ or QS encoded) to re-experience this audio frontier. And with the same sad inevitability of many great inventions, Quad-encoded albums became a small footnote in the history of recording almost immediately thereafter.
So the fact that Roger Waters brought Quad sound to Dubai for the first time last night added a certain personal frisson to the event. And he did not disappoint. Initially, the sound was rather quiet and restrained, perhaps deliberately so in the light of what was to come. First set was a mixture of seminal Floyd and independent Waters - most of my favourite tracks from Wish You Were Here, stuff I hadn't heard like 'Leaving Beirut', all carefully and respectfully played. And it just kept getting better.
Set two was Dark Side of the Moon, in full. Simply wonderful. All present and correct, with all the necessary noises off and subliminal sound effects. Plenty of sound and fury, pyrotechnics and crashing jets, bubble lamps and dry ice. Never imagined that I would ever have the opportunity to see it performed live, yet here it was in all its glory. Last night I was a teenager again, standing in that record shop, with the volume control turned up to 11...
Curiously, I first encountered Quad about the same time as I discovered Floyd. UK stereo equipment manufacturer Quad were touring a demonstration version of their new development 'Quadraphonics' as a sort of public entertainment/lecture, and held one such session in the local technical college. What was most impressive was not so much the music (which was indeed very impressive) but the atmospherics - imagine a large, low-ceilinged room, completely utilitarian space, set with school chairs and hung with institutional drapes, utterly functional and inert. Now close your eyes, and listen. Around you, behind you, far away from you, you can hear the coughs and small sounds of a congregation taking their pews in a vast medieaval cathedral, echoing and stone-built, where every sound lingers and resonates in the ringing air. In front, the orchestra are settling into their spaces, adjusting music stands, plucking strings, clearing tubes.
And it was this, the spaces between the music, that showed the awesome power of Quad. That spare, square room was transformed, and I have been a hi-fi nut ever since. Needless to say, I rushed out and bought a quad-encoded copy of Pink Floyd's Wish You Were Here (not sure now if it was SQ or QS encoded) to re-experience this audio frontier. And with the same sad inevitability of many great inventions, Quad-encoded albums became a small footnote in the history of recording almost immediately thereafter.
So the fact that Roger Waters brought Quad sound to Dubai for the first time last night added a certain personal frisson to the event. And he did not disappoint. Initially, the sound was rather quiet and restrained, perhaps deliberately so in the light of what was to come. First set was a mixture of seminal Floyd and independent Waters - most of my favourite tracks from Wish You Were Here, stuff I hadn't heard like 'Leaving Beirut', all carefully and respectfully played. And it just kept getting better.
Set two was Dark Side of the Moon, in full. Simply wonderful. All present and correct, with all the necessary noises off and subliminal sound effects. Plenty of sound and fury, pyrotechnics and crashing jets, bubble lamps and dry ice. Never imagined that I would ever have the opportunity to see it performed live, yet here it was in all its glory. Last night I was a teenager again, standing in that record shop, with the volume control turned up to 11...
Labels: concert, Pink Floyd, Roger Waters
posted by EyeOnDubai at 9:55 pm
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